Longlisted for the Man Booker International Prize (which the book went on to win), \u2018The\u00a0Vegetarian\u2019 by Han Kang and translated from the Korean by\u00a0Deborah Smith tells the story of Yeong-hye who suddenly\u00a0declares she will no longer eat after having a disturbing\u00a0dream. Originally published as separate \u201cnovelettes\u201d,\u00a0the three parts of the story are told from the point of view\u00a0of her husband, brother-in-law and sister respectively who\u00a0are all outraged by her decision to become a vegetarian in a\u00a0society where refusing to eat meat is extremely rare.<\/p>\n
Some elements of the story such as the first part narrated\u00a0by Yeong-hye\u2019s emotionally detached husband were vaguely Longlisted for the Man Booker International Prize (which the book went on to win), \u2018The\u00a0Vegetarian\u2019 by Han Kang and translated from the Korean by\u00a0Deborah Smith tells the story of Yeong-hye who suddenly\u00a0declares she will no longer eat after having a disturbing\u00a0dream. Originally published as separate \u201cnovelettes\u201d,\u00a0the three parts of the story are told from the point of view\u00a0of her husband, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":5047,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[322],"tags":[373],"class_list":["post-5037","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-magazine","tag-han-kang"],"acf":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/notofu.com\/new\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/The-Vegetarian-Book.jpg?fit=825%2C475","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paoQFa-1jf","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/notofu.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5037","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/notofu.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/notofu.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/notofu.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/notofu.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5037"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"http:\/\/notofu.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5037\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5050,"href":"http:\/\/notofu.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5037\/revisions\/5050"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/notofu.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5047"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/notofu.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5037"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/notofu.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5037"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/notofu.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5037"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nreminiscent of the novels of Haruki Murakami but that\u00a0comparison really doesn\u2019t do justice to the unique atmosphere\u00a0of \u2018The Vegetarian\u2019. As Yeong-hye\u2019s obsession begins\u00a0to manifest itself in extreme ways to the point where\u00a0she rejects all food and attempts to live as a tree, Kang explores\u00a0broader social issues surrounding gender politics\u00a0through Yeong-hye\u2019s relatives\u2019 reaction to her mental illness\u00a0in spare, precise prose. The absence of Yeong-hye\u2019s\u00a0own voice as she becomes increasingly disconnected from\u00a0yet also imprisoned by society is particularly unsettling.\u00a0Subtle and surreal, \u2018The Vegetarian\u2019 is a tightly controlled\u00a0novella which boldly takes the reader to some very unexpected\u00a0places.\u2014Clare Rowland<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"