Sunday book pick: ‘We Do Not Part’ by Han Kang, winner of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature

There’s a strong sense of déjà vu in Han Kang’s We Do Not Part, the first novel in translation since her 2024 Nobel Prize win. Like in The Vegetarian, the protagonist here is of fragile physical health and mental state. She finds it difficult to eat or sleep, and is in profound discomfort with the heat and cold of the changing seasons. “Nothing one human being did to another could ever shock me again”: a line that instantly reminded me of Han Kang’s 2016 novel Human Acts. Based on the 1980 massacre of student protestors in Gwanju, it is, to me, her best work. In her 2017 book, The White Book, the protagonist reflects upon the death of her baby sister in wartime Poland. Mourning a new life with the virgin whiteness of salt, snow, and white birds becomes a stark reminder of the fragile nature of life. Snow is the most hazardous natural obstacle in We Do Not Part, salt, a life-sustaining food, and white birds, its beating heart. An opaque muteness is at the centre of Greek Lessons (also co-translated by e yaewon) – an impairment that ails our new protagonist as she lapses into long periods of silence and resolutely ignores human contact.

On Jeju Island

This long creative history of discomfort, silence, and…

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