Upon graduating, Yang was hired as a professor at Pyongyang Soongsil School (숭실전문학교; 崇實專門學校) but had to leave when it closed during the Japanese colonial period.
In 1923, he issued the journal Geum-Seong (금성) with Yoo Yeop (유엽), Baek Giman (백기만), and Lee Janghui(이장희) and introduced the literary movements from other countries.
Some exemplary poets presented in ‘’Geum-Seong’’ include French Symbolists Charles Baudelaire, Paul Verlaine, and Arthur Rimbaud.
[4] ‘’Geumseong’’ also published a number of original poems by Korean poets, which aided in the development of modern poetry in 1920s’ Korea.
[6] This eclectic perspective first emerges in his article “The Attitude of a Literary Critic (문예비평가의 태도 기타)”, and evolves into a structural perspective in “Regarding the Attitude of Literary Critics Once More (다시 문예비평의 태도에 취하야).”[7] Yang’s turned his eyes to traditional Korean literature in the 1930s.
Yang, in response to this, argued that the idea of creative liberty in translations evoked the danger of distorting the original meaning of the text.
When the Japanese linguist Shinpei Ogura published A Study of Hyangga and Idu in 1929, Yang felt the need for a Korean to research this canonical text.
[14] Yang's main point in his criticisms was that Ogura dismissed the importance of meter and rhythm when interpreting Hyanggas.Yang believed that preserving the rhythmic element of the verses was crucial to delivering the poetic form of the original works.
Nevertheless, his work was a dominant achievement in Korea's initial study on Hyanggas, and his exceptional use of poetic forms was seldom challenged by those in the field.
With Korea subject to Japanese colonial rule, scholars of both perspectives deemed the main objective of literature to be a restoration of national authority, but they diverged in their views on how to achieve this goal.
While nationalists opted for emphasis on the text itself, preferring works that reflected national spirit, proletarianists asserted that literature must inspire a political message.
[18] In 1927, Singanhoe was founded with the objective of discovering a way to develop and study literature in a manner that embraced both nationalist and proletarian values.
Yang, who was a member of Singanhoe, claimed that to recover the nation's subjectivity, both perspectives had to be modified to tackle their deficiencies.
[20] His idea that literature reflects historical problems and responsibilities criticized the nationalist scholars who underestimated the influence of the social elements.
[21] Today, Yang's perspective is viewed as instrumental in detecting and modifying the then-current ideologies' limitations to suit modern needs.