Little Pilgrim: A Novel

Ko Un

From Korea’s most revered author comes the tale of a small boy’s quest for enlightenment. Loosely following the last chapter of the Avatamsaka sutra, Little Pilgrim relates the heroic journey of Sudhana, who sets out on a grand adventure. Along the way, he encounters fifty-three teachers — including men, women, children, animals, and heavenly beings — as he travels mountains, valleys, deserts, and forests in his search for truth. A spiritual tale in the tradition of Siddhartha, this novel is now available to English audiences for the first time. A passionate and lively epic, Little Pilgrim takes its readers on a fantastical journey.

Born in 1933, Ko Un is acknowledged as Korea’s foremost contemporary poet. Following firsthand encounters with the horrors of war, he became a Buddhist monk and a Zen master, later leaving the order to become a full-time writer. In his native Korea, Ko Un has published over a hundred volumes of poetry, essays, fiction, and drama. He has been short listed for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2002 and 2004. Little Pilgrim is the first release of Ko Un’s fiction available in English.

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