This article attempts to explore in detail some major themes of The Innocent (1968) written by Richard E. Kim who has been hailed as one of the forerunners of Korean American literature. It argues that based on the military coup d`etat in 1961, Kim`s second novel can be best read not as a political novel, but as an epistemological story in which the protagonist learns much about the human existence. Among the things he learns as an Army officer who joins the coup against the civilian government is the nature of good and evil. Evil is ubiquitous like a misty fog that can be almost tangible wherever the protagonist goes. He also comes to the recognition that good and evil are so intricately mixed that they cannot be easily entangled; in the process of getting rid of evil, good is also necessarily hurt. In addition, The Innocent deals with its corollary theme of conflicts between the ideal and the actual. However, Richard E. Kim fails in writing a convincing metaphysical novel. In many scenes of the novel, he is more interested in `telling` than `showing.` In conclusion, The Innocent falls short of Kim`s first novel, The Martyred (1964), and the third novel, Lost Names (1970).
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