South Korean Novelist Han Kang won Nobel Literature Prize

Han Kang, the acclaimed South Korean author of The Vegetarian, has won the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature, making her the first South Korean writer to receive the prestigious award. Recognized for her “intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life,” Han’s work has captivated readers worldwide with its unflinching examination of both personal and collective suffering.

At 53, Han’s literary journey began with poetry before she transitioned to prose in 1995. Her novel The Vegetarian, which earned the Man Booker International Prize in 2016, remains one of her most recognized works. The novel delves into the inner turmoil of a woman who chooses to adopt a “plant-like” existence in response to harrowing nightmares about human cruelty. As the novel opens, a male narrator reflects, “Before my wife turned vegetarian, I’d always thought of her as completely unremarkable in every way.”

Han’s exploration of deeply human questions resonates across her body of work. A character in her 2019 novel Europa poses a striking inquiry: “If you were able to live as you desire, what would you do with your life?”

Announcing the prize, the Swedish Academy praised Han for her “unique awareness of the connections between body and soul, the living and the dead,” and her ability to blend “poetic and experimental style” to innovate in contemporary prose.

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Anna-Karin Palm of the Nobel Committee urged new readers to start with Han’s Human Acts, a 2014 novel that grapples with the trauma of South Korea’s 1980 Gwangju Uprising. “Human Acts shows how the living and the dead are always intertwined and how these kinds of traumas stay in a population for generations,” Palm said.

Despite the heavy themes, Han’s “tender, precise prose” offers a kind of consolation in the face of historical violence, Palm added. “Her writing becomes a counterforce to the brutal noisiness of power.”

The Nobel Prize ceremony will take place on December 10 in Stockholm. Han, who was having “an ordinary day” with her son when informed of the win, is already preparing for the celebration.