KOREA - Stanley Gibbons Japan & Korea 2008

Published by Stanley Gibbons. 665pp. Colour. English

Inc booklets, miniature sheets, Chinese and Japanese post offices, North Korean occupation of South Korea, Indian Custodian Forces in Korea, Japan

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Philatelic Exporter review, courtesy of David Rennie (July 2008):

Major improvements in this issue, mean the catalogue page extent jumps from 409pp to 665pp, and all of these now in full colour. The text has been reset though this does mean the earlier tabular listings for different perforations are now back in the single column listing style.; In addition to all the colour illustrations, a number of early illustrations have been re-screened, but these are still in black and white.

It's 11 years since the last edition and new issues for Japan, (80 extra pages), are now listed up to March 2007, for South Korea, (40 extra), to the end of 2006, and for North Korea, (45 extra), to January 2007.

The Japanese Prefecture stamps are now fully listed and illustrated, occupying some 60pp. They are organised chronologically within each Prefecture, but since the prefecture name only shows in Japanese on the stamp, a Japanese index of names would have been helpful.;;

The Japanese Occupation issues of World War 2 issued in China and South East Asia have now been included, occupying some 30pp.

There is now a design index for Japan, but the style and design of many Japanese stamps make this a difficult area, and the user may need to use some lateral thinking when using it. Consideration for providing indexes for both the Korean sections could be undertaken, but the problems here are not so difficult since most stamps from both areas since the 1960s have a date somewhere in their design.

The whole of the Japanese section occupies some 340 catalogue pages, and the Korea section 320+ catalogue pages, so serious consideration of whether to publish the next edition of this volume in two parts must be undertaken, especially if it is eleven years away!

With such a large time interval between publication dates, there is little point in comparing prices.; Suffice to say, these have been fully amended to reflect today's market levels.