Hello Gentle Reader,
Pathos is the nucleus of Han Kang’s literary oeuvre. Han’s preoccupation to explore the intensity of the human conditions emotional landscape, retains a particular interest towards mankind’s proclivity to perpetrate and engage in violence. Violence of course comes in a variety of forms, be it: physical, political, psychological, emotional, or spiritual. Han cartographs the trajectory of violence and its subsequent fallout and consequences with a pathologist’s dedication to understand; while always stopping short of entertaining any notion of diagnosis. Violence, as far as Han Kang can summarize is not an activity or action strictly unique to human beings. It is a forceful consequence of life itself. An otherwise existential and natural fact. Practically primordial. While human beings though remain unique in their ability to enterprise and invent new modes, methods, and means in which to perpetrate, retaliate, and engage in acts turned arts of violence. As far as society and people are concerned, violence is mere natural consequence and tool encompassing change. For example, the guillotine remains one of the most striking images of violence inspiring terror to provoke political and social change and subdue opposition to its progressive purposes and ideals. The guillotine, with its brutal function, was defended for its perceived ethos and humanistic approach. Its engineering ensured the condemned were executed with mechanical precision, minimizing the follies and mistakes of manual executions; while denying executioners their petty pleasures. As such, the guillotine was deemed the most humane form of execution for its swiftness and indifference. A tug of the rope, the drop of the blade, and the deed is done. No different then hanging, public burning, or any other form of decapitation, the guillotine was also a crowd pleaser. A public spectacle where people crowded to coo, jeer, and awe at, delighting in the bloodied spectacle. As for someone like Robespierre, who had their initial hesitations towards employing violence in order to ultimately achieve the French Revolutions goals for rationale rule and enlightened governance, before embracing it as the means in which to further purify the revolutions ideals by deposing tyranny. In turn, the despotism Robespierre curated around him, and his liberal embrace of political violence alienated his former allies and would-be supporters, until at last Robespierre found himself beneath the metallic glare of the guillotine.
Designating pathos as the stellar core of one’s literary preoccupations is riddled with challenges and pitfalls. Especially for Han Kang’s unapologetic surveying of violence as an inherent natural and existential factor of the human condition. Poor writing, terrible execution, and no sense of planning, means the work is always teetering on the precipice of melodramatic hysteria, sensationalism, hyperbole, and such mawkish second-hand emotion, that any actual weight and discussion of these elements are lost within the white noise of a writer who has no control or appreciation of their subject matter, and therefore has no business or talent writing about the subject. Writers who perilously dive into the cavernous landscape of emotional spelunking, are often lost within their subject, which overpowers their work with solicitous sentiment. There is nothing as frivolous as a writer whose work panders for affecting responses from their reader. Its feeble as it is cheap, with no literary quality or hope of redemption. Thankfully for Han Kang, her use of language is what steers her novels from becoming moored and mired within the swamp and ruin of such frivolity. Han’s literary language relies on brittle lyricism to make its case, avoiding smouldering on shock value sensationalism, or lingering to long wallowing into caricature of melodrama. In “Human Acts,” Han wrote about the inherent violence of the Gwangju Uprsing with a frankness towards the real human cost; while ensuring she can sketch out the sinew to other episodes and perspectives ensuring the narrative was capable of moving forward, without chewing on the macabre and grotesque details. In an opening chapter, the boy recounts the makeshift morgue being used to house the bodies of the dead. The bodies washed. Their details and identities recorded. Han reticently observes these moments with their resolve and resilience, not in the death of the participants, but the care, order, and administrative efficiency taking place in managing the deceased. In one scene though, to offer a glimpse or understanding of the events which had previously taken place and a foreshadowing to the events that will take place; Han describes one body whose neck has been sliced open by bayonet. The red of the wound and the uvula dangling at the back of the throat. The image speaks for itself. Han does not insulate further with brutalist imagery or extrapolate beyond; the scene stands alone. The same tactics are employed in, “The White Book,” a deeply personal and autobiographical novel, whereby Han recounts the tragic circumstances of her older sister’s birth and death, juxtaposing it against a writer who’s on a retreat in Warsaw, Poland, who reflects on the city’s decimation and destruction during the Second World War and the process of it being rebuilt. Woven throughout the narrative is an inventory of white objects and poetic philosophising on the colour white, the nature of grief, loss, and the fragility of the human condition. The sparsity of the work, the ellipses and its elliptical nature ensure it’s a short fragmentary meditation, provides enough space for the work to breathe in its poetic intensity, without becoming indulgent in solipsism.
