Han Kang, A New Language

×

Expand

Image courtesy of CCCB.

Han Kang, winner of the prestigious Man Booker International Prize in 2016, talks to cultural journalist Anna Guitart as part of the Setmana del Llibre en Català. 

South Korean author Han Kang became widely recognized in the West thanks to The Vegetarian, an uncomfortable and disturbing work about the unexpected consequences of a housewife's decision to stop eating animals. In her new novel Greek Lessons, Kang revisits the effects of oppressive Korean society and its symbolic violence on the individual.

The subtlety in presenting the inner conflicts of her protagonists, one of the hallmarks of Kang's writing, becomes the speech block of her main character in this novel. She confronts this situation with an unusual solution: to learn classical Greek to express herself again. The metaphor of the search for a new language that allows her to communicate, even if it is through a dead language, and the beauty of Kang's reflections on language, its words and structures are some of the themes that this conversation raises.

This event is part of the program of the 40th edition of the Setmana del Llibre en Català, which will take place September 8-17 at the Moll de la Fusta in Barcelona, with the collaboration of Casa Asia. 

Event will be held in Spanish, Catalan and Korean.

For more events check our online events calendar.