''The White Book'' (흰) is a 2016 novel by the Korean novelist

Han Kang Han Kang (; born November 27, 1970) is a South Korean writer. She won the Man Booker International Prize for fiction in 2016 for ''The Vegetarian'', a novel about a woman's descent into mental illness and neglect from her family. The novel is ...

which was short-listed for the 2018

Man Booker International Prize The International Booker Prize (formerly known as the Man Booker International Prize) is an international literary award hosted in the United Kingdom. The introduction of the International Prize to complement the Man Booker Prize was announced ...

. The English translation by Deborah Smith was first published by

Portobello Books ''Granta'' is a literary magazine and publisher in the United Kingdom whose mission centres on its "belief in the power and urgency of the story, both in fiction and non-fiction, and the story’s supreme ability to describe, illuminate and ma ...

in 2017. The setting is in post World War II Warsaw, Poland. The book has been described as "a fragmented autobiographical meditation on the death of the unnamed narrator’s baby sister, who died two hours after her birth.". The novel uses an unconventional narrative and short meditations on the color white to discuss grief, loss, and the fragile nature of the human spirit. Kang describes a total of 65 white objects in the book, including rice, sugar cubes, and breast milk.

Main White Objects List

* Swaddling bands * Newborn gown * Salt * Snow * Ice * Moon * Rice * Waves * Yulan * White bird * "Laughing whitely" * Blank paper * White dog * White hair * Shroud

Translation

* Kang, Han. ''The White Book.'' Translated by Smith, Deborah. Portobello Books. ISBN 978-0-525-57306-7

References

21st-century South Korean novels 2016 novels Grief in fiction Portobello Books books {{2010s-hist-novel-stub