At a press conference held in Stockholm, Mats Malm, the permanent secretary of the Swedish Academy, which administers the prize, lauded Han for her “intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life.”
Published in Korea in 2007, “The Vegetarian” garnered the International Booker Prize in 2016 following its translation into English. The novel explores the life of a discontented housewife who astounds her family by rejecting meat and ultimately decides to stop eating entirely, longing instead to metamorphose into a tree sustained solely by sunlight. In a review for The New York Times, Porochista Khakpour praised Han as a “visionary” within South Korea’s literary landscape.
The announcement of Han Kang’s Nobel Prize came as a surprise. Prior to the reveal, bookmakers favored avant-garde Chinese author Can Xue for the honor. Nevertheless, the news sparked jubilant reactions among writers and fans on social media, celebrated with fervor across South Korea.
“This is a remarkable achievement for South Korean literature and a cause for national jubilation,” expressed President Yoon Suk Yeol, acknowledging Han’s capacity to encapsulate painful aspects of the nation’s history. Members of the K-pop group BTS also expressed their excitement, with one posting a crying emoji paired with a heart beside a photograph of Han.
Many in South Korea were astonished by the news of a Korean author’s win. “I could hardly believe my eyes when I saw this,” shared Park Sang-in, an office worker in Seoul. “No one had indicated we had a strong contender this year.”
However, numerous voices found the choice fitting. Han’s pioneering work has transformed the literary scene in South Korea, according to Paige Aniyah Morris, co-translator of Han’s upcoming novel, “We Do Not Part,” set for release in the United States in January.
“Han’s writing has encouraged a generation of Korean authors to be more honest and daring in their themes,” remarked Morris. “Time and again, she has confronted a culture of censorship and societal expectations, emerging from these challenges with bolder, more uncompromising narratives.”
Born in 1970 in Gwangju, Han, now 53, grew up in a family of modest means that frequently relocated. In a 2016 interview with The Times, she reflected on her transient childhood, saying, “It was overwhelming for a young child, but I found solace in books.”
When Han was nine, her family moved to Seoul shortly before the Gwangju uprising, during which government forces violently suppressed pro-democracy protests, resulting in numerous casualties. This traumatic event deeply influenced her perspective on human violence, a theme that permeates her writing. In her 2014 novel “Human Acts,” a character witnesses a police raid on activists.
She recounted images of individuals waiting in line to donate blood to those injured in the uprising. “It posed two profound questions in my mind: How can humans be so violent, and how can they exhibit such sublime compassion?” she stated. “When I write, I invariably explore the essence of humanity.”
Hernan Diaz, a fellow novelist, commended Han’s “unique sensitivity to historical echoes,” emphasizing her ability to address generational traumas without reducing her novels to mere instructional narratives.
Han pursued literature at Yonsei University, initially publishing poetry. Her first novel, “Black Deer,” released in 1998, centered on the mystery of a missing woman. In that same interview, Han revealed the inspiration for “The Vegetarian” emerged from an earlier short story about a woman who transforms into a plant.
Following her debut, Han authored seven additional novels, alongside several novellas and collections of essays and short stories. Her notable works include “The White Book,” also nominated for the International Booker Prize, and “Greek Lessons,” which debuted in English in 2023.
“Greek Lessons” follows a woman who loses her ability to speak and embarks on a journey to recover it by studying ancient Greek. In a review for The Times, Idra Novey described the novel as “a tribute to the ineffable trust found in sharing language.”
“Han Kang is a visionary — there’s no other term that encapsulates her,” stated Parisa Ebrahimi, executive editor at Hogarth, Han’s North American publisher, highlighting her profound insights into women’s inner lives.
Though Han’s work is now revered in South Korea, this acclaim has taken time to develop, with some of her earlier books met with confusion. “The Vegetarian” was initially perceived as “extreme and bizarre,” Han noted.
Despite having published fiction and poetry for over two decades, her work only garnered attention in English after Deborah Smith translated “The Vegetarian,” selling it to a British publisher based on just the first ten pages. The English edition, released to critical acclaim in 2016, spurred a wave of translations for more experimental literature, particularly from women with feminist themes.
“Her work and its translation have made Korean literature in translation bolder and more innovative,” asserted Anton Hur, a South Korean translator and author based in Seoul. “She has reshaped the discourse surrounding Korean literature.”
Ankhi Mukherjee, a literature professor at the University of Oxford, stated that she has taught Han’s works consistently for nearly two decades. “Her writing is unflinchingly political — examining issues of the body, gender, and resistance against authority — yet it remains deeply imaginative,” Mukherjee added. “It avoids sanctimony; instead, it is playful, humorous, and surreal.”
The Nobel Prize, the pinnacle of literary accolades, serves as a crowning achievement for a writer’s career. Previous laureates include Toni Morrison, Harold Pinter, and Bob Dylan, who received the award in 2016. In addition to the prestige and substantial boost in book sales, the new laureate receives 11 million Swedish krona, roughly $1 million.
While Han is relatively young for a Nobel laureate, she is older than Rudyard Kipling, who won the award at age 41 in 1907.
In recent years, the Swedish Academy has sought to diversify the pool of authors considered for the literature prize, responding to criticism regarding the limited number of female and non-European/North American laureates.
Since 2020, the prize has been awarded to Abdulrazak Gurnah, a Tanzanian author whose works examine the legacy of colonialism, along with two women: American poet Louise Glück and French autobiographical writer Annie Ernaux.
Last year, Jon Fosse, a Norwegian novelist and playwright known for lengthy sentences and religious themes, received the honor.
Han is the 18th woman to be awarded the Nobel in Literature, which has recognized 120 writers since its inception in 1901.
Several scholars and translators remarked on the significance of a woman being the first Korean author to win the Nobel Prize. Much of the most transformative contemporary Korean literature is authored by women, many of whom are challenging misogyny and the societal pressures on women in South Korea. Despite this, older male writers have often dominated discussions about potential Nobel candidates.
“For years, the conversation about how Korea could secure a literature prize often overlooked Han Kang, despite her immense success,” Morris noted, who has translated works by other Korean female authors, including Pak Kyongni and Ji-min Lee. “Thus, it is both a delightful surprise and a touch of poetic justice that a woman has ended Korea’s long wait for a Nobel in literature.”
