A Stanford Professor and winner of the 2013 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction, Adam Johnson will read from his novel, The Orphan Master’s Son, w followed by a seminar on trauma narratives.

The Orphan Master’s Son, set in North Korea, explores the depths of this totalitarian state in which being human is a citizen’s biggest challenge. In a place where even emotions are dictated by the Dear Leader’s oppressive national narrative, Johnson takes the reader into the intimate space of a man named Jun Do, who dangerously transcends this country’s psychological and physical boundaries to understand what it means to feel real love.  

In addition to beautiful prose and breathtaking storyline, The Orphan Master’s Son offers an unprecedented window into the politics, history, and culture of North Korea’s closed, mysterious world. In the seven years he spent researching the book, Johnson not only read widely about the country, he also interviewed defectors. And, in his attempt to give as much verisimilitude to his fictional setting as possible, he traveled to North Korea in 2007.

 After the reading sections from the book during his visit at Georgia Tech, Johnson will take questions from the audience regarding his research, writing process, and trip to North Korea. A book signing will follow.

The reading is ponsored by The School of Literature, Media, and Communication (LMC) Speaker Series and cosponsored by Liberty in North Korea (LINK), The Sam Nunn School of International Affairs (INTA), The School of Modern Languages, The School of History, Technology, and Society (HTS), and The Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts (IAC).