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The Aquariums of Pyongyang: Ten Years in the North Korean Gulag

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"Destined to become a classic" (Iris Chang, author of The Rape of Nanking), this harrowing memoir of life inside North Korea was the first account to emerge from the notoriously secretive country -- and it remains one of the most terrifying. Amid escalating nuclear tensions, Kim Jong-un and North Korea's other leaders have kept a tight grasp on their one-party state, quashing any nascent opposition movements and sending all suspected dissidents to its brutal concentration camps for "re-education." Kang Chol-Hwan is the first survivor of one of these camps to escape and tell his story to the world, documenting the extreme conditions in these gulags and providing a personal insight into life in North Korea. Sent to the notorious labor camp Yodok when he was nine years old, Kang observed frequent public executions and endured forced labor and near-starvation rations for ten years. In 1992, he escaped to South Korea, where he found God and now advocates for human rights in North Korea. Part horror story, part historical document, part memoir, part political tract, this book brings together unassailable firsthand experience, setting one young man's personal suffering in the wider context of modern history, giving eyewitness proof to the abuses perpetrated by the North Korean regime. Read more

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Basic Books; 7/25/05 edition (August 24, 2005)


Language ‏ : ‎ English


Paperback ‏ : ‎ 238 pages


ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0465011047


ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 49


Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 10.9 ounces


Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.5 x 0.75 x 8.25 inches


Best Sellers Rank: #252,403 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #27 in North Korean History #115 in General Asia Travel Books #7,428 in Memoirs (Books)


#27 in North Korean History:


#115 in General Asia Travel Books:


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Top Amazon Reviews

    • Very, Very Vital Reading
My reading of human-rights literature is a little slender, but THE AQUARIUMS OF PYONGYANG ranks as one of the best I've thus far discovered. The symbolism of the title is one of the only real literary devices on display here (and it is both apt and effectively used); otherwise this very straightforward account of a family and a childhood turned inside out by the absolute moral corruption of the North Korean regime is a dry, devastating and informative read. Kang's writing successfully balances between the matter-of-fact and a conversational informality that manages do almost accomplish the impossible: to have not experienced the politics and controls of North Korea, I don't think any of us could truly see the world through his eyes, but he does manage to get close enough to make this a scary piece of literature, and an enraging one for anyone who cares about the state of human rights, which would hopefully be all of us. Throughout, I was reminded specifically of the late Dr. Haing Ngor's A CAMBODIAN ODYSSEY. Dr. Ngor survived the atrocities of the Khmer Rouge years in Cambodia, only to subsequently gain fame in the west through the film "The Killing Fields;" a powerful film greatly overshadowed by the grim detail of his own autobiographical account. THE AQUARIUMS OF PYONGYANG is very similar - both in the undeniability of Ngor and Kang's repective insistence upon levels of human dignity that most of us take for granted, and in the parallels between the two nations. The current state of affairs in North Korea inspires very little hope; this updated edition of this book provides a link to the website of the NGO organized by Kang, and this resource is valuable - this must-read book is only the beginning, in many ways. I will state that I am a cynic and a skeptic about just about everything that I read and hear; and I came away from this book firmly convinced that it's author is one of today's more heroic figures, and that this book is absolutely essential. -David Alston ... show more
Reviewed in the United States on December 28, 2006 by David Alston
    • A painstaking account of prison life
This is a thoughtful and well-detailed account of life in a gulag, told by a defector who originally was released from the prison. I was surprised by the level of detail surrounding the daily life of a prisoner in North Korea and recommend this book if you are interested in a small but important aspect of North Korean life. The author did not start or end the book in prison; rather, he gave the book some context by showing how he wound up in the gulag. It is this context that is very important because the author implies that the road to the gulag can be as arbitrary and bizarre as the people who run it. The reader learns early on that family is a core aspect of life in North Korea, and the book's development and breakdown of human bonds in prison is the work's greatest strength. Of course, this is a memoir about a secretive country so there is little that can be done to fact-check a literary work like this one. Even the author admits that many of the stories he heard about other people were based upon a lot of hearsay. One could also sense the palpable hatred that the author had for the North Korean government, which is understandable given what he went through. The painstaking level of detail in this work makes it very credible as well as informative. ... show more
Reviewed in the United States on September 21, 2010 by Normjunior
    • superb
I loved this memoir. The telling from such young age, with its honesty of a child’s perspective was so unique. This is a tragedy for this nation, and sad that time has not been able to improve their lives.
Reviewed in the United States on January 8, 2025 by Crazy woman
    • A disturbing look into the world's last Stalinist country........
Aquariums of Pyongyang is the story of one man's life through ten years of captivity in a North Korean gulag....an incredible story of struggle against man's inhumanity to man. Many who read this book will probably view his family as highly naive for leaving Japan for North Korea and in believing North Korean propaganda over what they heard firsthand from people who had been there. On the docks before leaving, they were warned about going back and about the conditions to be found in North Korea. But, the elder family members were ardent supporters of Kim Il-Sung, and believed the propaganda put out on a daily basis. Little did they know they were putting their kids into a deathtrap from which they would have to endure many years of beatings and privation at the hands of the guards. The reeducation lessons are particularly noteworthy, as readers can gain valuable insight into how this regime works. Even dead people were not immune from being used to inculcate hate.....the picture of the prisoners being forced to throw rocks at the people hanging on the gallows (because they were enemies of the state no less!) until they were unrecognizable is one of the most chilling things I have ever read. All in the name of propping up one of the worst ideologies the world has ever known. It should be noted that while Yodok was (and is) a terribly inhumane place, it is by the author's account, one of the lesser concentration camps in terms of harsh brutality. This being the case, I could not imagine even a short life in one of the more harsh gulags. This is a book of required reading for anyone who thinks gulags and concentration camps went away with the demise of Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin. ... show more
Reviewed in the United States on July 5, 2006 by Brian

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