Turning vegetarian has devastating consequences

Han Kang's The Vegetarian is both a terrific and a terrifying read about a woman's decision to become a vegetarian 

 

 

One of the best ways to complete a book challenge is to pick up books that are less than 200 pages. Considering The Vegetarian was only 180-odd pages, I thought of a quick read over my bus journey from DC to New York. But what it lacked in quantity was more than ably salvaged in quality. And it will stick with you for a considerable amount of time. I must warn the reader that the book does not talk about the virtues or ethics of becoming a vegetarian. 

 

Set in South Korea, the protagonist one night has a terrible dream with images of blood and brutality. She immediately renounces eating meat and turns vegetarian. This simple decision of hers ends up with profound implications for her husband, her parents, and her sister's family. Everyone in her family beseeches, persuades, coerces, and even threatens her to stop her madness and return to the 'normal' world of eating meat. 

 

Yet it is not the decision of becoming a vegetarian that angers everyone. It is the act of making the decision itself that angers everyone. How can she make such a decision? Does not she know that we, the family, know what is best for her? Such questions are implied in the behavior of her husband and her parents when the protagonist refuses to eat meat. 

 

The book is dark and visceral. The visuals described in the book remain vivid in my mind several days after I read the book. It has themes of control and power, and one woman's struggle to break away from them and in doing so, possibly break herself.