Human Acts, by Han Kang

Translated by Deborah Smith

(2014, translated 2016)

Hogarth

(Historical Novel)

Ms. Han exploded onto the literary scene with her controversial and disturbing novel, The Vegetarian. In Human Acts, Han brings to life the living and the dead, characters who experienced the government crackdown on the Gwangju Democracy Movement in 1980. In large part a youth movement, students and factory workers filled the streets protesting labor laws, the continuation of martial law, and the closing of universities all over the country. After the assassination of President Park Chung-hee, Major General Chun Doo-hwan organized a military coup and took over the leadership of South Korea. When students began to protest, he claimed that they were actually infiltrators from North Korea. He sent in paratroopers, many of them combat veterans who had fought in Vietnam, and, from May 18 through May 27, these soldiers shot, beat, bayonetted, and raped the citizens of Gwangju. Ms. Han is not the first to write about these events—Gwangju is still an aching wound for many South Koreans—however, the strategies she employs succeed in bringing the reader directly into the chaos on the streets as well as into the horrors lived by the survivors who were arrested and tortured by the military. Han uses the direct address of “you” throughout as she takes us into the thoughts of young men and women of Gwangju, some still in high school, others in college. Her central focus is on one of the greatest wounds inflicted by the soldiers: they hid and destroyed many bodies, either burning them or dumping them in unmarked graves. Han brings to the story of Gwangju the sense of tragedy that Sophocles brings to Antigone: how can we fail the injunction of the gods to bury the dead? How will the souls of the dead find rest? The desecration of bodies is a recurring image throughout the novel. And though it is harrowing to read this novel, on every page you hear the author’s abiding love for the souls of her countrymen. For example, much of the early action involves a search for Dong-Ho, a boy who was shot by a military sniper who was firing down into the crowd from a rooftop. We hear his story as told from the points of view of family members, neighbors, and his best friend as they search for his body. Finally, Han reveals the location of the body and allows the soul of the boy to speak as he lingers over his own corpse.

“Your fingers clutching the still-warm candle stub, you bend down. Fighting the putrid stink, you look deep into the heart of the new flame. Its translucent edges flicker in constant motion, supposedly burning up the smell of death that hangs like a pall in the room. There’s something bewitching about the bright orange glow at its heart, its heat evident to the eye. Narrowing your gaze even further, you center in on the tiny blue-tinged core that clasps the wick, its trembling shape recalling that of a heart, or perhaps an apple seed. You straighten up, unable to stand the smell any longer. Looking around the dim interior, you drag your gaze lingeringly past each candle as it wavers by the side of a corpse, the pupils of quiet eyes. Suddenly it occurs to you to wonder, when the body dies, what happens to the soul? How long does it linger by the side of its former home? You give the room a thorough once-over, making sure there are no other candles that need to be changed, and walk toward the door. When a living person looks at a dead person, mightn’t the person’s soul also be there by its body’s side, looking down at its own face?” (18)