Human Acts LitChart

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Human Acts
explains, “because they always change.” The structure of Human
INTR
INTRODUCTION
ODUCTION Acts, which requires multiple different narrators, narration
from beyond the grave, and the use of the second-person
BRIEF BIOGRAPHY OF HAN KANG
perspective, is rooted in some important modernist and post-
Han Kang was born in Gwangju, South Korea, less than two modernist techniques. The shift in narration is a device perhaps
decades after the end of the Korean War (and just 10 years most frequently associated with William Faulkner (in books like
before the events of the novel). Han’s father, Han Seung-won, As I Lay Dying and Absalom, Absalom), while the use of the
was a celebrated novelist in the 1950s and 1960s who worked second-person perspective is a favorite narrative technique of
as a creative writing teacher in Gwangju before moving with his Italian writer Italo Calvino.
family to Seoul in late 1979. It was during Han’s high school and
college years in Seoul that she started to follow in her father’s
KEY FACTS
footsteps, writing poetry and her debut novel, A Love of Yeosu
(1995). After achieving widespread popularity in Korea, Han • Full Title: Human Acts
rose to international fame with her novel The V Vegetarian
egetarian, • When Written: 2013–2016
written in 2007 and translated to English in 2016, when it won • Where Written: Seoul, South Korea
the Man Booker prize. Han, who also works as a musician,
• When Published: 2016
sculptor, and non-fiction essayist, currently lives and teaches
writing in Seoul. • Literary Period: Contemporary
• Genre: Novel
HISTORICAL CONTEXT • Setting: Gwangju, South Korea
In 1979, South Korean military dictator Park Chung-hee was • Climax: Dong-ho, only in middle school, is killed by South
assassinated. A few months later, on May 17, 1980, Park’s Korean soldiers while trying to peacefully surrender.
mentee Chun Doo-hwan seized power in a military coup, • Antagonist: President Chun Doo-hwan and his military
declaring martial law. In the days before and after this coup, government
students at Chonnam National University in Gwangju staged • Point of View: Various
city-wide, non-violent protests against Doo-hwan’s reign
(known collectively as “the Gwangju uprising,” or the “May 18 EXTRA CREDIT
democratic uprising”). Chun Doo-hwan’s crackdown on these
Literary Lineage. In addition to her father Han Seung-won, Han
protests was swift and brutal, as two army battalions arrived on
Kang’s brother Han Dong-rim has also had a successful career
planes and tanks to silence the activists. Hundreds of civilians
as a writer. And in living up to her father’s literary legacy, Han
were killed, thousands more were injured, and the very phrase
has also snagged many of the same prizes her father won
“5:18 Democratic Uprising” was criminalized. Han’s novel
decades earlier, including the prestigious Yin Sang and Kim
focuses on these weeks in May 1980 when young people rose
Tong-ni literary awards.
up and were massacred, but it also deals with the
reverberations of the 5:18 protests throughout history. In
2013, when Han began to write Human Acts, South Korea was It's All Greek to Me. In Human Acts, Han is fascinated and
being forced to once again grapple with the implications of the horrified by the powers of censorship and forced silence—but
Gwangju uprising, as Park Chung-hee’s daughter Park Geun- interestingly, Han’s most recent novel Greek Lessons, published
hye assumed the presidency (until she was impeached in 2017). in 2023, follows a woman whose silence originates from within.
When the protagonist mysteriously loses her ability to speak,
she decides to study ancient Greek, hoping that the rarely
RELATED LITERARY WORKS
spoken language will teach her to find meaning in silence.
Han frequently cites modernist Korean poets Lim-Chul Woo
and Yi Sang as stylistic influences. She also sees Russian
novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky as an important inspiration, PL
PLO
OT SUMMARY
perhaps because Dostoevsky, like Han, demonstrates a
willingness to bring readers into his characters’ sense of grief It’s May 1980, and Dong-ho is a middle-schooler living in
and dislocation. Having been raised by a prominent author, Gwangju, a city on the southern tip of South Korea. Almost by
however, Han finds herself consistently drawn to new plots and accident, Dong-ho has become involved in the student protests
forms: “it isn’t easy for me to namecheck favorite writers,” she against military dictator Chun Doo-hwan. Alongside fellow
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activists Eun-sook, Seon-ju, and Jin-su, Dong-ho helps clean While in prison, the narrator was forced to share all of his meals
and classify the bodies murdered by state soldiers. Dong-ho with the silent, effeminate Jin-su. Both men are subjected to
takes his job seriously, laying the Taegukgi over the dead and many forms of torture, including one that involves mutilating
lighting candles to honor the corpses. Though most of the their hands with a pen. The narrator contrasts the experience
protestors are students, Dong-ho is the youngest of all, and his of feeling like “raw meat” in prison with the memories of
work worries both his mother and his middle brother. protests, when he felt that he and the crowd of activists shared
A few days ago, Dong-ho watched as soldiers shot down his “the sublime enormity of a single heart.” Over the course of his
best friend, Jeong-dae, in the middle of a mass protest. Last time in prison, the narrator befriends Jin-su and a younger boy
week, Jeong-dae’s sister Jeong-mi (long the object of Dong-ho’s named Yeong-chae. Yeong-chae leads the prisoners in several
affections) disappeared. Dong-ho blames himself for both of small acts of protests, though he also bursts into tears
these losses, obsessing over what happens to people’s whenever he thinks of his favorite sweet treats. In his
“fluttering” souls when they die. Tonight, Chun Doo-hwan’s innocence and courage, Yeong-chae reminds both the narrator
soldiers are coming back into Gwangju, and everyone knows and Jin-su of Dong-ho.
there will be carnage. Dong-ho’s mother pleads with him to Now, Yeong-chae has been institutionalized and Jin-su has
leave the Provincial Office where he works, but Dong-ho killed himself. The narrator, too, has struggled with alcoholism
refuses, promising that he will be home by dinner. and depression, and he lashes out at the professor (Yoon) who
The story shifts perspective, and now Jeong-dae, recently is interviewing him about the Gwangju Uprising. The narrator
murdered, is narrating from beyond the grave. To his horror, believes that the only thing all humans have in common is their
Jeong-dae’s body has been taken to a clearing, where it is ability to be cruel to each other, like “ravening beast[s].”
thrown at the bottom of a pile of corpses. Jeong-dae senses In 2002, Seon-ju is working as an environmental activist. For
that his sister Jeong-mi has also been killed, and he longs to the most part, she is secretive about her role in the Gwangju
punish the soldiers who have murdered her. Though there are protests, ignoring Yoon’s requests for an interview. But when
other souls in this clearing, Jeong-dae cannot figure out how to Seon-ju learns that her old friend, labor activist Seong-hee, has
communicate with any of them. His only hope is to find Dong- fallen gravely ill, she feels newly motivated to tell her story.
ho and watch over his still-living friend. As Seon-ju tries to work up the nerve to visit Seong-hee in the
After a few days, while his body rots and swells and turns black, hospital, she is haunted by regret, her narration interrupted by
Jeong-dae learns that the soldiers have come to burn the pile of a series of confused, half-remembered vignettes (which the
corpses. He is initially relieved, believing that being rid of his novel calls “Up Risings”). Finally, Seon-ju reveals the truth of
body will allow his soul to roam Gwangju more freely. But as his what happened to her in the years after Gwangju: she was
body goes up in smoke, Jeong-dae realizes with despair that sexually assaulted, brutalized to the point that she can no
Dong-ho, too, has been murdered. longer have children or stand any form of sexual intimacy. Seon-
Five years later, Eun-sook is working in a book publisher’s ju blames herself for Dong-ho’s death, wishing she had sent him
office. While working on the company’s latest book, a Korean home instead of merely sharing gimbap with him. But Dong-
translation of some protest plays, Eun-sook is called into the ho’s memory also gives Seon-ju strength, and she resolves to
police station for her involvement in the piece. While at the keep going in tribute to the murdered young boy.
station, the interrogator slaps Eun-sook seven times. For the Eight years later, Dong-ho’s mother still sometimes hallucinates
next week, Eun-sook resolves to forget one slap each day. Dong-ho on the streets of Gwangju. She replays the day of her
Though years have passed, Eun-sook is still haunted by her son’s death, wondering if she could have done more to bring
memories of the Gwangju massacre, so she rarely leaves her him home and resenting the other young activists for refusing
house other than to go to work. to let her grab Dong-ho before the killing began. Dong-ho’s
At the end of the week, Eun-sook brings the book to the mother also laments renting out the annex of their family hanok
censor’s office. She is horrified to see that the censors have to Jeong-dae and Jeong-mi, though she knows Dong-ho’s
blotted out entire pages (even though usually they only cross friendship with Jeong-dae was a highlight of his life.
out a few words). But the play’s producer, Mr. Seo, is firm that Dong-ho’s older brother has moved away, but usually when he
the show will go on, honoring the victims of Gwangju even visits, he and the middle brother fight, blaming each other for
though Chun Doo-hwan’s government is still in power. When Dong-ho’s death. Meanwhile, Dong-ho’s mother gets to know
Eun-sook attends the premiere, she sees the actors silently other grieving parents, and they join together to protest,
mouthing the censored words. One young actor, wearing despite arrests and injuries. After Dong-ho’s father dies,
trackpants, reminds her of Dong-ho. however, Dong-ho’s mother loses steam. Now, all she can do is
Five more years pass, and an unnamed narrator reflects on the remember, thinking back to the poems Dong-ho used to create.
months that he was imprisoned for protesting in Gwangju. In 2013, the writer—a stand-in for author Han Kang herself—is

