Yi’s award winning "The Poet and The Thief" was incorporated into a larger novel, "The Poet", which is available in an English translation by Brother Anthony. It is the novelized biography of Kim Pyong-yon whose grandfather was executed as a traitor. Punishment for such a crime extended over three generations.  Kim’s death sentence was commuted but he and his remaining family (like Yi's family) lost the privileges of their former high status. In a story well known to Korean’s, he had entered a poetry contest without acknowledging (or in other accounts without knowing) his true identity, wrote a poem critical of his grandfather and was declared the winner. However, the guilt of that betrayal led him to eventually take up the life of a wandering poet.  As he went from village to village, he exchanged poems for food and shelter. In his travels, he wore a large bamboo hat as protection from sun and rain (or in some accounts as a symbol of his shame). Thus, he became known as Kim SakGat (or Kim Bamboo Hat). As depicted in this narrative, his poems, which often ridiculed the ruling elite, were a work of genius but were somehow lacking in authenticity.  A chance encounter with a Taoist poet known as the Old Drunkard leads to a transformation described by Brother Anthony, as a vision that "poetry has nothing at all to do with words, techniques, or themes, but with being". The poet achieves harmony with nature and at times is seen to "vanish behind clouds and mist". Peter Lee noted that this imagery is recurrent in Korean poetry and represents the highest praise for a poet-recluse in a Buddhist or Taoist context.