INCHEON — Korean literature’s growing international recognition must be matched by sustained translation funding and greater autonomy, translators said Thursday, warning that global success cannot rest on individual passion. Speaking at “Translation: Text in Transit,” an international colloquium organized by the National Museum of World Writing Systems, Debora Smith, Anton Hur and Choi Mi-kyung called for support that enables translators to discover overlooked works while defending the human judgment behind literary translation. Smith, who translated the 2016 Man Booker International Prize “The Vegetarian” by Han Kang, recalled choosing to learn Korean when its literature was barely available in British bookstores. “Now it’s a completely different story. I see Korean literature and translation everywhere,” she said. Smith and Hur emphasized that the breakthrough reflected years of work by translators across many languages, rather than a single award or author. Han’s Nobel Prize, Hur said, arrived amid Korean literature’s ascent, not before it. Hur, whose translations