beginning to write a book about the Gwangju protests, told Jeong-dae – Jeong-dae is Jeong-mi’s little brother and Dong-
from the perspective of Dong-ho and those who loved him. The ho’s best friend. Like Dong-ho, Jeong-dae is small for his age,
writer has a personal connection to the uprising: her family and the novel often emphasizes that the trackpants he always
used to live in the hanok that they then sold to Dong-ho’s wears are far too big for him. Before the outbreak of the
parents. Though the writer moved to Seoul a few months Gwangju protests, Jeong-dae is a troublemaker, taking odd jobs
before the protests began, the writer’s father stayed in touch behind his sister’s back and playing pranks on his schoolmates.
with many friends in Gwangju. He and Dong-ho are also constantly competing in badminton,
The more the writer studies the Gwangju protests, visiting the cracking each other up as they play. Jeong-dae is killed early in
5:18 Research Institute and the house where she used to live, the Gwangju violence, and he narrates the rest of the 5:18
the more she becomes obsessed with Dong-ho and the pain he uprising from beyond the grave, as his soul looks with disgust
suffered. Before she leaves Gwangju, the writer visits Dong- on his decomposing body. Dong-ho, who was present when
ho’s grave, lighting a candle to pay her respects. Jeong-dae was shot, to some extent holds himself responsible
for his friend’s death—and so much of Dong-ho’s volunteer
work at the Provincial Office is motivated by his memories of
CHARA
CHARACTERS
CTERS his beloved Jeong-dae.
Jeong-mi – Jeong-mi is Jeong-dae’s sister. She and her brother
Dong-ho – Dong-ho, the central character in Human Acts, is a
rent out the annex in Dong-ho’s hanok. Jeong-mi is remarkably
middle schooler in Gwangju at the time of the 5:18 uprising.
stubborn, bossing her brother around and pushing herself to
After Dong-ho’s best friend Jeong-dae is killed, Dong-ho begins
her limits in factory work to fund his education. She is also
volunteering at the Provincial Office alongside Eun-sook, Seon-
pretty—Dong-ho harbors a secret crush on her—and prone to
ju, and Jin-su, helping to honor and classify the corpses of
jokes, often delighting in Jeong-dae’s goofiest pranks. Though
murdered protestors. Dong-ho’s remarkable bravery and
Jeong-mi has had to sacrifice her own education in order to
ability to keep calm under pressure is contrasted by some of his
finance her brother’s schooling, she dreams of being a doctor,
more youthful traits: the trackpants that are too big for him, an impossibility that still haunts her old friend Seon-ju many
the delight he takes in sponge cakes and gimbap, and the years after Jeong-mi’s death. Jeong-mi disappears in the early
innocent crush he has on Jeong-mi. When Dong-ho, carried weeks of the Gwangju uprising. Years later, Dong-ho’s mother
away by the sentiment of the crowd, resolves to stay in the finds conclusive evidence that Jeong-mi was killed in the first
Provincial Office even as Chun Doo-hwan’s soldiers return, he round of state violence.
does not seem to realize that he is condemning himself to an
almost certain death. Years after his death, Eun-sook is haunted Eun-sook – Eun-sook is a high-school volunteer at the Gwangju
by his face the last time she saw him, as she could tell he Provincial Office during the time of the 5:18 uprising. She is the
“wanted to live.” After Dong-ho’s death, nearly every other only one of the characters who leaves the office the night state
character in the novel (from Dong-ho’s mother to his still- soldiers return, escaping to a nearby hospital to wait out the
vengeful middle brother to silent Jin-su) blames themselves for carnage. In the aftermath, she feels guilt about leaving and
his death. But in telling his story, each character also preserves about not doing anything to protect Dong-ho. Years later, the
Dong-ho’s memory, allowing him to live beyond the horrific once-cheerful Eun-sook is a private, quiet young woman, with
violence that killed him. no friends or lovers. She spends all her time at home or working
at a publishing house, reporting to a timid publisher and
The Writer – The writer, closely based on Human Acts author collaborating with a controversial translator. Still, Eun-sook
Han Kang herself, is a novelist. The writer was born in Gwangju, continues to resist in quieter ways, helping to produce a slate of
living in a hanok there until she was nine. When the writer’s potentially seditious plays even when she faces interrogation
father moved the family to Seoul, Dong-ho’s family bought the and violence for doing so.
house and moved in. As a little girl, the writer saw herself in
parallel to Dong-ho, hearing snippets of conversation about Jin-su – Jin-su is the unspoken leader of the student organizers
this bright, creative young boy who had been shot down in the during the 5:18 uprising. He is also a boss, mentor, and support
Gwangju riots. Now, as an adult, the writer returns to Gwangju, system for Dong-ho, Eun-sook, and Seon-ju. Jin-su advises
determined to capture Dong-ho’s story (and to share the larger Dong-ho to leave the Provincial Office when Chun Doo-hwan’s
narrative of the 5:18 uprising with the world). The writer ends soldiers return to Gwangju. When Dong-ho refuses, Jin-su tells
the narrative by traveling to Dong-ho’s grave, lighting a candle him to surrender. Still, Jin-su blames himself for Dong-ho’s
to honor this young boy she never knew. As the candle death, a loss that haunts him long into adulthood. After being
“flutter[s]” in the wind, the writer imagines that she feels a imprisoned and tortured alongside an unnamed narrator and
connection to Dong-ho’s soul, kept alive by her words of the young Yeong-chae, Jin-su loses faith completely, slipping
memory and testimony. into a life of depression and alcoholism. After Yeong-chae is
institutionalized for a violent outburst, Jin-su wonders what

the point of existence is; “it was only when we were shattered,” organizing tactics (which include large-scale sit-ins and having
he reflects, “that we proved we had souls.” Unable to bear the young women strip naked in protest). Seong-hee frequently
brutality that he and his closest friends have been subjected to, pushes Seon-ju to tell the story of her experience in the
Jin-su kills himself in 1990, 10 years after the uprising. Gwangju uprisings, and Seon-ju feels that Seong-hee is judging
The Narr
Narrator
ator – The unnamed narrator is one of the oldest her. By the end of Seon-ju’s narrative, Seong-hee and Seon-ju
student protestors working at the Provincial Office during the are estranged, and Seong-hee is in the hospital, aware that
5:18 uprising. The narrator is imprisoned alongside Jin-su and death is likely on the horizon.
Yeong-chae and forced to share her meager portions of food Dong-ho
Dong-ho’s ’s Mother – Dong-ho’s mother is the mother of the
with Jin-su. Though the narrator initially resents Jin-su because older brother, the middle brother, and Dong-ho. She is also
of their small rations, the two men bond after they are released married to (and then eventually widowed by) Dong-ho’s father.
and find themselves unable to shake their memories of brutal Decades after Dong-ho’s death, Dong-ho’s mother still shapes
torture. After Yeong-chae is institutionalized and Jin-su kills her days around her beloved son, following a little boy through
himself, the professor Yoon tries to interview the narrator—but the streets of Gwangju simply because his trackpants remind
though the narrator shares his testimony, he lashes out, unable her of her son. But though her grief is sometimes paralyzing, it
to contemplate why Jin-su died but he is still alive. Throughout is also energizing: toward the end of Chun Doo-hwan’s tenure,
his recollections of his time in prison, the narrator considers Dong-ho’s mother joins forces with other bereaved parents to
how torture—specifically the pain inflicted on him with a fancy protest, fighting back even when she is taken to jail or tear-
pen—is used to reduce human beings into nothing more than gassed. Dong-ho’s mother is also committed to remembering
“filthy stinking bodies,” devoid of pride or “conscience.” At the her son beyond his involvement in the uprising—she also
same time, he marvels at the way crowds of protestors can find remembers him as a young boy, writing short poems and
strength and clarity in their shared experiences—insight that playing in the flowers.
not one of them could achieve on their own. The Older Brother – The older brother is the eldest child of
Yeong-chae – Yeong-chae is the youngest person imprisoned Dong-ho’s father and Dong-ho’s mother; he is a few years older
alongside Jin-su and the unnamed narrator. In his youth and than the middle brother, and 11 years older than Dong-ho. The
bravery, Yeong-chae reminds Jin-su (often painfully) of Dong- older brother is very intelligent and cheerful, and though he
ho. Yeong-chae tends to waver between adult strength and moves to Seoul for work, he continues to visit Dong-ho’s
childlike innocence: he might lead the other prisoners in a mother regularly into her old age. The older brother was very
beautiful, forbidden version of the national anthem, risking attached to Dong-ho in his infancy, and he resents the middle
death, only to collapse into tears moments later at the mention brother for not doing more to protect Dong-ho that day at the
of his favorite sweet foods (Fanta and sponge cake). Ten years Provincial Office.
after they were all jailed and tortured together, Jin-su reveals The Middle Brother – The middle brother is the second child of
to the narrator that Yeong-chae has gone mad, ending up Dong-ho’s father and Dong-ho’s mother. He is not as successful
institutionalized after a violent outbreak. as his older brother, who moves to Seoul, and he struggles with
Seon-ju – Seon-ju is one of the students who worked in the survivor’s guilt following Dong-ho’s death. Though the middle
Provincial Office, dealing with the corpses left by the Gwangju brother remains in Gwangju his entire life, working at a “cram
massacre and protesting against Chun Doo-hwan. Unlike most school” (a private tutoring company), he is reluctant to visit
of the other protestors, Seon-ju’s entire life has been defined home. The older brother blames the middle brother for Dong-
by various forms of activism. Before the Gwangju protests, ho’s death, believing that he could have done more to bring
Seon-ju worked alongside her close friend Seong-hee, Dong-ho home from the Provincial Office on that fateful night.
organizing for labor rights. After the protests, Seon-ju goes to Dong-ho’s mother notes that the middle brother has
work at an environmental organization, helping to advocate internalized this sense of guilt: he is constantly angry and
against the use of radioactive substances. Whenever she is agitated. And even decades later, the middle brother cannot let
jailed for these various forms of resistance, Seon-ju is go of his wish for revenge on the soldiers who killed Dong-ho.
brutalized and sexually assaulted, leaving her unable to have Dong-ho
Dong-ho’s ’s Father – Dong-ho’s father is married to Dong-ho’s
children or even conceive of intimacy with men. When Yoon mother, and he is a parent to the older brother, the middle
asks to interview Seon-ju for his oral history, she is initially brother, and Dong-ho himself. The novel generally suggests
reluctant. But memories of the fearless Seong-hee, now in the that Dong-ho’s father is sweet and reserved, not getting swept
hospital, eventually encourage her to speak up. into either grief or protest to the same extent that his wife
Seong-hee – Seong-hee is a prominent labor activist in the does. Dong-ho’s father falls sick and dies in the late 1990s,
1970s, as well as a close friend (and mentor) to Seon-ju. By the making his wife a widow.
1990s, Seong-hee has become a hero to progressive South President Chun Doo-h
Doo-hwan
wan – President Chun Doo-hwan ruled
Koreans like Park Yeong-ho, largely because of her radical

