Han Kang was born in 1970 in South Korea. In 1993 she made her literary debut as a poet, and was first published as a novelist in 1994. A participant in the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa, Han has won the Man Booker International Prize, the Yi Sang Literary Prize, the Today's Young Artist Award, and the Manhae Prize for Literature. She currently works as a professor in the department of creative writing at the Seoul Institute of the Arts.
www.writerhankang.com
"Compulsively readable, universally relevant and deeply resonant...
It lacerates, it haunts, it dreams, it mourns... 'Human Acts' is,
in equal parts, beautiful and urgent."--New York Times Book Review
"Human Acts is unique in the intensity and scale of this
brutality... [T]he novel details a bloody history that was
deliberately forgotten and is only now being recovered."--The
Nation "[Han Kang's] new novel, Human Acts, showcases the same
talent for writing about corporeal horrors, this time in the
context of the 1980 Gwangju uprising."--TIME Magazine "Han Kang's
Human Acts speak the unspeakable." --Vanity Fair "The long wake of
the killings plays out across the testimonies of survivors as well
as the dead, in scenarios both gorily real and beautifully
surreal."--Vulture "Human Acts is stunning. Book reviews evaluate
how well a book does what it sets out to do, and so we sometimes
write nice things about books that perfectly fulfill trivial aims.
Otherwise, we'd always be complaining that romance novels or
political thrillers fail to justify the ways of God to men. But Han
Kang has an ambition as large as Milton's struggle with God: She
wants to reconcile the ways of humanity to itself."--NPR.org
"Engrossing... The result is torturously compelling, a relentless
portrait of death and agony that never lets you look away. Han's
prose--as translated by Deborah Smith--is both spare and dreamy,
full of haunting images and echoing language. She mesmerizes,
drawing you into the horrors of Gwangju; questioning humanity,
implicating everyone... Unnerving and painfully immediate."--Los
Angeles Times "Revelatory ... nothing short of breathtaking... In
the end, what Han has re-created is not just an extraordinary
record of human suffering during one particularly contentious
period in Korean history, but also a written testament to our
willingness to risk discomfort, capture, even death in order to
fight for a cause or help others in times of need."--San Francisco
Chronicle "But where Kang excels is in her unflinching,
unsentimental descriptions of death. I am hard pressed to think of
another novel that deals so vividly and convincingly with the
stages of physical decay. Kang's prose does not make for easy
reading, but there is something admirable about this clear-eyed
rendering of the end of life."--Boston Globe "Absorbing... Han uses
her talents as a storyteller of subtlety and power to bring this
struggle out of the middle distance of 'history' and into the
intimate space of the irreplaceable human individual."--Minneapolis
Star-Tribune
"Kang explores the sprawling trauma of political brutality with
impressive nuance and the piercing emotional truth that comes with
masterful fiction... a fiercely written, deeply upsetting, and
beautifully human novel."--Kirkus Reviews "Kang is an incredible
storyteller who raises questions about the purpose of humanity and
the constant tension between good and evil through the
heartbreaking experiences of her characters. Her poetic language
shifts fluidly from different points of view, while her fearless
use of raw, austere diction emulates the harsh conflicts and
emotions raging throughout the plot. This jarring portrayal of the
Gwangju demonstrations will keep readers gripped until the
end."--Booklist (starred) "With Han Kang's The Vegetarian awarded
the 2016 Man Booker International Prize, her follow-up will garner
extra scrutiny. Bottom line? This new work, again seamlessly
translated by Deborah Smith, who also provides an indispensable
contextual introduction, is even more stupendous."--Library Journal
(starred) "Pristine, expertly paced, and gut-wrenching... Human
Acts grapples with the fallout of a massacre and questions what
humans are willing to die for and in turn what they must live
through. Kang approaches these difficult and inexorable queries
with originality and fearlessness, making Human Acts a must-read
for 2017."--Chicago Review of Books "Though her subject matter is
terrifying, her prose is too beautiful, her images too perfectly
crystallized to wince and turn away from them... 'Human Acts' is a
slim novel weighted with philosophical and spiritual inquiry, but
if offers no consolations. Rather, it grapples with who we are,
what we are able to endure, and what we inflict upon other
people..."--St. Louis Post-Dispatch "Kang interconnects the
chapters in her novel to focus on characters who are irreparably
affected by the historic Gwangju Uprising in South Korea in May
1980, in which government troops killed an estimated 600
protesters. The Guardian calls it 'an act of unflinching
witness.'"--Sacramento Bee "Reading about human acts like these can
be excruciating. But true to the urgency conveyed through its
frequent use of second-person narration, Han's book is also filled
with human acts involving profiles in courage that inspire hope...
