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The Story of Nol-boo[1] is a well known Korean novel written during the Yi Dynasty in Korea.
Story
editThe novel centers around a perverse man called Nol-boo. An organ filled with vice (simsulbo) protruded from under his left rib cage. He is the most greedy, perverse and heartless character in Korean literature.[1]
Among his listed favorite activities are:
- dancing at a funeral
- killing a dog during a birthing
- forcing excrement into the mouth of a crying baby
- fanning the flames of a burning house
- taking a debtors wife as payment
- grabbing the nape of an elderly man
- relieving himself in a well
- poking holes in rice paddies
- driving stakes through green pumpkins
- stomping on the back of a hunchback
- pushing down on a man squatting to relieve himself to cause him to sit in his own excrement
- kicking the chin of a disabled man
- wielding a stick at a dealer in pottery
- stealing bones from graves
- breaking an engagement by spreading malicious rumors
- scuttling a ship in high seas
- punching a boil on a man's face
- slapping the cheek of a man with a toothache, and
- opening the lid of a neighbors bean sauce jar in the rain.
He was rich, but miserly. Instead of making real offerings to his ancestors, he wrote words on pieces of paper.
He had a brother, named Hung-boo, who was his opposite, poor but good-natured. One day, Hung-boo found a swallow with a broken leg. He cared for the swallow and in the late summer the swallow flew south with its family. The next spring the swallow returned and dropped a gourd seed to him. He planted the seed in his thatch and it was soon groaning with the weight of the gourds. In the autumn, he and his wife used a saw to open the gourds, which were packed with jewelry and gold.
When Nol-boo heard about it, his simsulbo ("a bag of perverseness") began to ache. He caught a swallow, broke its leg and tied it with splints. The bird flew to the south and returned with a seed the next year. However, out of Nol-boo's gourds emerged monsters that kicked his buttocks, yanked his beard and sapped his wealth. One gourd spewed excrement on him when it was opened.
Versions
editThe tale has been retold in several mediums.
In modern versions, Hung-boo is given greater prominence, [2] and the simsulbo is not mentioned.
A Flash version was posted on Newgrounds.com in 2007.[3]
The online game MapleStory has quests related to the tale.[4]
A 1959 film named "Heungbuwa Nolbu" was made in South Korea.[5]
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ a b Choe, Sang-Hun; Christopher Torchia (2002). How Koreans Talk. Korea: UnhengNamu. pp. 272–273. ISBN 8987976955.
- ^ Roberson, Dongwol Kim; Jeong-Hee Suh (2009). Two Korean Brothers: Hungboo & Nolboo. GLPI. ISBN 8993074100.
- ^ Ezekiel Artbow (kyleartbow) (2007). "Hungboo and Nolboo" (swf). Newgrounds.com. Retrieved 2011-08-31.
- ^ "Opening Nolbu's Gourd". MapleWiki. Retrieved 1 September 2011.
- ^ "Heungbuwa Nolbu (1959)". Internet Movie Database. Retrieved 1 September 2011.
- ^ Yi, Ŭng-ho (1996). The story of Hungbu and Nolbu: a Korean folktale. Mondo. ISBN 9781572551398. Retrieved 1 September 2011.