South Korea as a military dictator from the fall of 1980 to the others—specifically the narrator—continue to distrust the
winter of 1988. After being primed for office by his equally professor even after they share testimony with him.
dictatorial predecessor, Park Chung-hee, Chun seized power in Park Y
Yeong-ho
eong-ho – Park Yeong-ho is Seon-ju’s boss at the activist
a military coup on May 17, 1980, prompting the 5:18 uprising environmental organization where she now works. Yeong-ho is
in Gwangju. Chun’s crackdown on the uprising was brutal, with younger than Seon-ju, and he looks up to her because he knows
hundreds of civilians (many of them young people) murdered she used to organize and protest with famed labor activist
and thousands more left injured and traumatized. Throughout Seong-hee. Yeong-ho is the only one of Seon-ju’s colleagues
the novel, many of the characters reflect on the gap between with whom she has any real relationship, and he often sweetly
Chun’s sleek appearance and the brutality he and his teases her about her impeccable work ethic.
government are capable of.
Jeong-dae
Jeong-dae’s ’s Father – Jeong-dae’s father, also father to Jeong-
The Interrogator – The interrogator works at Eun-sook’s local mi, arrives in Gwangju soon after he hears the news that his
police station. When he learns that Eun-sook has worked with children have disappeared. Though it is evident to everyone
the wanted translator to publish a controversial play in Korean, that Jeong-dae and Jeong-mi have been killed, Jeong-dae’s
he slaps her seven times, startling her with his brutality. For a father refuses to accept this, searching for them during the
week, Eun-sook remains haunted by these slaps; she especially days and drinking to excess at night. Dong-ho’s mother sees
struggles with the fact that the interrogator looks “utterly Jeong-dae’s father as a kind of mirror to herself: though both
ordinary”; “had they met on the street,” Eun-sook thinks, “she are destroyed by their grief for their murdered children, only
would have taken him for some run-of-the-mill company Dong-ho’s mother is able to accept reality and use her grief as a
manager.” tool of change.
The TTrranslator – The translator is a mild-mannered man who The Writer’s Father – The writer’s father is a creative writing
helps translate the controversial play Eun-sook is working on teacher in Gwangju. Though he moves the writer and the rest
into Korean. The translator is wanted by South Korean of her family to Seoul just a few months before the Gwangju
authorities in Chun Doo-hwan’s regime, but he has thus far uprising, the writer’s father stays in touch with old friends in his
managed to escape detection. The whole time Eun-sook is former city, getting news about the 5:18 protests and the
meeting with the translator, she is struck by how polite and horrors that followed. The writer’s father is likely based on Han
deferential he is to her, even though he is many years her Kang’s real father, the celebrated South Korean author Han
senior. Seung-won.
The Publisher – The publisher is Eun-sook’s boss at the
publishing house. He is depicted as a somewhat cowardly man,
as he lets Eun-sook take the blame—and the violence that TERMS
comes with it—for working with the criminalized translator. But
Gimbap – Gimbap (sometimes anglicized as kimbap) is a
by the end of Eun-sook’s narrative, the publisher is working to
popular Korean snack. Usually consisting of rice, carrots,
overcome his fear, printing the plays Mr. Seo wants to produce
pickled radish, cucumber, and tuna or ham, gimbap are rolled in
even though he knows it will mean trouble.
seaweed to form sushi-shaped bites. Because of their size and
Mr
Mr.. Seo – Mr. Seo is the producer of the controversial play Eun- seaweed wrappers, gimbap are good on the go, which perhaps
sook is trying to get published. Though he shares Eun-sook’s explains why they are such a popular snack in the throes of the
despair at the state’s censorship of the play—entire pages have Gwangju protests.
been blotted out with ink-rollers—he works with the publisher
Hanok – The word hanok refers to a traditional Korean
to circumvent the government’s prohibition. Eventually, Mr.
architectural style. Hanoks in Gwangju were often L-shaped,
Seo stages the play, having the actors mouth the blotted-out
with a central courtyard and a small annex. In the novel, Dong-
lines rather than say them out loud. This seditious act could
ho’s family buys a hanok from the writer’s family, moving in and
potentially mean imprisonment or torture for Mr. Seo, but Eun-
sook finds this version of the play especially galvanizing and renting out the annex to Jeong-mi and Jeong-dae. Later in life,
beautiful. the writer laments that the peaceful stone hanok of her
childhood has been torn down, replaced by more modern
The Professor/Y
Professor/Yoon
oon – The professor, later revealed to be development.
named Yoon, is working on an oral history of the Gwangju
Pro
Provincial
vincial Office – The Old Jeonnam Provincial Office
uprising (what he calls a “psychological autopsy”). The
(sometimes also known as the South Jeolla Provincial Office)
professor is slowly interviewing all the surviving student
was the seat of the Gwangju municipal government. In the
protestors, though he often meets resistance from those most
1980 uprising, the Provincial Office became the center of
traumatized, like Seon-ju. Though some survivors decide that
student-led protests. It is fitting, then, that in Human Acts, the
bearing “witness” to the 5:18 massacre should be the priority,
Provincial Office is the place where Dong-ho first meets fellow

activists Jin-su, Eun-sook, and Seon-ju. “clear edges.” For better or for worse, Human Acts suggests,
Taegukgi – Since 1948, the Taegukgi (also anglicized as the crowds always erase individuality.
Taegeuk) has been the national flag of South Korea. The flag’s On the level of plot, this loss of self is a great tragedy, as crowds
white background represents the land South Korea sits on, of soldiers murder crowds of protestors (including Jeong-dae,
while the blue and red circle at the center is meant to symbolize his sister Jeong-mi, and the novel’s young protagonist Dong-
the Korean people. The four sets of black lines, one in each ho). But on a structural level, the novel demonstrates that
corner, represent the nation’s government. In the novel, the connection and commitment to a shared caused can preserve
Taegukgi is used in funerals for murdered protestors, a ritual an individual even beyond the bounds of their physical life. Each
that confuses Dong-ho, as it was the government of the nation chapter in the narrative, spanning from 1980 to 2013, pauses
the flags represent that killed the protestors. to honor Dong-ho, giving details about the way he spoke and
5:18 – Because Chun Doo-hwan’s military government dressed and laughed. Therefore, even as Dong-ho is killed in
officially came to power on May 17, 1980, the anti-Chun Doo- part because he loses himself in the swell of a crowd, his
hwan protests in Gwangju were often collectively known as the figurative inclusion in a crowd of activists, artists, and
May 18 uprising. Under Chun Doo-hwan’s reign, the phrase protestors who tell his story throughout Human Acts,
“5:18” was forbidden in South Korea, as it was seen as determined to give his life and death meaning, ultimately
seditious. In more recent years, however, May 18 has become a preserves and extends his memory.
National Day of Remembrance for those lost in the Gwangju
massacre. Moreover, as the writer sees when she returns BODIES AND VULNERABILITY
home to Gwangju, there are now a number of buildings Han Kang’s 2014 novel Human Acts, which follows
dedicated to studying this history, like the 5:18 Research a group of protestors in the years after the 1980
Institute. Gwangju uprising, is full of descriptions of bodies in
distress. Dong-ho, the novel’s murdered protagonist, spends
his middle-school years cleaning and categorizing corpses,
THEMES noting how death swells toes and whitens faces. Seon-ju, who
In LitCharts literature guides, each theme gets its own color- spends her life moving from activist group to the next, can
coded icon. These icons make it easy to track where the themes comprehend complex labor and environmental issues—but she
occur most prominently throughout the work. If you don't have can never wrap her head around the way that soldiers
a color printer, you can still use the icons to track themes in brutalized young women’s “naked bodies,” which she once
black and white. believed to be “almost sacred.” An unnamed narrator, tortured
in prison for months, reflects that the soldiers’ goal is to reduce
him to “raw meat,” stealing his sense of personhood and
HUMAN CONNECTION replacing it with the sense that he is only a “filthy, stinking
Human Acts, Han Kang’s 2014 novel about the body.” And Jeong-dae, a young activist whose ghost narrates a
1980 Gwangju uprising, is filled with scenes section of the novel, feels similarly ashamed of his corporeal
depicting crowds. Some depict protestors chanting form, now simply one more body at the bottom of a pile.
and singing in unison, refusing to bend to the tyranny of then-
But as Jeong-dae learns when he is reduced to nothing but a
president Chun Doo-hwan, In others, crowds of soldiers rush
flitting soul, even in death, one cannot escape their own flesh
to fire their guns, encouraging one another to kill more
and blood. For nearly all of the characters in Human Acts, bodies
innocents. Elsewhere, the novel depicts crowds of corpses piled
are a source not only of pain but of vulnerability: the
together for group funerals. In each case, the narrative
imprisoned narrator makes false confessions just to make the
suggests that individual people transform in crowds, becoming
torture stop, while book publisher Eun-sook, determined to
capable of acts of bravery or brutality they could never achieve
publish controversial texts, loses her will after being slapped
on their own. One such individual is an unnamed narrator,
seven times in a row. But even as the novel illustrates the
imprisoned alongside Gwangju activist Jin-su, who spends his
vulnerability of the body, it also suggests that bodily
time in jail reflecting on the bravery he felt in a crowd. “I
experiences are unavoidable and unignorable. By emphasizing
remember feeling that it was alright to die,” the narrator thinks,
bodily vulnerability, Human Acts highlights the fragility of life.
because he felt “the blood of a hundred thousand hearts
For the protestors in Han’s novel, pain, physical humiliation,
surging together […] the sublime enormity of a single heart,
and death are always just around the corner. In light of this,
pushing blood into my own.” Similarly, Jeong-dae, who speaks in
then, it becomes critically important to choose to regard all life
the novel only as a ghost, experiences a more tragic version of
with dignity and respect. Conversely, failing to do so, as the
this loss of self: thrown at the bottom of a pile of dead bodies,
book’s depictions of violence and trauma repeatedly show,
he muses that he has “crumbled into ambiguity,” losing his own
devalues life, reducing characters to mere “raw meat” rather