Han Kang’s skill in utilizing figurative language effectively, restraint, and literary maturity to understand and veer towards subtlety, when writing about subjects which are inherently flavoured with a heightened degree and level of poignancy, and detail historical acts of brutality and violence, it is safe to assume that her most recent novel to be translated, “We Do Not Part,” would once against showcase Han’s curated control of her brittle lyricism and dedication to probing the enduring question of violence and its relationship to the human condition, by recounting a brutal atrocity that had taken place within contemporary Korean history. Instead, “We Do Not Part,” didn’t quite land its punches or find its footing. “Human Acts,” was a symphonic novel. Structured around the political uprising and subsequent crack down and slaughter in the city of Gwangju, the novel spiraled outwards, showcasing how the events that took place within that city continue to reverberate, and how those consequential effects persist with the families of victims, and are felt within the society at large, and remembered within a societal and collective consciousness. This gave, “Human Acts,” a concrete structure, a scaffolding if you will, in which the novel continued to build off and gain momentum. The second chapter of the boy’s soul’s desperation to get home to say goodbye to his mother before the sun rises, remains an exhilarating piece, showcasing Han’s talents to propel a narrative with a sense of emotional urgency, while remaining coldly distant, to ensuring the impacts landed organically rather than manufacturing the required responses. In “We Do Not Part,” the prose became overladen with cumbersome repetition, and lacked the necessary focal point in which to take off. Instead, Han’s fragile lyricism became lost within the white noise of its own production. Or if more preferable, lost within increasingly tiresome descriptions of snow and wind. Throughout the beginning of the novel and continued well after, the prose and sentences became increasingly episodic, simply describing “then this happened, then this happened, then this happened, then this happened,” as if Han found it difficult to find the natural rhythm or flow to propel the narrative and instead described minute actions and responses as they happened in a manner of a play by play.
In addition, “We Do Not Part,” lacks the concrete structure of “Human Acts,” where the symphony bloomed; instead, “We Do Not Part,” is more ephemeral, lacking the gravity to anchor it. Instead, the novel is characterized as more of a singular flame within a non-descript room, whose light exists only to showcase the dancing flickering mercurial shadows shifting, twisting, and changing on the wall and ceiling, as they always remain imperceptible and constantly in motion. This is perhaps the biggest downfall of “We Do Not Part,” as the novels prose became increasingly circuitous. Crossing and crisscrossing the same ordeals. Treading and retreading the same territory. Kyungha’s snow ridden odyssey through Jeju Island to get to Inseon’s remote village and home, should at once be filled with tension and urgency to save the bird; instead, it becomes lugubrious and laborious. Leaving many readers to wonder: what’s the point? Then there is the premise of the novel. “We Do Not Part,” draws out getting to the discussion of the massacre that took place on Jeju Island, and when it finally reaches this pinnacle, Han appears to cram all her research and testimony into the island’s tragic history and unresolved grief into the last three quarters of the novel. It also became increasingly apparent, that Han only started to find her footing as the novel began to conclude. Her lyricism became sharper, clearer, and far more engaging. Kyungha’s moaning and wallowing ceased, beyond a few non-descript comments about the cold and chill; but in the delirium of the later components of the novel, Kyungha thankfully became less perceptible, without commenting on her ailments, or projecting a sense of longing companionship on an elderly passerby.
“We Do Not Part,” is Han Kang’s longest novel (which is currently translated). In previous novels, such as “Greek Lessons,” Han showcased herself as a master of the slow burn, gradually delving into the psychological interior of her characters, her prose penetrating and image rich, provide enough bait and tackle to string readers along. The same can be said of the “The White Book,” whereby the personal—even private—nature of the work is tolerated because Han is sparing. The waxing prose of Han’s book allows it to ruminate and contemplate the nature of loss, grief, and their relation to love, and in turn the kernel of guilt that is felt with the understanding that her life is only made possible because of the death of her older sister. Once again though, Han’s prose is psychologically acute without being self-indulgent. Its evocation comes through a layering of images and an association of images, and the metaphors produced from there. “We Do Not Part,” lacks this in its first half to three quarters. The novel would have benefited from being moulded and shaped more; pruned and sharpened with greater scrutiny. Instead, the rambling meandering roundabout journey became vacuous and vapid. “We Do Not Part,” could have employed a more concrete structure, instead of relying on snow which is unreliable, as it drifts, blows, and accumulates, and sadly the novel got lost within the ether of it, becoming colourless and anesthesia inducing. “We Do Not Part,” is disappointing, and rightfully so, because Han Kang can do better and has proven as much; furthermore, the assertion to call “We Do Not Part,” Han’s masterpiece, is misguided as it is disagreeable.
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
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