An, Soo-hyun is an aesthetician trained in Japanese classical literature, who has traversed the aesthetic traditions of Korea and Japan in pursuit of the origins of poetry and the archetypes of beauty. His scholarly journey has not remained confined to the study; rather, he has wandered through the forest of fixed-verse traditions, seeking the sensibilities embedded in sijo, waka, and haiku.
He currently serves as a research fellow at the Institute of Humanities at Busan Catholic University, while also holding positions as Secretary-General of the Korea Haiku Federation and Chair of the Foreign Literature Criticism Division of the Busan Writers’ Association. Through these roles, he reinterprets the long-standing resonances of East Asian poetics in the language of the present.
Standing at the boundary of sijo, where difference and reception, opposition and coexistence intersect, he draws forth the aesthetic archetypes that permeate literature. Along this path, he has explored the possibilities for the modern restoration and narrative expansion of sijo as an art form.
His major works include The Poetics of Fujiwara no Teika: A Lyrical Poet of Yojō and Yōen, Dreaming of Yūshin (2016), Sijo Translation and Renaissance (2023), and Four Great Masters of Modern Korean Sijo (2025). In addition, through seventeen translated volumes—including The Long Night of the Winter Solstice: 100 Classical Sijo (2016), 100 Poems of Park Mok-wol: Centennial Edition (2016), The Melody of Two (2019), Morning of Wild Grasses (2019), and From Sijo to Haiku (2020)—he has built a literary bridge connecting tradition and modernity, as well as Korea and Japan.
Even today, he continues to build bridges across the river of sijo, striving through both creative and critical practice to discover new possibilities of beauty shimmering on the far shore.
