culture

The June 4 Literature Prize, instituted in March 1982, is an award for working people and students who created literary works with excellent ideological and artistic qualities.

The most outstanding novels, poems, children’s stories and plays are selected on the occasion of June 4 every year among literary works written and published in that year, and the authors of those works are awarded the prize.

The June 4 Literature Prize has nurtured people’s ambition for literary creation and greatly inspired creative enthusiasm in many people.

Literary correspondents are tutored by writers of the regional committees of the writers’ union and take an intensive short course every year.

The prize is awarded to common workers, farmers and office workers in the DPRK.

The first winner of the June 4 Literature Prize was Ju Ok Yang, a worker at the Ryongsong Machine Complex, who composed the poem “I Will Climb Mt Paektu Everywhere” which is still loved by the people across the country.

Among the literature prize winners are a young farm girl in Yangdok County, a boiler attendant at the Kusong Textile Mill, a middle school teacher and a special-class honoured disabled soldier who lost both legs and one arm.

Many common people including workers, farmers and office workers have been awarded the prize and became prominent educators and writers.

In the DPRK, anyone who truly loves labour and has a high ambition and zeal for literary creation, irrespective of who they are and where they work, can be a literary correspondent and a winner of the prize and bring their hopes and talents into full bloom.