Ju Won-kyu

Joo Won-gyu (; born 1975) is a South Korean novelist, screenwriter, and pastor.

He serves as the director of the Institute for Shared Culture, focusing on everyday art, cultural discoveries, and small-group Bible studies. Best known for his socially conscious fiction and crime dramas, Joo won the 14th Hankyoreh Literary Award for his novel A Cruel History of an Outsider Race. His other notable novels include Bad God, The Watchtower, Anti-Human Declaration, and A Christmas Carol, alongside youth fiction such as Hideout. His non-fiction works span essays, cultural criticism—such as Sanctuary and Babel—and theological studies, including translating The Talmud closest to the original source as a researcher of Jewish texts.

As a screenwriter, he wrote the 2017 tvN drama series Argon and Disney+ Gangnam B-Side. Since 2017, he has been represented by the writer's agency Writer of Finecut (WAF).

Early life Joo was born in 1975 in Seoul to a devout Buddhist mother, though he converted to Christianity during his third year of elementary school. His adolescence involved significant turbulence. During middle school, he became a target of school bullies and was forced into the role of a "bread shuttle." To protect himself, he aligned with a group of delinquents and became a subordinate to the school gang leader. His teenage years involved frequent disciplinary issues, to the point where school authorities ultimately recommended that he drop out.

His entry into literature began modestly. Joo began writing novels at age eighteen in high school, receiving encouraging feedback from peers that inspired him to continue. Despite this early passion, he initially pursued a technical path, enrolling in engineering school. However, he felt continually drawn back to writing by a persistent personal momentum. He spent his time isolating himself in the library to read books outside his major, eventually dropping out because the field did not align with his goals.

Career

As writer Joo Won-kyu won the 14th Hankyoreh Literary Award in 2009 for his novel A Cruel History of an Outsider Race, beating 211 competitors. From the preliminary judging stages, the work received praise for its bold settings, compelling characters, and provocative themes. The judges noted that Joo appeared to operate outside the traditional university creative writing establishment. While they identified flaws such as rough prose and structural echoes of films and video games, they concluded these did not diminish his narrative competence or the raw energy of the book, prompting the panel to remark, "I wonder who this person is."

That same year, Joo was ordained as a minister and founded a church, beginning a tenure in pastoral leadership that lasted seven years. Following his literary debut, he maintained a prolific output across multiple genres, including full-length novels, cultural criticism, autobiographies, interviews, youth novels, and fairy tales, publishing more than twenty books. Drawing on his academic background in engineering, he has also occasionally worked as an electrician.

In 2015, after losing contact with twenty runaway teenagers he had previously counseled, Joo tracked them to a nightclub district in Gangnam. To locate them, he spent six months working undercover inside a Gangnam club, eventually reconnecting with most of the youths. He discovered that many of the young men were working as guards or hosts, while most of the young women were trapped in prostitution. Despite his intervention, he was unable to convince them to leave. Since 2017, Joo has been represented by the writer's agency Writer of Finecut (WAF).

On December 7, 2022, at the Yong Film Night event, it was announced that veteran director Kim Jee-woon and director Park Bo-ram would co-direct an OTT series tentatively titled Mangnaein, adapted from the crime novel Second Sister by Hong Kong author Chan Ho-kei. The series is produced by Yong Film in collaboration with Anthology Studio and SK Global. In 2023, Joo announced via social media that he serves as the screenwriter for the adaptation.

Saeum 2010-01-15

2010-07-31 2011

2011-12-08 2012

Consonants and Vowels 2012-01-03 2015

Hankyoreh Publishing House 2015.03.16. 2016

Consonants and Vowels 2016-12-20

Humanities Academy 2017-01-25

New 2017-09-20

Neofiction 2019-02-25

Seo Yoojae 2019-10-30

Consonants and Vowels 2019-11-07 2020

2020-02-26 2021

2021-06-10 2022

Neofiction 2022-01-25 2023

Floating 2023-03-10 Audio books YearTitleProducerPublication Date English Korean 2021Talmud: Today, like the first day, like the last day Mari Books 2021-08-02

Filmography Film +Film creditYearTitleCredited as English Korean Original WriterScreenwriterCreator 2022 Christmas Carol 2023 Asura: The War of the Beehair

Series +Series(s) creditYearTitleNetworkCredited as English Korean Original Writer Screenwriter Creator 2017Argon tvN 2019 The Lies Within OCN 2024 Gangnam B-Side Disney+ 2026 Unfriend TVING Gwangju Daily Literary Award 2006 Short Story Knife 2009 Novel A Cruel History of an Outsider Race