The Nature of Things

I am a big fan of Han Kang's previous book, The Vegetarian , and so I was eager to read this new book. The White Book is quite a different kind of literature. It is quieter, more introspective and philosophical. At the same time, it is full to overflowing with human emotion. On one level, it is a memoir of the writer's elder sister who was born two months premature and died after only a couple of hours outside the womb. There is a devastating portrayal of the 22-year-old mother, alone and going into labor unexpectedly with no one around to help her. She does her best for her child but ultimately she cannot save her. This is the family tragedy that haunts the writer and her family throughout her life. That first baby, as well as the writer herself, were born in Korea, but, as we meet her, she has moved to a European city which is not immediately identified but eventually we recognize as Warsaw. It is a city that still bears the scars of World War II even as the writer bears ...

What a strange little book. I tried to think of something in my reading experience with which to compare it and the only thing that came to mind was Kafka's The Metamorphosis, but instead of waking up to find herself transformed into a giant insect, Yeong-hye awoke one morning from a troubled dream of blood and gore and cruelty and decides to give up the eating of all flesh; to become a vegetarian. For her avidly meat-eating family, a metamorphosis into a giant cockroach might have been preferable. They are appalled and outraged.  At a family gathering some time after she makes her decision, they try to force her to eat meat. Her brutal father slaps her twice and forces a piece of meat between her lips, but Yeong-hye manages to spit it out and then grabs a knife and slits her wrist. As her blood spurts out, the only one who comes to her aid is her brother-in-law, while her parents, her husband, sister, brother, and sister-in-law look on. What is wrong with these people? Well, a lot...