than people with individual aspirations, quirks, and strengths. Even faced with extreme violence, Dong-ho and Yeong-chae,
another young protestor, cannot stop thinking about their
LANGUAGE, MEMORY, AND POWER favorite sweet treats: Dong-ho wolfs down sponge cake, while
Yeong-chae stays steely-eyed as he is tortured but breaks
Throughout Human Acts, Han Kang’s novel about
down while thinking about Sprite. By returning so frequently to
the 1980 Gwangju uprising, language emerges as a
these poignant images of youth, Human Acts reminds readers
powerful tool of resistance and memory. A
that children like Jeong-dae, Dong-ho, and Yeong-chae were
professor named Yoon, determined to publish a true account of
not necessarily conscious political actors, nor were they always
the harrowing protests, insists that only through oral history
aware of the danger they were getting into—“you wanted to
can survivors “bear witness” to the pain they experienced in the
live,” fellow activist Eun-sook recalls about Dong-ho,
past. Theatrical producer Mr. Seo skirts government
remembering how his eyelids trembled with fear. The novel
restrictions, causing a mass of protest poems to rain down on
examines the tragic losses during the Gwangju protests from
audience members even after the state forbids the text of his
many different angles. Above all, however, the novel
play. And the character of the writer—a stand-in for Han Kang
demonstrates the utter horror of the South Korean
herself—uses language to remember the dead protestors the
government’s violence against children. Human Acts also
state would rather erase from history. “Write your book,” one
suggests that what may seem like courage in the novel’s young
interviewee tells her, “so that no one will ever be able to
characters is more akin to naivety, as the story’s central young
desecrate my brother’s memory ever again.” In other words,
boys struggle to understand the potentially dangerous
language can heal, preserve, and correct injustice.
consequences of their acts of protest.
It follows, therefore, that throughout the novel, the South
Korean government sees squashing language as an important
AFTERLIFE AND THE SOUL
imperative. State-sponsored soldiers beat and brutalize
students and young activists merely for the text on their fliers. Many times in Han Kang’s novel Human Acts,
Government censors block whole pages of text, using ink survivors and victims of the 1980 Gwangju uprising
rollers to erase any idea they consider seditious. When activist contemplate what happens after death. Some
Jin-su is tortured (alongside young Yeong-Chae and an disillusioned characters, like an unnamed narrator who spends
unnamed narrator), the interrogators use a pen as a weapon, years being tortured in prison, believe that humans are only
symbolically suggesting the force of language . In the story, it’s “filthy, stinking bodies,” existing in the flesh or not at all. But
more often the case that the government succeeds in silencing other characters disagree. At the very beginning of the story,
speech, frightening characters away from giving words to their young protagonist Dong-ho recalls seeing his grandmother die:
pain and anger. But even as Human Acts illustrates the state’s “something seemed to flutter up from her face,” he thinks, a
very real ability to silence its citizens, the fact of the book’s “winged thing” that he recognizes as a soul. After vicious state
existence testifies to the power of language to overcome even soldiers murder Dong-ho, many of his loved ones echo this idea
the worst violence. The novel ends with the writer standing in a of a “fluttering” soul, feeling Dong-ho’s presence as they walk
graveyard, paying her respects to an activist named Dong-ho down the street or look at blooming flowers. And crucially, the
who was murdered while still in middle school. Just by reading narrative itself affirms this existence of a soul. The novel ends
the novel, this final scene suggests, readers are remembering when a character known only as “the writer,” a stand-in for Han
Dong-ho. In this way, then, language returns to Dong-ho—and herself, mourns at Dong-ho’s grave; as she stands there, she
to the novel’s other silenced characters—some of the life and stares at a flickering candle, a “fluttering […] translucent wing”
power that the state’s violence and censorship took from him. that, as in Dong-ho’s earlier framing, signifies the presence of
this young boy’s soul. Perhaps more radically, the second
chapter of Human Acts is narrated by Jeong-dae, one of Dong-
YOUTH, COURAGE, AND NAIVETY
ho’s friends—but since Jeong-dae has already been murdered,
Many of the characters in Human Acts, Han Kang’s he speaks only as his soul.
2014 book about the 1980 Gwangju protests,
Emphasizing the presence of a tangible afterlife functions on a
become activists—and lose their lives for doing
practical level, allowing Han to make important formal leaps:
so—while still children. On the one hand, the novel emphasizes
she can have Jeong-dae speak from beyond the grave or give
the bravery that boys like Dong-ho and Jeong-dae, not yet in
Dong-ho’s mother an opportunity to commune with her long-
high school, possess. But on the other hand, Han’s prose
lost son. But more than that, this insistence on the reality of
consistently demonstrates just how undeveloped these boys
souls is an act of literary resistance, suggesting that the souls of
really were. When Dong-ho is killed, he is wearing his school
the protestors the repressive state tried to exterminate can live
gym uniform of a sweater and trackpants. Because he is still so
on in Han’s work.
small, the clothes don’t fit him, hanging off his body “like a sack.”

translucent wing.” The writer’s language is clear: by honoring
SYMBOLS Dong-ho’s memory in this way, she has allowed Dong-ho’s soul
to momentarily take shape on earth, “fluttering” in the candle’s
Symbols appear in teal text throughout the Summary and
flame much like his grandmother’s did all those years ago.
Analysis sections of this LitChart.
TRACKPANTS PENS AND INK

