White bird,

White dog,

White butterfly,

White gulls,

White fur,

White hair,

White pebble,

White bone,

White cabbage,

White grains,

White flakes,

White things,

We have all experimented like this. We have all thought this way about ourselves. Jotting down scribbles of pain and emotion and inner-life – paragraphs, sentences, phrases, single words that feel just too good to throw away. Little fragments of supposed genius. If you don’t grow out of it through your teenage years like most people, the appropriate thing to do, still, is to wait. Wait for a project that fits the language, somewhere or something that you can re-smuggle those old feelings into.

The inappropriate thing is to bundle together those scraps of paper, gather an audience of people who are expecting something else, and then dump them out on the table, proud, knowing, and sure. Thinking to yourself that because the words are personal, and because these people care about you, that this is enough; that they will also care about those words. They are an extension of you after all!

Ideally it ends with the concerned looks of family, friends or editors – those few people who have an interest in being honest. With Han Kang it’s different.

White clothes,

White city,

White pills,

White nights,

White paper,

White film,

White wicks,

White sweater,

White cloth,

White touched,

White splotches,

White colour,

The Vegetarian was one of those books that – before it was there – was also fairly unthinkable. It disorientated the world of Korean literature, which had long-settled on a comfortable style, something that seemed to work for translation, for export, and for international awards. Instead Kang wrote through oddity, darkness, uncertain passion and sensations and trauma, a shivering, nervous agitation.

Even then however, so much of her success came from how she put pen to paper, and not what she wrote about. And so perhaps – at the time – it made sense to go searching for a follow-up novel, rather than to let it find its author. What Kang found (Human Acts) was disturbingly poor! As far as second books go, it was an impatient mess: an aching demonstration of manufactured art, and the unconcealed, unglued image of the writing process. It was Kang trying much too hard to be meaningful, and also a pre-echo of the mistakes we now have: thinking that once spoken aloud, meaning and meaningful moments become universal.

Grey-white,

Voices white,

Smooth white,

Dirty white,

Dazzlingly white,

Dull white,

Shine white,

Crisp white,

Frozen white,

Billowing whiteness,

Applauded for her success and then applauded for her failure, it must have been hard to know what to do next. Trauma Writers can move forward in a few different ways: ideally they have personal suffering to talk about, next best they can go searching for it in warzones etc., then in a very distant last place they can build and embellish it.

Trying to extract more-and-more from less-and-less, with each book Kang is slipping a little closer toward mortality. What we have is an author plumbing her mind for new pain, each bit smaller than the last, and much less serious (perhaps not to herself, but certainly to her audience). Everything sucking down through frozen and tired language. Life is mildly harrowing for everyone, it is just that most people don’t think to make announcements to the fact, nor presume the interest of others.

Cold pavement,

Cold fists,

Cold-numbed,

Cold hand,

Cold air,

Cold mornings,

Cold light,

Cold and irrevocable,

So cold,

Sub-zero cold,

Cold,

Here we find Kang in flight, running away from her mother’s horror. The first order of business? Paint the door of her rented apartment from red to white. The rust and flaking wood disappears as “vestige[s] of violence, like long-dried bloodstains, hardened, reddish-black”. If you find this a difficult head-space to relate to, well, don’t read on – this three page chapter (“Door”) is also the best cut of language, the most emotionally accessible... and it is also, shockingly, the longest.

A blunt inflection point between poetry, prose and moaning aloud, what we are being handed here is not really a book at all. Just a selection of daily scribbles, tied together between photographs and deliberately blank pages, in the whitest possible tone. Everything circles inward from that gimmick, somehow we – as adults – are supposed to accept the mere presence of colour as significant. And a list of white objects (“Now I will give you white things”) as worthy of publication.

