Human Acts
by Han Kang
Buy on AmazonSouth Korean novelist and poet Han Kang was awarded this year’s Nobel Prize for Literature. The ceremony took place earlier this month, shortly after a brief declaration of martial law in her country; she appeared to address the political tumult at home in her speech , declaring that “the work of reading and writing literature stands in opposition to all acts that destroy life.” Kang’s 2014 novel Human Acts focuses on violent clashes between protestors and the military during an earlier period of martial law four decades previously. In a press conference after the ceremony, she said it had been “startling” to see similar events unfolding in real time.
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"South Korean novelist and poet Han Kang was awarded this year’s Nobel Prize for Literature. The ceremony took place earlier this month, shortly after a brief declaration of martial law in her country; she appeared to address the political tumult at home in her speech , declaring that “the work of reading and writing literature stands in opposition to all acts that destroy life.” Kang’s 2014 novel Human Acts focuses on violent clashes between protestors and the military during an earlier period of martial law four decades previously. In a press conference after the ceremony, she said it had been “startling” to see similar events unfolding in real time."
Award-Winning Novels of 2024 · fivebooks.com
"Mercy is a human impulse, but so is murder. In Human Acts, Han Kang’s novel of the 1980 Gwangju Uprising in South Korea, people spill blood and people brave death to donate it. With a sensitivity so sharp that it’s painful, Human Acts sets out to reconcile these paradoxical and coexisting humanities."
NPR Books We Love — 2017 · apps.npr.org
By the Book: Margo Jefferson · nytimes.com