In Human Acts, author Han Kang presents language
In Human Acts, the trackpants that Dong-ho and
as a powerful tool of protest and resistance—so it is
Jeong-dae wear symbolize the youthful innocence
perhaps a surprise that in the novel, pens and ink are almost
that was destroyed during the Gwangju massacre. Even for
always associated with violence. The unnamed narrator and
middle schoolers, both Dong-ho and Jeong-dae are small for
Jin-su, both taken prisoner after the Gwangju uprising, suffer
their age, meaning the exercise suits they wear as gym uniforms
when armed guards use expensive Monami Biro pens for
hang off them. But these oversized trackpants, initially
excruciating forms of torture. And for Eun-sook, who is working
representative of these boys’ normal, playful, childhood (and of
covertly to publish dissident plays, looking at the pages the
their physical vulnerability) take on new meaning after the 5:18
state censor’s ink-roller has erased feels like being “burned.” On
crackdown. When soldiers shoot down Jeong-dae during a
the one hand, then, pens and ink symbolize Chun Doo-hwan’s
protest, Dong-ho can only identify his friend’s corpse by its pair
dictatorial efforts to silence any disagreement: he blots out
of “light blue tracksuit bottoms, identical to [his] own.” Later,
protest art, rips up activists’ fliers and posters, and tortures
after Dong-ho has been similarly murdered, everyone from
those who speak against him until they feel “utterly devoid of
Dong-ho’s mother to the writer herself pictures the beloved
anything that could be said to resemble humanity.”
boy in his oversized trackpants, an image that speaks to the
adolescent phase Dong-ho was in when his was life was taken. But on the other hand, Chun Doo-hwan’s commitment to
Yet if the recurring symbolism of trackpants symbolizes the destroying language also reflects the power words have to
tragedy of youth cut short, it also provides a sense of strength create real change. Even though the actors in the play Eun-sook
and continuity to those who outlive Dong-ho. When the writer works on are only allowed to mouth their lines, the shapes of
gets caught in a snowbank, she pictures Dong-ho in his the words are still enough to energize an entire audience.
trackpants and finds herself newly able to withstand the cold. Dong-ho’s mother, mourning her son, redraws every set of
And when Eun-sook sees a young male actor wearing a posters that Chun doo-hwan’s soldiers shred, eventually
tracksuit, the memories of Dong-ho embolden her: “scalding helping to unseat the dictator. And Han Kang, by concluding
tears burn from [her] eyes” at the sight, “but she does not look her novel with a focus on the writer, a fictional stand-in for Han
away.” In other words, trackpants represent the inhumanity of herself, emphasizes that language continues to bring justice to
Dong-ho and Jeong-dae’s murders, but they also represent the the victims of state violence. After all, readers of Human Acts
way the boys’ memories ignite and inspire those that survived are encountering this story through words, thus helping to
them. remember a historical reality that Chun Doo-hwan is now
powerless to erase.
CANDLES
Throughout Han Kang’s novel Human Acts, candles QUO
QUOTES
TES
symbolize the souls of the dead. Early on, when he
Note: all page numbers for the quotes below refer to the
is still working at the Provincial Office, Dong-ho implores Jin-su
Hogarth edition of Human Acts published in 2017.
to get candles for all the corpses, hoping to honor the dead (and
eliminate the smell of decay). Moreover, though Dong-ho does
not explicitly make the connection, the appearance of a candle’s
flickering flame also reminds him of his grandmother’s death,
when “something”—which he later reflects must have been her
soul—“seemed to flutter up from her face, like a bird escaping.”
As the story progresses, characters like Jeong-dae and Jin-su
will echo this belief in the soul as a “fluttering” thing, impossible
to touch yet tangibly present. In the final moments of the novel,
the writer, having traveled to Dong-ho’s grave, lights a candle
for the murdered young boy, just as Dong-ho used to do for the
murdered protestors back in 1980. As the candle flames, the
writer notes its “wavering outline, fluttering like a bird’s

Chapter 1: The Boy, 1980 Quotes

between these two ways of being in a crowd. Repeatedly,
Why would you sing the national anthem for people the novel will assert that crowds can bring out both the best
who've been killed by soldiers? Why cover the coffin with the and worst in people, sometimes nullifying morals and
Taegukgi? As though it wasn't the nation itself that had sometimes encouraging selflessness. Importantly, Dong-ho
murdered them. […] here frames “the nation” as the ultimate crowd. With the
“But the generals are rebels, they seize power unlawfully. You right leader in place, a nation can be liberatory, becoming
must have seen it: people being beaten and stabbed in broad the South Korea that Eun-sook tries to celebrate with the
daylight, and even shot. The ordinary soldiers were following anthem and the Taegukgi. But with the wrong person in
the orders of their superiors. How can you call them the charge, the nation becomes a brutal, unthinking, murdering
nation?” mob.
You found this confusing, as though it had answered an entirely
different question to the one you wanted to ask. The national
anthem rang out like a circular refrain, one verse clashing with “Let’s go home,” she says. You give your wrist a violent
another against the constant background of weeping, and you wrench, trying to shake free of her grip. The insistent,
listened with bated breath to the subtle dissonance this desperate strength in that grip is frightening, somehow, making
created. As though this, finally, might help you understand what you think of someone drowning. You have to use your other
the nation really was. hand to pry her fingers away, one by one. “The army is coming.
Let’s go home, now.”
Related Characters: Eun-sook (speaker), Dong-ho, […] You turn around and call back to her: “We’re going to close
President Chun Doo-hwan up here at six, Mum.” […] You call again, louder this time: “Once
we've closed up, I'll come home. I promise.”
Related Themes: […] “Make sure you do,” she says. “Be back before the sun sets.
We’ll all have dinner together.”
Page Number: 17
Explanation and Analysis Related Characters: Dong-ho, Dong-ho’s Mother

As the students of Gwangju protest Chun Doo-hwan—and (speaker), The Middle Brother
mourn those killed by his militant regime—young Dong-ho
wonders why the South Korean national anthem plays such Related Themes:
a role in these funerals. His confusion is reasonable: it’s the
state, which the South Korean national anthem and the Page Number: 44
Taegukgi (the Korean national flag) honors, that ordered Explanation and Analysis
and paid for the violence that killed the dead. And even if, as
Eun-sook argues, the “ordinary soldiers” are merely Though Dong-ho knows that soldiers plan to re-invade
“following […] orders,” the crowd of soldiers killing people in Gwangju later tonight, he insists on staying at the Provincial
the square is ostensibly doing so in the name of the nation’s Office to help deal with the corpses, ignoring his mother
leader. and middle brother’s most desperate pleas. This poignant
exchange juxtaposes Dong-ho’s courageous decision to stay
On the one hand, then, Dong-ho’s hesitance to embrace the behind—even if it means facing almost certain death—with
national anthem shows the danger inherent in crowds: his youthful innocence. In scolding Dong-ho to be home for
when these soldiers come together, “ordinary” men are dinner, Dong-ho’s mother plays out a familiar parent-child
transformed into a seamlessly brutal whole. But on the scene; she has likely made the same request dozens of
other hand, Eun-sook believes that by joining her voice to times, when Dong-ho stayed out too late playing badminton
sing the national anthem alongside her fellow protestors, with Jeong-dae or got caught up in his studying. But now
she can reclaim what “the nation” really is. Instead of seeing the stakes are life and death, a warping that speaks to just
crowd psychology as a source of violence, as Chun does, how much all the normal routines of Dong-ho’s childhood
Eun-sook and the other young activists find strength in this have been interrupted.
chorus, taking comfort in standing—and singing—in
solidarity with others. It is also worth noting how Dong-ho’s uses of the pronoun
“we” and “we’re” contrasts with his mother’s use of “we” to
It is telling that Dong-ho finds “dissonance” (“clashing”) not refer to their family unit. Tellingly, the “we” in question here
only between these two ways of viewing the nation but

is not Dong-ho’s family but the group of protestors that has now feels these “translucent” souls around him. A candle is
become a different sort of family to Dong-ho. And though one form of memory, this literary framing seems to suggest,
many of the other young activists are near-total strangers but the novel itself can be another one.
to Dong-ho, he now chooses to stay with this group rather
than go home, choosing his sense of commitment to the
crowd over comfort, safety, and even love for his family. Chapter 2: The Boy’s Friend, 1980 Quotes
Burning my tongue on a steamed potato my sister gave
me, blowing on it hastily and juggling it in my mouth.
Bending down to remove the cloth, your gaze is arrested Flesh of a watermelon grainy as sugar, the glistening black
by the sight of the translucent candle wax creeping down seeds I didn’t bother to pick out.
below the bluish flame.
Racing back to the house where my sister was waiting, my
How long do souls linger by the side of their bodies? jacket zipped up over a parcel of chrysanthemum bread, feet
Do they really flutter away like some kind of bird? Is that what entirely numb with cold, the bread blazing hot against my heart.
trembles the edges of the candle flame? Yearning to be taller.
To be able to do forty push-ups in a row.
Related Characters: Dong-ho, Jeong-dae
For the time when I would hold a woman in my arms.
Related Themes:
Related Characters: Jeong-dae (speaker), Jeong-mi
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Page Number: 46
Page Number: 59
Explanation and Analysis
Earlier, Dong-ho reflected on the “fluttering,” bird-like
presence that seemed to fly away from his grandmother’s In the present, Jeong-dae’s floating soul looks on as his
body when she died. Now, as he studies the corpses of murdered, mutilated body languishes in a pile of other
people the state soldiers killed, he wonders if these bodies corpses. As he tries to distract himself from his horrifying
have similarly “fluttering” souls, looking down with shock at reality, Jeong-dae finds solace in quotidian memories: of
their brutalized “bodies.” eating too quickly and burning his tongue, of rushing home
through the rain. These little recollections of normal
To some extent, this is a dismaying thought—as Jeong-dae
physical discomfort have paradoxically now become
will learn in the next chapter, there is nothing more
comforting, reminding Jeong-dae of a time when his body
terrifying than being forced to “linger” long enough to come
could fuel him rather than merely tethering his soul to this
to terms with one’s own bodily vulnerability. But there is
awful place.
also something resilient and expansive in Dong-ho’s belief
that death does not necessarily mean the complete First, then, this passage suggests that memory can be
destruction of a person’s individual self. In conflating the rejuvenating, providing emotional sustenance even when
“flutter[ing]” soul with the forces that “trembles the edges the body itself fails to work. Second, in remembering his
of the candle flame,” Dong-ho ascribes power and presence “yearning to be taller” and his craving to “hold a woman” in
to those who have been murdered. Moreover, if souls come his arms, Jeong-dae’s musings here get at the impossible
back as candle flames, they can provide solace to those who tragedy of a childhood cut short. Jeong-dae’s desires to
survive them, warming and lighting the earth even in have the standard experiences of adolescence—to grow
moments of great pain. And importantly, the poetic framing physically and experientially, to do push-ups and have
of the soul as a “flutter[ing] candle flame” foreshadows sex—can never be realized without a living body. And so the
some of the novel’s most frequently occurring symbolism. novel demonstrates that a child’s death holds two endings:
the loss of the life the child had already lived, and the loss of
Lastly, it is worth noting the second-person narration that
the life the child still had in front of him.
Han has chosen for Dong-ho’s chapter. By putting readers
so firmly in the perspective of its soon-to-be-murdered
young boy, the novel ensures that its audience must feel
Dong-ho’s “trembl[ing]” in their own minds just as Dong-ho

