Another commentator addresses the many possible interpretations of what is in essence a simple situation. It has been asked whether Kim Sowol was not being self-indulgent in writing melancholy ditties in the context of the Japanese occupation of Korea. One answer has been that turning his back on experimenting with foreign literary styles, in order to engage with traditional forms in “the purest Korean", and that at a time when the language was under attack from the Japanese and occasionally banned, was a form of cultural resistance. Moreover, some even see the poem as a coded reference to the Japanese presence and an anticipation of their departure.