In a novel whose heroes include editors, actors and writers--each
battling to remember while censors try to forget--Han's own book
embodies the miracle this passage describes."--Milwaukee
Journal-Sentinel "Following The Vegetarian, one of the most
stunning novels of 2016, Human Acts is yet another belatedly
translated work from South Korean writer Han Kang. Centering on the
killing of a young boy during a student uprising, the novel follows
the rippling effects of the tragedy."--Huffington Post
"[E]xquisitely crafted."--O, the Oprah Magazine "After dazzling us
with The Vegetarian, which won the 2016 Man Booker International
Prize, Han Kang is dropping another amazing read. Set in South
Korea in 1980, in the wake of a student protest turned horrifically
violent, the book follows a cast of characters as they deal with
the harrowing consequences of that day."--Bustle "...Inventive,
intense and provocative...a work of considerable bravery...'Human
Acts' is a profound act of protest in itself."--Newsday "Kang's
forthcoming Human Acts focuses on the 1980 Korean Gwangju Uprising,
when Gwangju locals took up arms in retaliation for the massacre of
university students who were protesting. Within Kang tries to
unknot 'two unsolvable riddles' -- the intermingling of two
innately human yet disparate tendencies, the capacity for cruelty
alongside that for selflessness and dignity." --The Millions "This
novel is a thoughtful and humane answer to difficult questions and
a moving tribute to victims of the atrocity."--BookPage "South
Korean novelist Han first gained attention stateside with The
Vegetarian, her first novel to be translated into English, last
year. This follow-up novel follows a group of people who are
affected both directly and indirectly by the death of a young boy
during a violent student protest in South Korea."--Men's Journal
(online) "Han Kang made a big splash last year with The Vegetarian.
Using several points of view to delve into the death of one
adolescent boy during the Gwangju Uprising, Human Acts will surely
continue Kang's praise among critics and readers... Human Acts
ruthlessly examines what people are capable of doing to one
another, but also considers how the value of one life can affect
many."--Book Riot "Han Kang's first novel to appear in English, The
Vegetarian, was one of the most jarring works of fiction we've read
in a while. Human Acts takes a broader view of humanity, focusing
on a host of reactions to the death of a young man in a political
action in South Korea. We're looking forward to experiencing her
prose in a new context with this novel."--Vol. 1 Brooklyn "Human
Acts is elegantly written, unflinchingly brutal and absolutely
real. It is not so much a novel as it is a profound act of
connection; it is beyond powerful. Han Kang is what most writers
spend their lives trying to be: a fearless, unsentimental teller of
human truths."--Lisa McInerney, Baileys Women's Prize-winning
author of The Glorious Heresies "This is a book that could easily
founder under the weight of its subject matter. Neither inviting
nor shying away from modern-day parallels, Han neatly unpacks the
social and political catalysts behind the massacre and maps its
lengthy, toxic fallout. But what is remarkable is how she
accomplishes this while still making it a novel of blood and bone.
The characters frequently address themselves to an unnamed "You"...
This sense of dislocation is most obvious when a dead boy's soul
converses with his own rotting flesh - and it's here that the
language comes closest to the gothic lyricism of Han's previous
book, The Vegetarian...By choosing the novel as her form, then
allowing it to do what it does best - take readers to the very
centre of a life that is not their own - Han prepares us for one of
the most important questions of our times: "What is humanity? What
do we have to do to keep humanity as one thing and not another?"
She never answers, but this act of unflinching witness seems as
good a place to start as any."--Eimear McBride, The Guardian
"Harrowing...Han's novel is an attempt to verbalize something
unspeakable... But she humanizes the terrible violence by focusing
on the more mundane aspects: tending and transporting bodies, or
attempting to work an ordinary job years later. And by placing the
reader in the wake of Dong-ho's memory, preserved by his family and
friends, Han has given a voice to those who were lost."--Publishers
Weekly "With exquisitely controlled eloquence, the novel chronicles
the tragedy of ordinariness violated...In the echo chambers of
Han's haunting prose, precisely and poetically rendered by Smith,
the sound of that heartbeat resonates with defiant humanity."--New
Statesman
"Han Kang's writing is clear and controlled and she handles the
explosive, horrifying subject matter with great warmth."--The
Times
"Searing...In Human Acts [Kang] captures the paradox of being
human: the meat-like, animal reduction of our humanity--the dead
bodies of the beginning chapter - alongside our ability to love and
suffer for our principles, and die for them, that make us truly
human. She is excellent in summarizing this paradox... If it hopes
to tie the personal with the political, it does the former so much
more powerfully: a mother thinking of her dead son, for example,
displays literary mastery - as subtle and specific as it is
universally heartbreaking."--The Independent "A technical and
emotional triumph... A conversation of which we rarely hear both
sides: the living talking to the dead, and the dead speaking
back."--The Sunday Telegraph (5 star review)
"A grim but heartfelt performance, touching on the possibility of
forgiveness and the survival of the spirit."--The Sunday Times
"Harrowing...Human Acts portrays people whose self-determination is
under threat from terrifying external forces; it is a sobering
meditation on what it means to be human."--Financial Times
"A harrowing journey... By its very existence Human Acts is an
important and necessary book...Astonishing."--The National
"Human Acts is a stunning piece of work. The language is poetic,
immediate, and brutal. Han Kang has again proved herself to be a
deft artist of storytelling and imagery." -- Jess Richards
"A rare and astonishing book, sensitively translated by Deborah
Smith, Human Acts enrages, impassions, and most importantly, gives
voices back to who were silenced" --The Observer (UK)
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