“The 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature is Han Kang,” the Swedish Academy announced at 1 p.m. (local time). In South Korea, it was around 7 p.m. and the winner was having dinner. After hearing the news, instead of “celebrating,” the female writer chose to “commemorate” her victory quietly over a cup of tea with her teenage son. A brief interview between the Academy and Han Kang followed, with the winner only saying thank you and appreciation, and that was it.
Unexpected results. South Korea "broke out". Readers hunted for the winner's work. A few dozen degrees latitude away from South Korea, the Vietnamese public was stunned to hear the Academy's announcement. The 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature winner is Han Kang? A person familiar to Vietnamese readers for more than a decade, with the Vietnamese translations of the novels "The Vegetarian", "The White Book", and "Human Acts"?
Calculation of a Prize
In fact, the previous predictions about the winner of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature were not far off from reality, although the result was really surprising. Accordingly, a female writer outside the English-speaking world (and outside of Europe, the center of Europe) will win the 11 million SKr (1 million USD) prize. Han Kang is almost "empty", instead, Canadian poet - Anne Carson, Chinese female novelist - Tan Tuyet are the names predicted to win. If we list enough "familiar faces", the male writers will be named: Gerald Murnane (Australia), Ngugi wa Thiong'o (Kenya), Salman Rushdie (British-Indian), Michel Houellebecq (France), and of course, Haruki Murakami (Japan).
In the more than 120-year history of the Nobel Prize in Literature, 117 writers have been awarded the prize, of which only 18 were women. If we do a simple calculation, in the first 20 years of the 21st century, half of the writers awarded the prize were women. This number is not only equal to the victories of male writers, but also equal to the number of female writers who won the Nobel Prize in the 100 years of the previous century. And if we count from the victory of Alice Munro (Canada, 2013), every 2 years, a female writer would be named by the Academy, if there was not a year of interruption due to a sexual scandal of the judges (2018). That is a good sign for female authors, whether they are poets, short story writers, novelists or authors of memoirs.
More than a surprise, Han Kang's win was special. The Swedish Academy awarded her the honor for "her intense, poetic prose that captures historical trauma and exposes the fragility of human life." The 54-year-old is not only the first Korean author but also the first female author from Asia to win the prestigious literary prize. Twenty-four years after former President Kim Dae-jung won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2000, South Korea has won its second Nobel Prize: Han Kang.
"Anatomy" of a Victory
Han Kang's trajectory was bright even before winning the Nobel Prize. When "The Vegetarian" was published in English (2015), she won the Man Booker International Prize just a year later (2016). When the English version of her autobiography "The White Book" was published, Han Kang's name was once again shortlisted for the prize. Not to mention, Han Kang also became the first Asian representative to participate in the Future Library project, a collection of 100 works by 100 contemporary writers that is only opened every 100 years to entrust to future generations.
To explain Han Kang's special and unexpected victory, people often resort to... politics. After announcing the Nobel Prize in Literature, the Swedish Academy repeatedly mentioned Han Kang's book "Human Nature", a novel about the Gwangju massacre in 1980, nearly 50 years ago. Observers explained that Han Kang's work is linked to the recent unrest in Gaza and the Northern Hemisphere. This comparison is similar to when Abdulrazak Gurnah won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2021 for his hot topic of migration and refugees; or Anne Ernaux in 2022 for her body freedom in her works, which have been hot in the media since the beginning of this decade.
If the “dissection” continues, the reader will be led to many other references. If the political factor is not enough to justify, the Nobel Prize winner in literature must have a special platform, the economic potential and the growth of Korean culture. One of them will be the cultural soft power on the international stage of the country that has created global music groups such as BTS, Blackpink. Long-term literary translation programs, publishing support and cultural exports have helped Korea step by step to achieve resounding cultural victories.
South Korea not only has kimchi, K-Pop, shooter Kim Yeji (2024 Olympics), but also Bong Joon-ho and the Oscar-winning Parasite. Now, in the elite cultural field like literature, they have Han Kang with the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Ginkgo tree metaphor
Everything seems to be set for the female writer Han Kang to win the Nobel. But the path to each literary "rank", from a domestic award (like the Seoul Shinmun) to an international award like the Man Booker International or the Nobel is not so simple. With more than 30 years of writing, starting with poems and short stories published in newspapers since 1993, Han Kang has published many collections of poems, short stories and novels.
Her books have been translated into many languages around the world. On every page, readers will find a plethora of questions, under the themes of loss and healing, trauma and violence, sexuality and existential crisis. Above all, Han Kang always asks questions about conscience and humanity.
Han Kang is called the "Korean Kafka", but instead of turning a human into a bug, she turned one into a tree (The Vegetarian). In "Human Nature", she mentions the ginkgo tree, the hollyhocks, the fragrant white flowers of the locust tree in summer. These are metaphors for loneliness, a consolation for a writer who suffers from chronic migraines. They are also a way to ease the punishment of survivor's guilt after the Gwangju massacre when she was 10 years old. And that, if she were healthy and active, Han Kang would not have chosen to be a writer.
Anyone who has read "The Nature of Man" will know that Han Kang mentioned the ginkgo tree right from the first page. In late autumn and early winter, the ginkgo leaves will change from green to yellow, making the whole space shimmer and shine so brilliantly that it is almost unreal. But after that glorious moment, when the ripe fruit falls, all that remains is an unbearable stench.
If the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature were a metaphor, it would be the ginkgo tree. The Nobel Prize creates a shimmering effect on the name Han Kang, but when you put the prize aside and look at her writings, you will see only the human side and the human nature - sometimes with an unbearable smell.
Nobel will pass away each year like the ginkgo tree changes its leaves at the change of seasons. People will continue to read Han Kang, as long as they are still ecstatic at the beauty and frown at the ugliness, because that is the nature of man.