I looked on in silence as my face blackened and swelled, my Chapter 3: The Editor, 1985 Quotes
features turned into festering ulcers, the contours that
His face was utterly ordinary. Thin lips, no noticeable
had defined me, that had given me clear edges, crumbled into
irregularities to his features. He wore a pale yellow shirt with a
ambiguity, leaving nothing that could be recognized as me.
wide collar, and his gray suit trousers were held up by a belt. Its
As the nights wore on, increasingly more shadows came and buckle gleamed. Had they met by chance in the street, she
pressed up against my own. Our encounters were, as always, would have taken him for some run-of-the-mill company
poorly improvised things. We were never able to tell who the manager or section chief.
other was, but could vaguely surmise how long we’d been
“Bitch. A bitch like you, in a place like this? Anything could
together for. Every time our shadow boundaries brushed
happen, and no one would find out.”
against each other, an echo of some appalling suffering was
transmitted to me like an electric shock. At this point, the force of the slap had already burst the
capillaries in her cheek and the man's fingernails had broken
her skin. But Eun-sook hadn't known that yet.
Related Characters: Jeong-dae (speaker)
Related Themes: Related Characters: The Interrogator (speaker), Dong-ho,

Eun-sook, Jin-su, President Chun Doo-hwan, The Translator
Page Number: 62
Related Themes:
Though only a few short days pass in Jeong-dae’s section of Page Number: 69
the narrative, decomposition works fast, so Jeong-dae’s
body “blacken[s]” and “swell[s]” almost in real time. This
“festering” illustrates the fragility of the human body, a Eun-sook, whom the local police have summoned to their
reality all of the characters in the story struggle to cope station due to her work with a controversial translator, is
with. But more than that, the deterioration of Jeong-dae’s shocked when the interrogator’s questioning turns into
body leads him to experience a strange, mirror-image violence—seven slaps in a row, to be exact. As she
version of the loss of self he felt as a protestor. In the obsessively recalls the slaps in the following days, Eun-sook
crowds of activists, Jeong-dae could join a unified whole finds herself stuck on the idea that such an “utterly
(“the miracle of stepping outside the shell of our own ordinary” person could commit such an extraordinarily
selves,” as the unnamed narrator will put it in a later brutal act. Indeed, nearly every phrase of this passage
chapter). And strangely, as his corpse collapses, Jeong-dae gestures towards this man’s seeming normalcy: he has “no
feels a similar sensation: “the contours that had defined” noticeable irregularities” in his features to signal his cruelty,
him, his “shell” of sorts, give way as his “clear edges” dissolve and his pastel, “run-of-the-mill” outfit makes him seem like a
into the pile of carnage around him. middle manager more than a violent officer of the state.
Previously, the novel has shown that ordinary people like
It is also worth noting the silent, almost intuitive form of
Dong-ho and Jin-su can, under the right circumstances,
understanding Jeong-dae reaches with his fellow victims.
commit incredible acts of bravery and generosity. Now, the
For many of the characters in Human Acts, written words
interrogator reverses that principle—empowered by the
are an essential form of communication and protest. But
state to be brutal, this “utterly ordinary” man becomes a
here, the only language is “appalling suffering,” as each
monster.
separate being feels now entirely reduced to their pain. And
as the “shadow boundaries” break down, so does a sense of There are two other important details in Eun-sook’s
each individual’s life before and beyond the horrific state flashback here. First, the interrogator’s use of the word
violence they have experienced. “bitch” hints at the misogyny undergirding his slaps, a facet
of Chun’s state terror that Seon-ju’s section of Human Acts
explores in greater depth. Moreover, the interrogator’s
threat that “anything could happen, and no one would find
out” also implies sexual violence—because he is acting as an
arm of the state, the interrogator seems to see himself as
above the law.
Second, it is important to pay attention to the level of detail
Han provides about the way the slaps function biologically.

The man’s fingernails shred Eun-sook’s skin, while his force thing that isolates Eun-sook—she is a “tiny island,” unable to
simultaneously bruises her beneath her flesh, “burst[ing] cross the seas of the censors’ ink-roller.
the capillaries” deep in her cheek. Violence at this scale and It is especially telling that Eun-sook frames this censorship
frequency, the narrative seems to suggest, makes those who as a form of almost murderous violence—the meaning has
experience it more aware of how their bodies function—and been “charred out of existence,” “burned” and “left to
of how easily that functioning can be disrupted. blacken.” In the right hands, Eun-sook knows, language can
be a powerful tool of protest and unity. But pens and ink-
rollers can also be metaphorically (and, later, literally)
Her initial impression is that the pages have been burned. weaponized. After all, if Chun knows that words can contest
They’ve been thrown onto a fire and left to blacken […] his brutal power, he will try to exert his brutal power over
words, erasing even the most abstracted forms of dissent.
More than half of the sentences in the ten-page introduction
have been scored through. In the thirty or so pages following,
this percentage rises so that the vast majority of sentences
have aligned through them. From around the fifth page onward, As she silently chewed the grains of rice, it occurred to her,
perhaps because drawing a line had become too labor- as it had before, that there was something shameful about
intensive, entire pages have been blacked out, presumably eating. Gripped by this familiar shame, she thought of the dead,
using an ink roller […] for whom the absence of life meant they would never be
She recalls sentences roughly darned and patched, places hungry again. But life still lingered on for her, with hunger still a
where the forms of words can just about be made out in yoke around her neck. It was that which had tormented her for
paragraphs that had been otherwise expunged. You. I. That. the past five years—that she could still feel hunger, still salivate
Perhaps. Precisely. Everything. You. Why. Gaze. Your eyes. Near and at the sight of food.
far. That. Vividly. Now. A little more. Vaguely. Why did you.
Remember? Gasping for breath in these interstices, tiny islands Related Characters: Dong-ho, Jeong-dae, Eun-sook,
among language charred out of existence. President Chun Doo-hwan
Related Themes:
Related Characters: Eun-sook, President Chun Doo-hwan
Page Number: 86
Related Themes:
Related Symbols: Though five years have passed since the 1980 Gwangju
massacre, each of Eun-sook’s days continues to be shaped
Page Number: 80 by the horrors she witnessed there. Fascinatingly, while the
Explanation and Analysis characters themselves do not have the language of
“survivor’s guilt,” that is what Eun-sook feels here: she finds
As someone who works at a publishing house in the early
“eating,” the most basic act of survival, to be “shameful”
years of Chun Doo-hwan’s regime, Eun-sook is used to
when so many are dead (meaning they will “never be hungry
turning all new manuscripts over to state censors, who are
again”). Eun-sook’s question each time she craves food,
then supposed to cross out any words or phrases they see
clearly hinted at but unspoken, is why she deserves to have
as seditious. But when she delivers this collection of newly
life “linger on” while Dong-ho and others like him, even
translated plays (the same collection she was slapped for),
younger than she was, do not.
the censors have gone much further, censoring so much of
the text that its meaning is nullified. It is telling that when Yet even as Eun-sook despairs at the “yoke” of hunger
Eun-sook returns to the text, she can only find sentence around her neck, it is also important that her body wants
fragments. The words that might hint at grief and mourning her to survive even if her mind does not. She can still
(“near and far,” “your eyes”) now are reduced to “salivate” at the sight of food, suggesting an instinctual
meaninglessness; though the plays ask their readers to excitement that Chun’s violence has yet to fully quash. And
“remember,” the censors have erased any narrative that if she has any sort of will to live, Eun-sook will later discover,
could require remembrance. Therefore, instead of being a then she can also use her still-working body—still “hungry,”
tool of communication, language now becomes one more still “chew[ing]”—to honor and fight for those who can no