Sweet,

Rice,

Raw rice,

Cooked rice,

Rice cake,

Salt,

Porridge,

Milk,

Grains,

Sugar,

Kitchen,

Stove,

Stomach it if you can, and save yourself the nagging thoughts of conspiracy: she is serious! This is not some errant cup in the corner of a modern art museum. Nobody is going to walk over smiling and tell you that you’ve just been had, pointing out the hidden cameras and actors in the room. No! Kang really believes that white matters, that it heals, that it has answers, that it transcends.

Illumination,

Incandescent,

Shimmer,

Glistening,

Bright,

Lights,

Power,

Flashes,

Crystals,

Hazy,

Faint glow,

Alight,

So what about her grief, the reason that we are being asked to play along. It goes like this: “My mother’s first child died, I was told, less than two hours into life.” She was told because, of course, she wasn’t there, she didn’t live it; she only soaked it in as a distant story (just as her readers are now doing). A horrible story, but not hers. Still here we find her abandoning her country, her family and her home for a snowy European winter (ideal if you are looking for white things), quarantining herself indoors, and humming as a “dumb witness” about pale shades.

“I felt that yes, I needed to write this book, and that the process of writing it would be transformative, would itself transform, into something like white ointment applied to swelling, like gauze laid over a wound. Something I needed.” Pain has its own life, it works within people in difficult and impossible ways, but it is the job of the novelist to turn the private into the public, to make the reader feel and sympathise and understand, to make the finished article relatable. This does the opposite!

Blizzard,

Winter,

Ice,

Ice capped,

Spring,

Snow,

Frost,

Sleet,

Glacier,

Freezing,

Snow flakes,

Moisture,

Early morning,

As one suspected with The Vegetarian, Kang is her own protagonist, and she does have a wonderful ability to drag the reader in through small untamed details. It all borders on hallucination and it all works… when Kang is at her best. What we have instead now, from the hackneyed title – The White Book – to the desperate search for content and page-fillers and substance, has the feel of a different kind of creative illness: when someone is trying (really trying) to be poetic, they are – more often than not – just being pretentious.

Either way, The White Book reads as a cautionary tale on the limits of compassion, and the realities of an adult life. Most people cannot get vicariously lost in the swings of history like this, time and responsibility just won’t allow it. New problems and new hurt... new life… are always there, dragging most people from indulgence.

Scorching sun,

Sky,

Afternoon sky,

Summers day,

Sunlight,

Winter sun,

Beach,

Sandy shore,

Waves,

Sea,

Winter sea,

Puddle,

Soot,

Smoke,

Moon,

The best that can be said, is that maybe (unlikely, but maybe) Kang, from her sudden apex of fame, is trying to write a self-help book of sorts. Kind words and guidance for others, a gift to the world. But even then, the author still needs something to actually say. The book still requires content. Crisp prose, and a stern focus on too little for too long just won’t do it, no matter how agitated and hot it makes the author. Self-help books are fine in their own way, but not when they have a target audience of one. 

Freshly laundered,

Pristine,

Unsullied,

Clean,

Wash,

Bathed,

Scoured,

Vanished,

Invisible,

Empty,

Sterile,

Bleach,

Powdery,

What does carry over from all three of her books, is an odd and interesting fascination with the human body. The language seems to echo from a distance, as if Kang is dislocated from herself and her limbs. The slightest change in air temperature, pressure and environment sets off a war within. Her flesh, nerves, tendons, ligaments, muscles, bones, fighting a war without surrender nor prisoners: migraines, headaches, discomfort and near-masochistic pain.

Bones,

Anklebone,

Kneebone,

Collarbone,

Crossbar bone (another name for collarbone),

Breastbone,

Powdered bones,

Clean bones,

Rib,

Skin,

Nipple,

Breast,

Bare flesh,

Teeth,

Windpipe,

Puffy eyes,

Part of the business of writing involves an aggressive type of people-watching, something just short of stalking and harassment. Studying human traffic, and not letting a curious subject – someone interesting enough to write about in some way, no matter how mild – walk away. Writers follow people down streets, from cafe to cafe, from shops to restaurants to their cars; jotting down details about mannerisms, fashion, tone of voice, posture, attitude, the shape of eyes and mouths, food choices, birth marks, scars, anything that can help to fill out the details of a character.

