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I traveled to visit family in North Carolina last week and I was happy to find out that people still like to talk about books. I packed my e-reader with its dozens of novels, nonfiction and poetry—and also a slim novel that I was reading: The Vegetarian by Han Kang, this year’s Nobel laureate in literature. In 2016, the book (its English translation) won the Man Booker International Prize for fiction.
In my routine commutes on the CTA, I often see people reading on their phones or e-readers (which of course I do too occasionally). But it frustrates me because I can’t tell what they are reading. I want to see that book cover! And on my recent trip, it was in fact the book cover that started several conversations.
As I sat at the gate at O’Hare waiting to board, the man next to me asked if I was a vegetarian. No, I said, just reading a novel. That started a discussion, which ended sadly with him telling me that his girlfriend reads books but he hadn’t read a book in years. On the plane that day (one of those 50-seaters), the woman next to me was fascinated and wanted to know the story of the book. On my return trip, our flight to Chicago was delayed for several hours and several people sitting near me at the airport wanted to know about the book. The title, obviously, was tantalizing. A couple of people thought it was a cookbook. No, not at all, I said, thinking that Han Kang’s story would at the very least discourage you from snacking while you read. When the plane finally departed, I sat next to a radiologist going to the massive annual Chicago radiology conference. He had heard of Han Kang and knew about the book, but hadn’t read it. I finished it on the plane and told him I highly recommended it.
The Vegetarian is a story told in three distinct acts and voices. The first is told in first person, in the stern voice of Mr. Cheong, who is married to Yeong-hye. She has a violent dream about human cruelty that convinces her that she will not eat meat or dairy again (actually she becomes a vegan), he’s furious because that means the meals she cooks for him will be meatless. That part of the story (and her father’s vicious treatment when she refuses to eat meat) illustrates the misogynistic Korean culture (the book is set in modern-day Seoul).
Part two, told in third person, is the story of Yeong-Hye’s brother-in-law, an unnamed artist and videographer married to her sister, In-hye. Tempted and intrigued by his sister-in-law and her refusal to eat much of anything, he plans a dazzling video art-piece based on his painting Yeong-hye’s nude body all over with luminously colored flowers and floral imagery. She agrees and as the plan progresses, he adds a friend who agrees to be the painted male model and encourages them to engage in sexual activity while he films it. At the end of that section, Yeong-Hye is described like this: “She thrust her glittering golden breasts over the veranda railing. Her legs were covered with scattered orange petals and she spread them wide as if she wanted to make love to the sunshine, to the wind.”
Part three is also written in third person but focuses on In-hye, whose sole concern is now her sister’s health and mental state. Yeong-hye is now confined to a psychiatric hospital. Among other treatments, she is force-fed with a tube inserted in her nose. (That reminded me of the descriptions of the Price sisters being force-fed in the excellent book, Say Nothing by Patrick Radden Keefe, about the IRA in Belfast during the Troubles. It’s now been filmed as a mini-series on Hulu. I highly recommend the book but the series is well done too.)
The Vegetarian is just 183 pages. The three sections are not divided into chapters, but each section is divided by blank spaces between sections. In part three, many of them begin like this: “Time passes.” And so it does as In-hye fights to save her sister and sustain her own life and that of her son Ji-Woo.
Kang’s book is written in a minimalist style but she often focuses on nature with descriptions of trees, sun, shadow and water. The book is not an easy read; I found myself rereading paragraphs now and then because of their intensity or beauty. The book is troubling but excellent and worth reading.
Han Kang is author of ten other novels published in Korean. Those that are available in English are Greek Lessons, The White Book, Human Acts and We Do Not Part.
The Vegetarian by Han Kang is available from the publisher, local bookshops and online booksellers.