longer eat. And second, Eun-sook’s pleading with Dong-ho to leave—a

moment that seems to remain a source of deep guilt for
her—echoes Dong-ho’s mother’s similar experience with
her son.
She could have pressed her hands over her ears, could
have screwed her eyes tight shut, shook her head from
side to side or moaned in distress. Instead, she simply
remembered you, Dong-ho. How you darted away at the stairs Certain crowds do not blench at the prospect of looting,
when she tried to take you home. Your face frozen with terror, murder, and rape, while on the other hand, others display a
as though escaping this importunate plea was your only hope of level of courage and altruism which those making up that same
survival. Let’s go together, Dong-ho. We ought to leave together, crowd would have had difficulty in achieving as individuals. The
right away. You stood there clinging to the second-floor railing, author argues that, rather than this latter type of crowd being
trembling. When she caught your gaze, Eun-sook saw your made-up of especially noble individuals, that nobility which is a
eyelids quiver. Because you were afraid. Because you wanted to fundamental human attribute is able to manifest itself through
live. borrowing strength from the crowd; also, similarly, that the
former case is one in which humanity's essential barbarism is
exacerbated not by the especially barbaric nature of any of the
Related Characters: Eun-sook (speaker), Dong-ho, Dong-
individuals involved, but through that magnification which
ho’s Mother, President Chun Doo-hwan
occurs naturally in crowds.
Related Themes:
Related Characters: Dong-ho, Eun-sook, Jin-su, President
Page Number: 93 Chun Doo-hwan
Related Themes:
In the moments after Chun Doo-hwan’s soldiers invaded
Gwangju, Eun-sook thought not of the danger she herself Page Number: 96
was in but of Dong-ho—his “terror,” the youth evident in his
“trembling” and his hands “clinging” to the railing. Most of Explanation and Analysis
all, Eun-sook remembers Dong-ho’s naivety: even as he is While she is working late one day at the publishing office,
staying behind and risking his life, he seems unsure of his Eun-sook opens a scholarly book about the psychology of
decision, desperately “want[ing] to live” but winding up dead crowds (also frequently termed “mob mentality” or
almost by default. This pivotal moment, in which a middle “groupthink”). This excerpt gives theoretical backing to what
school boy had to make a decision far beyond his pre-teen many of the characters have already learned first-hand: that
processing capacity, will haunt Eun-sook (and the rest of the crowds made up of “individuals” transcend and transform
characters) forever, making it one more reason why this those individuals’ traits. On the one hand, crowds can make
child’s death is uniquely tragic. people who would not normally be “especially noble”—like
But even as Eun-sook mourns Dong-ho, she also remains Dong-ho, Jin-su, and perhaps Eun-sook herself—find
deeply connected to him. The novel’s use of second person extraordinary courage and selflessness by “borrowing” from
perspective here (“you stood there,” Eun-sook thinks, “you the communal energy. On the other hand, crowds can make
wanted to live”) turns the reader into Dong-ho, allowing all people who would not be “barbaric” on their own behave in
those who pick up the novel to experience the sense of brutal, seemingly inhuman ways. This dark side of the
solidarity and care that those young protestors offered “magnification which occurs naturally in crowds” can be
each other during the 5:18 uprising. And so while Dong-ho seen in the young soldiers who carry out Chun Doo-hwan’s
did not get to “physically” live, Eun-sook’s letter of sorts brutal orders, and in the interrogator who slapped Eun-
allows him another life in her readers. sook again and again and again.
Lastly, there are two notable moments of foreshadowing in Once more, this passage highlights—albeit from a scholarly
this passage. First, the image of Dong-ho’s “quiver[ing]” perspective rather than a personal one—the way that being
eyelids echoes the “fluttering” language the book uses often part of a crowd erases individual selfhood. Seen through
to describe human souls, suggesting that in making this this lens, the piecemeal structure of the novel makes sense:
decision, Dong-ho is already transitioning to the afterlife. by focusing on one character at a time, author Han is
returning individuality to those who have, at least

temporarily, given it up. newly “fierce” way.

Finally, it is significant that Eun-sook sees an image of a
candle in her mind at this exact moment in the play.
Eun-sook closes her eyes. She does not want to see his Throughout the narrative, candles symbolize souls. When a
face. flame flickers, several characters suggest, it is a sign of a
soul’s tangible presence. In a metaphysical sense, then, as a
After you died I couldn’t hold a funeral, so my life became a funeral.
well a metaphorical one, Dong-ho is present as this radical
After you were wrapped in a tarpaulin and carted away in a garbage play unfolds.
truck.
After sparkling jets of water sprayed unforgivably from the fountain.
Everywhere the lights of the temple shrines are burning. Chapter 4: The Prisoner, 1990 Quotes
In the flowers that bloom in spring, in the snowflakes. In the It wasn’t as though we didn't know how overwhelmingly
evenings that draw each day to a close. Sparks from the candles, the army outnumbered us. But the strange thing was, it didn't
burning in empty drinks bottles. matter. Ever since the uprising began, I’d felt something
coursing through me, as overwhelming as an army.
Scalding tears burn from Eun-sook’s open eyes, but she does
not wipe them away. She glares fiercely at the boy’s face, at the Conscience.
movement of his silenced lips. Conscience, the most terrifying thing in the world. The day I
stood shoulder to shoulder with hundreds of thousands of my
fellow civilians, staring down the barrels of the soldiers’ guns,
Related Characters: Dong-ho, Eun-sook, Mr. Seo
[…] I was startled to discover an absence inside myself: the
Related Themes: absence of fear. I remember feeling that it was all right to die; I
felt the blood of a hundred thousand hearts surging together
into one enormous artery, fresh and clean…the sublime
Related Symbols:
enormity of a single heart, pulsing blood through that vessel
and into my own. I dared to feel a part of it.
Page Number: 104
Explanation and Analysis Related Characters: The Narrator (speaker)

Though the state has censored most of the protest play
producer Mr. Seo had hoped to put onstage, he finds a Related Themes:
clever workaround. Rather than having actors speak the
censored words, he will have actors silently mouth this Page Number: 115
language. One of those actors is a young boy in trackpants,
his silence onstage reminding Eun-sook of the way Dong-ho
was violently silenced. At first, Eun-sook cannot bear to look Ten years after the Gwangju uprising of 1980, this unnamed
at this little boy’s face—but she cannot escape the pain even narrator is still trying to understand how he was capable of
when she “closes her eyes.” In her mind, censored phrases such incredible fearlessness at the young age of 22. In this
from the play (“after you died I couldn’t hold a funeral, so my passage, which echoes the theories of crowd psychology in
life became a funeral”) mix with other memories of erasure Eun-sook’s section, the narrator feels as if he were similarly
(the fountains that “sprayed unforgivably” as if no violence able to borrow strength from the crowd. Indeed, the
had ever happened in Gwangju, the streams of bodies narrator speaks as if the crowd were almost one body:
“carted away” out of sight). though his individual form might be shot down, “a hundred
thousand hearts” would keep beating, and the “enormous
Midway through these italicized phrases, however, Eun-
artery” of this unified crowd would keep “pulsing blood.”
sook’s images change. Rather than thinking about erasure,
Thus, two of the novel’s central themes come
she begins to think about memory and survival: the temple
together—each person’s body may be fragile, but the
lights still “burning,” the flowers that still “bloom,” and the
physical “vessel” of the crowd is “sublime” and “enormous,”
“candles” that Dong-ho lit. These new images prompt Eun-
more “terrifying” than the barrels of any soldiers’ guns.
sook to open her eyes, choosing to remember even if it
makes her cry—to recall Dong-ho into being in her mind just The narrator’s reflections on conscience here reflect the
as this little boy recalls him onstage. And this decision to beauty of a crowd’s “single heart.” But the “absence of fear”
remember allows Eun-sook to approach the world in a

he recalls feeling, while noble, was also irrational—almost spent their last moments longing for.
“terrifying[ly]” so. Even as the narrator’s reflections testify
to the amazing bravery of the young protestors in the 5:18
uprising, then, it also gestures towards the naivety of a
At that moment, I realized what all this was for. The words
crowd, the sense that as the crowd’s strength pumps “into”
that this torture and starvation were intended to elicit. We
each person’s body, that person’s ability to make their own
will make you realize how ridiculous it was, the lot of you waving the
decisions gets pumped out.
national flag and singing the national anthem. We will prove to you
that you are nothing but filthy, stinking bodies. That you are no
better than the carcasses of starving animals.
Kids crouching beneath the windows, fumbling with their
[…] Watery discharge and sticky puss, foul saliva, blood, tears
guns and complaining that they were hungry, asking if it
and snot, piss and shit that soiled your pants. That was all that
was OK for them to quickly run back and fetch the sponge cake
was left to me. No, that was what I myself had been reduced to.
and Fanta they'd left in the conference room; what could they
I was nothing but the sum of those parts. The lump of rotting
possibly have known about death that would have enabled
meat from which they oozed was the only “me” there was.
them to make such a choice?
Related Characters: The Narrator (speaker), Yeong-chae,

Related Characters: The Narrator (speaker), Dong-ho, Jin-
President Chun Doo-hwan
su, Yeong-chae
Related Themes:
Related Themes:
Page Number: 117 Related Symbols:
Explanation and Analysis Page Number: 120

Though he was by no means a mature adult the time of the Explanation and Analysis
Gwangju protests, the narrator (like his colleague and friend
Amid the protesting crowds, the narrator felt as if he were
Jin-su) was no longer a teenager. But pre-teens Dong-ho,
almost superhuman, just one facet of “the sublime enormity
Yeong-chae, and their friends had yet to enter high school
of a single heart.” But after months of imprisonment and
when violence swept through their city. Here, the narrator
torture at the hands of Chun Doo-hwan’s soldiers, the
comments on the central tragedy of the novel: Dong-ho
narrator no longer feels like he is a member of a massive
could not choose to stay behind, facing the soldiers’
whole; instead, he is “nothing but the sum of [his] parts,”
brutality, because he did not yet have the logic “to make
“reduced” to the sticky liquids of the human body. The
such a choice.” Rather than facing the gravity of the
contrast could not be starker—“singing the national anthem”
situation, these “kids” are “fumbling” with weapons they do
in unison allowed the narrator to transcend his physical
not know how to use and complaining of hunger, signs of
limits, only to have to reconceive of himself as a “lump of
their youthful clumsiness and naivety. After all, what
rotting meat” at the hands of his punishers.
middle-schooler can see the big picture, thinking beyond
their need immediate needs and cravings? First, then, the state’s torture is effective by making those
who once felt strong become hyper-aware of their physical
The narrator’s mention of soda and sponge cake, beloved by
vulnerabilities—the narrator sees himself and his co-
both Dong-ho and Yeong-chae, is particularly poignant.
prisoners as “nothing but filthy, stinking bodies,” “carcasses”
First, these sweet treats exemplify the boys’
without selfhood or soul. But it is also important to track
unsophisticated tastes, their childish desire for candy
how the state uses torture to force language, changing the
strong even in a moment of crisis. And second, these
narrative of the protests by physically distorting the
quotidian snacks mark just how much all normalcy has been
prisoners’ words. The narrator knows that above all else,
destroyed. Yeong-chae, who meets torture and
“words” are the thing “this torture and starvation were
imprisonment with a steely calm, breaks down into tears at
intended to elicit.” And by compelling the prisoners, through
the mere mention of Fanta. Even more unbearable than
the sheer intensity of their pain, to speak the words Chun
what these boys experience, it seems, is the weight of what
wants them to speak, the soldiers claim power not just over
they will not get to experience—Dong-ho and Yeong-chae
each person’s body but over their inner life. After all, as the
will never get to outgrow the Fanta and sponge cake they

