I could have reached out to her, and my hand would have encountered her warm skin.īut for some reason I found myself unable to touch her. Yet it didn’t sound like the deep, regular breathing of someone who has fallen asleep. If I stood perfectly still, held my breath and strained to listen, I was able to hear the faintest sound of breathing coming from where she lay. When I went back into the living room my wife was lying down, her legs curled up to her chest, the silence so weighted I might as well have been alone in the room. The loneliness of this cruel season began to make itself felt, seeping from the black opening of the ventilation fan above the bath, leaching out of the white tiles covering the floor and walls. I’d showered only a few hours ago, so my plastic shower slippers were still cold and damp.

The cold snap had continued for several days now, consistently hovering around 14☏. I turned on the bathroom light and went in. I was left alone in the dark kitchen, looking helplessly on as her retreating figure was swallowed up beyond the door.

As she entered the room she stretched out her foot and calmly pushed the door closed. She turned so that her body was facing me, then slowly walked off through the open door into the living room. How long might she have been standing there like that-barefoot, in thin summer nightwear, ramrod straight as though perfectly oblivious to my repeated interrogation? Her face was turned away from me, and she was standing there so unnaturally still it was almost as if she were some kind of ghost, silently standing its ground. On such a night, my wife would ordinarily have hurriedly slipped on a cardigan and searched for her shower slippers. Her thick, naturally black hair was fluffed up, disheveled, and she was wearing her usual white ankle-length nightdress. Her face was submerged in the darkness so I couldn’t make out her expression, but the potential options all filled me with fear. She was standing, motionless, in front of the fridge. Any lingering alcohol-induced drowsiness swiftly passed. It was cold enough as it was, but the sight of my wife was even more chilling. It was around four in the morning, and I’d woken up with a raging thirst from the bottle and a half of soju I’d had with dinner, which also meant I was taking longer to come to my senses than usual. I’d been about to switch on the bathroom light when I was brought up short. A participant of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, Han has won the Yi Sang Literary Prize, the Today’s Young Artist Award, and the Manhae Literary Prize. In 1993 she made her literary debut as a poet, and was first published as novelist in 1994. Han Kang was born in 1970 in South Korea.

The following is from Han Kang's novel, The Vegetarian, translated from the Korean by Deborah Smith.

Han kang's the vegetarian