Returning home – the last journey of Isang Yun
This past November marked the 30th anniversary of the death of German–Korean composer Isang Yun. A pioneer of avant-garde music, Yun left Korea in 1956 to study in Paris and Berlin and later premiered groundbreaking works in Darmstadt and Donaueschingen. His life took a dramatic turn in 1967, when he was abducted from West Berlin by South Korean agents, accused of espionage, tortured and sentenced to life imprisonment in Seoul. An international campaign supported by more than 200 prominent artists, such as Igor Stravinsky and Herbert von Karajan, finally secured his release in 1969. Returning to West Berlin, where he obtained German citizenship, Yun rose to prominence, celebrated for masterfully weaving traditional Korean music through the lens of Western avant-garde technique. Upon his death on 3 November 1995, he was laid to rest in a grave of honour in Berlin. Yet one wish remained unfulfilled: he had always longed to return to his homeland.
Twenty-three years later, while I was living in South Korea, I was asked to help bring Isang Yun home. My initial reaction was scepticism. Wasn’t he also a German composer, having built his entire career in Germany? Was he not buried alongside figures such as Mendelssohn and Bruch in an honoured Berlin grave? But a moving conversation with his widow, Sooja Lee, and an earnest appeal from Kim Dong-Jin, the mayor of Tongyeong (Yun’s birthplace) convinced me. This was about fulfilling a final wish. I began navigating Berlin’s notorious bureaucracy, securing permissions and researching the intricate logistics of transporting human remains across continents.
Yun had been interred in an old-fashioned metal urn. After 23 years underground, would it even hold together? And that was only the first worry. How would airport security and immigration authorities react? Beyond the practical hurdles, there were also political sensitivities: in Korea, Yun remained a controversial figure, at times the subject of fierce debates and even demonstrations.
His final journey began with a ceremony on a brisk, chilly February morning in 2018. About 70 people gathered at his Berlin graveside. After a brief address by the Korean Ambassador, a cemetery officer in a dusty black suit opened the plot, retrieved the urn and handed it to Yun’s daughter. She led a quiet procession towards the cemetery hall, flanked by a large press corps eager to know what would become of the ashes. I was grateful to go unnoticed.
Earlier that morning, I had received a frantic call from the Korean Embassy. Was this “operation” really proceeding? What would happen to the urn? Did I have authorisation from President Moon? Unsure who had actually approved the plans, I simply lied: yes, of course, the presidential office had given its consent.
At the hall, the procession halted abruptly. Staff took the urn inside and closed the doors. Later, they returned “Mr Yun” to me in a new urn made of corn granulate, which is biodegradable and discreet for travel. And so, we embarked together on Isang Yun’s final journey. First, we visited his favourite Italian restaurant in Charlottenburg. In the afternoon, we took a high-speed train to Munich, where his celebrated opera Sim Tjong premiered at the Bayerische Staatsoper in 1972, and from there, we began the long trip home to Asia.
On the plane, a haunting symmetry struck me: we were flying with the same airline, Japan Airlines, on the same route Yun had taken when he was kidnapped in 1967… This time, however, he travelled in the comfort of Business Class.
Miraculously, aside from a brief check at Munich Airport, no one paid any attention to my distinguished companion, and the trip proceeded smoothly. The mayor, fearing protests, had sent an unmarked police car to meet us at Busan Airport for the final leg to Tongyeong, but the journey was quiet, almost serene.
We arrived at City Hall in the late afternoon. There, the mayor and Yun’s widow, now 91, were waiting. Words cannot truly capture the moment she received her husband after so many years. Everyone wept, and one could only imagine the memories that came flooding back.
Florian Riem