Kang does this with an unhealthy dose of fear and panic. Like she is expecting to be found-out, confronted, and somehow punished for the intrusion. Rich with nerves and unease, it is no wonder that she sees so much of it mirrored back at her from the world: “Seen from behind, men and women bundled up in heavy coats are saturated with a mute presentiment, that of people beginning to endure”.

Chain,

Lace curtain,

Silver,

Scales,

Cotton,

Canvas,

Glass,

Candle,

Wax,

Bedsheets,

Feathers,

Blank paper,

Shroud,

Gown,

Stone, 

Flower,

This is a game of self-torture that everyone can play, if they are inclined: imagine the obvious truth that someone, somewhere in the world, has just starved to death. A long and denigrating end to a life, and one that is – and should have been – avoidable. It is excruciating and yet we are hopeless to intervene. Sure, we could donate more to charities that help prevent and remedy global poverty, but for that particular person right now, it is all too late, there is nothing for us to do. The pain is already baked-in.

Now think long and hard about the suffering involved in such a moment and such a life. The sensations of a slow wind-down through malnutrition, of hoping for any kind of help or rescue that never comes, the terrible feelings of shame and humiliation and abandonment. And then the physical anguish, over days and weeks. Think of it moment by moment… focus on it! It’s enough to edge us all towards depression. It’s more than enough to write a book about.

But what would you think of someone who, when it came time to hand-in their final draft, had chosen to write from the perspective of the distant dreamer, the person imagining the pain in their head and struggling with it all, as opposed to the person who was actually there and suffering. It would take some ego to do such a thing, to holiday in another person’s grief and then claim it as one’s own… for the benefit of art.

Childhood,

Child’s voice,

Breath,

Fragility,

Fear,

Love,

Anguish,

Pain,

Isolated,

 Sleep,

Mute,

Stillness,

Silence,

And it would likely show-up in the language and flow of the finished product; labouring under its own effort to convince. Instead of just seeing a white dog, the author would really see a white dog. Everything pregnant with a purpose and symbolism that just isn’t there. Each line and idea trying, straining to say something, desperate to be evocative and romantic.

This wouldn’t be easy. Maybe the dog works for some people on some level, but then what about the white bird, the white butterfly, the white stain… It quickly stretches thin, even for the most gullible of readers. And while struggling to transform the mundane into the profound something unpleasant would then happen. Cliché after cliché would begin to litter the language, and clumsy literary devices such as the use of ghosts would repeat, page after page, taking over the story and further alienating anyone still trying to follow along.

Ghosts,

Spirits,

Sacred,

Reanimated,

Graceful,

Soul,

Eternal,

Fog,

Gas,

Gaze,

Clouds,

Dusting,

Rejuvenation,

Revivification,

There is an important lesson here for people who want to be writers, and who mistakenly think it’ll be fun. Good stories come from within, and so the writing process involves long hours alone, in silence, sinking into your own subconscious; trying to magnify your own pain. And it’ll get to you! If Han Kang weren’t a writer, it’s hard to imagine that she would have the constitution for much else.

There is a lot of pomposity and gibberish to be found in these pages, but Kang is too good at what she does to not occasionally hit gold. The picture of a mother alone in her house, holding the baby that she had just given birth to, haunts and tears at the emotions in horrifying ways: “For God’s sake don’t die, she muttered in a thin voice, over and over… For God’s sake don’t die.” And while most of her efforts at list-making are appallingly hollow – white, whiteness, whitening, whitely, white things, all whiteness, whiteout – even those occasionally catch the right, fragile, nerve.

Kitchen floor,

Birth,

Perfection,

Precious,

Crying,

Umbilical cord,

Breast milk,

Clenched,

Final breath,

Frozen body,

Dead baby...