Nobel laureate Han Kang’s ‘The Vegetarian’ offers us a new vocabulary on illness and sickness
Yeong-hye, the protagonist of the novel is described as an ordinary woman – an obedient wife – until she quits eating meat after having dreams.
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“At first it was the underwear. I wanted to become a tree because trees did not wear bras.”
My thesis on Han Kang’s novel The Vegetarian started out with a simple and clear self-directive, the desire to help other women, trapped in bodies with invisible illnesses. Eventually, that grand ambition trickled down into a small act, i.e., the act of reading. In many ways, I replaced my body, with this book, in search of answers that I wasn’t able to find in doctors’ offices.
We get to know Yeong-hye, the female protagonist of The Vegetarian, as she is being read by her husband, brother-in-law, and sister. I say “read” specifically because they are constantly trying to interpret Yeong-hye as they narrate the novel.
Yeong-hye is described as an ordinary woman – an obedient wife – until she quits eating meat after having dreams. Uncannily vivid and violent dreams, “But the fear. My clothes still wet with blood. Hide, hide behind the trees. Crouch down, don’t let anybody see. My bloody hands. My bloody mouth. In that barn, what had I done? Pushed that red raw mass into my mouth, felt it squish against my gums, the roof of my mouth, slick with crimson blood.”
She proceeds to throw out all the meat...
