Cho Byung-hwa

Cho's academic career began with his 1959 appointment to Kyunghee University, where he rose to become dean of the graduate school of education.

One finds it, for example, punctuating the simple couplets that describe the humdrum tourist scene in "The Toksu Palace": Cho has been lauded as a poet who tore down the notion that modern poetry must be obscure and won the sympathy of many readers by his candid expression in everyday language of the sentiments and experiences of his own life.

For some critics, however, his vision is too self-centered and pays scant attention to the social or political dimensions underlying the realities he describes.

Thus the critical reception of his poetry divides between admiration of its harmony while noting that it lacks innovation or much striving after aesthetic quality for its own sake.

The sheer volume of his published work, which includes 44 poetry collections among his 130 books, coupled with a lack of much variety or overall dramatic development there, has probably done him a disservice.