Fraught, disturbing, and beautiful, Han Kang’s novel is about shame and desire, and our faltering attempts to understand the lives of others. Translated by Deborah Smith.
By Han Kang
Translated by Deborah Smith
The Man Booker International Prize 2016
Deborah Smith and Han Kang on hearing the winners' announcement
The Man Booker International Prize fell in line with its Man Booker Prize sibling and became an annual award for a single book. Han Kang and her translator Deborah Smith scooped the first honours.
With the £50,000 prize money now being split equally, the modest pair had cause for celebration when The Vegetarian, the story of a woman whose decision to give up eating meat has unexpected consequences, beat a strong shortlist that included Elena Ferrante and Orhan Pamuk. Han, who is Korean, and Smith, who is British (and learnt Korean because she saw few of its books in English) treated the translation as an imaginative rather than literal word-for-word exercise. A second collaboration, The White Book, also made the prize shortlist in 2018.
- By
- Han Kang
- Translated by
- Deborah Smith
- Published by
- Portobello Books
Fraught, disturbing, and beautiful, Han Kang’s novel is about shame and desire, and our faltering attempts to understand the lives of others. Translated by Deborah Smith.
The shortlist
Playful and full of warm humour, José Eduardo Agualusa’s dazzling human drama explores the thrills, hopes and dangers of radical change. Translated by Daniel Hahn.
Translated by Daniel Hahn
Through one man’s journeys around a vibrant city, Orhan Pamuk asks what matters more in life: what we wish for, or what fate has in store? Translated by Ekin Oklap.
By Orhan Pamuk
Translated by Ekin Oklap
Robert Seethaler’s tender book about finding dignity and beauty in solitude looks at the moments, big and small, that make us who we are. Translated by Charlotte Collins.
Translated by Charlotte Collins
Yan Lianke’s compelling novel tells the story of one of China’s most controversial periods, the Great Famine, in which at least 45 million people died. Translated by Carlos Rojas.
By Yan Lianke
Translated by Carlos Rojas
Against the backdrop of a seductive and perilous Naples, Elena Ferrante delivers a searingly honest chronicle of a lifelong female friendship. Translated by Ann Goldstein.
Translated by Ann Goldstein