narrator puts it, once the torturers have seized his meaning chipped,” metaphorically and literally. This passage thus
away from him, they have also taken his entire sense of adds one more layer to the novel’s overall concern with
himself as a “me.” bodily vulnerability, acknowledging the force of biology
while suggesting that true life force comes from something
beyond one’s cells.
Looking at that boy's life, Jin-su said, what is this thing we call
a soul? Just some nonexistent idea? Or something that might
as well not exist? Or no, is it like a kind of glass? Glass is transparent, I heard a story about one of the Korean army platoons that
right? And fragile. That's the fundamental nature of glass. And that's fought in Vietnam. How they forced the women, children,
why objects that are made of glass have to be handled with care. and elderly of one particular village into the main hall, and then
After all, if they end up smashed or cracked or chipped, then they're burned it to the ground. Some of those who claim to slaughter
good for nothing, right, you just have to chuck them away. us did so with the memory of those previous times, when
committing such actions and wartime had won them a
Before, we used to have a kind of glass that couldn't be broken. A
handsome reward. It happened in Gwangju just as it did on Jeju
truth so hard and clear it might as well have been made of glass. So
Island, […] in Bosnia, and all across the American continent
when you think about it, it was only when we were shattered that
when it was still known as the new world, with such a uniform
we proved we had souls. Though what we really were was humans
brutality it's as though it is imprinted in our genetic code. I
made of glass.
never let myself forget that every single person I meet is a
member of this human race.
Related Characters: Jin-su, The Narrator (speaker), Dong- […] So tell me, professor, what answers do you have for me?
ho, Yeong-chae You, a human being just like me.
Related Themes:
Related Characters: The Narrator (speaker), Eun-sook, The
Page Number: 130 Professor/Yoon
Explanation and Analysis Related Themes:

Years after being imprisoned with Yeong-chae and the
narrator, Jin-su learns that Yeong-chae has been Page Number: 134
institutionalized for a violent outburst. Yeong-chae’s
struggle makes Jin-su think of Dong-ho, also a middle-
schooler at the time of the Gwangju uprising—and the sheer The narrator has experienced crowds mostly as a force for
tragedy of what Yeong-chae and Dong-ho have had to good, finding comfort and solidarity as he stood along
experience finally causes Jin-su’s collapse. Human Acts has thousands of other young protestors. But Eun-sook’s book
made it clear that a soul can survive physical violence, as about crowd psychology was clear that “humanity's
when Jeong-dae’s soul narrates from beyond the grave. But essential barbarism” could also be exacerbated “through
Jin-su’s sense of being utterly “shattered” here suggests that magnification which occurs naturally in crowds”—and
that souls can be destroyed by senseless tragedy, by a sense now, the narrator must address how crowds can provoke
that there is no moral “truth,” no matter how “hard and cruelty, too. In this critical passage, the narrator suggests
clear” it once seemed. Even as Jin-su’s speech affirms the that this seemingly extraordinary cruelty (abusing children
reality of the soul, then, it also suggests a more nihilistic and the elderly, setting whole buildings on fire) is in fact
view of the world than any of the characters have yet commonplace. The narrator suggests that brutality is in
espoused. Indeed, in Jin-su’s mind, the soul can be killed, humans’ “genetic code,” with unthinkably cruel acts
too; it is perhaps unsurprising, then, that Jin-su soon happening all over the world and across history, from the
chooses to take his own life. violent colonization of the Americas to the horrific Bosnian
genocide.
Moreover, Jin-su’s musings here—written in italics instead
of quotes to reflect their weight and lyricism—emphasize And if everyone has the capacity to commit such brutal acts,
how vulnerable the body is once the soul is taken away. As from an “utterly ordinary” interrogator in South Korea to a
someone who was tortured for months, Jin-su knows profit-hungry settler of the United States, how can the
firsthand what is means to be “smashed or cracked or narrator ever trust anyone again? In this final line of his
section, the narrator poses exactly this question to the

Some weekend afternoon when the sun-drenched scene
professor (later revealed to be Yoon). While the professor outside the window seems unusually still and Dong-ho’s
may claim to want to help, how can he differentiate himself profile flips into your mind, mightn’t the thing flickering in front
from those who share that same “genetic code”? And worst of your eyes be what they call a soul? In the early hours of the
of all, how can the narrator even trust himself—also a morning, when dreams you can’t remember have left your
“human being,” and therefore also capable of such cheeks wet and the contours of that face jolt into an abrupt
cruelty—to know the difference? clarity, mightn’t that wavering be a soul’s emergence? And the
place they emerged from, that they waver back into, would it be
as black as night or dusk's coarse weave? Dong-ho, Jin-su, the
Chapter 5: The Factory Girl, 2002 Quotes bodies at your own hands washed and dressed, might they be
The repeated words from Yoon’s e-mail, a pianist gathered there in that place, or are they sundered, several,
hammering the same keys, flicker in your mind’s eye like a scattered? You are aware that, as an individual, you have the
cursor blinking on a computer screen. Testimony. Meaning. capacity for neither bravery nor strength.
Memory. For the future.
[…] Again, you experienced that moment when the contours of Related Characters: Dong-ho, Jeong-dae, Jin-su, Seon-ju,
suffering coalesce into clarity, a clarity colder and harder than The Professor/Yoon
any nightmare could ever be. The moment when you are forced
to acknowledge that what you experienced was no mere Related Themes:
dream.
Page Number: 172
[…] Yoon has asked you to remember. To face up to those
memories, to bear witness to them. But how can such a thing be Explanation and Analysis
possible? Seon-ju’s section of the novel is the least plot-driven and the
most poetic—frequently, it is hard to tell what is a dream
Related Characters: Seon-ju, President Chun Doo-hwan, and what is a memory, or where the past is leaching into the
The Professor/Yoon present. In this passage, Seon-ju wonders if “what they call a
soul” might function in the same way, flitting in and out of
Related Themes: presence just as her thoughts do. And more than just
affirming the concept of the soul as a tangible, “flickering”
Page Number: 164 thing, Seon-ju begins to wonder about the mechanics of this
possible afterlife. Specifically, she suspects that souls might
have “contours”—hinting that each soul is a separate being
Nearly a decade after receiving an interview request from with unique, distinct edges, a contrast to the blurring Jeong-
Professor Yoon, Seon-ju is still deliberating about whether dae experiences as a corpse and the rush Dong-ho and
or not she can revisit the events of the Gwangju uprising for others feel in a crowd.
this scholarly project (what Yoon calls a “psychological
Yet even as Seon-ju imagines this more individualistic
autopsy”). On the one hand, Seon-ju is well aware of what
version of the soul, she also embraces the sense of
her interview could mean—she has always known words
community that can be found in a crowd. She hopes that
have the power to make “meaning” and preserve “memory,”
Dong-ho, Jin-su, and other loved ones who have died are
that her “testimony” about the past could help prevent such
“gathered” together instead of “several, scattered”; she
events from happening in “the future.” But on the other
recalls, seemingly with some measure of pride, her own care
hand, the “nightmare” Seon-ju lived through, filled with
and commitment to the dead. But most of all, Seon-ju knows
horrific sexual violence and the loss of loved ones, is
that “as an individual,” she—or maybe “you,” the
impossible to “face up to.” Even almost two decades after
reader—lacks the “capacity for bravery or strength” that she
Chun Doo-hwan lost power, then, the silencing effect of his
has in a group. Seon-ju’s use of the phrase “as an individual”
state terror persists. And the very people who could best
implies her sense that she is someone different in a group.
“testi[fy]” to the scope of these events are so scarred by
And indeed, when Seon-ju is working alongside Eun-sook, or
their memories, both emotionally and physically, that
when she sees Dong-ho’s or Seong-hee’s faces in her mind,
revisiting them might not be “possible.”
she finds the courage she needs to look to the past and to
move forward into the future.

If I demanded that you go home, Dong-ho; if I’d begged, while
we sat there eating gimbap, you would have done as I asked, too, must wonder where they end and the characters begin,
wouldn’t you? as one “you” blurs into another.
And that’s why you’re coming to me now. Lastly, it is worth recalling that at the beginning of the novel,
Dong-ho suggested that falling rain could be seen as “the
To ask why I’m still alive.
tears of souls.” Just as Eun-sook and the writer encounter
You walk, your eyes red rim seeming carved with some keen some physical manifestation of Dong-ho’s soul, Seon-ju
blade. Hurrying back to the bright lights of the emergency seems to be cheered by this tangible presence of her lost
department. loved one.
There’s only one thing for me to say to you, onni.
If you’ll allow me to.
Chapter 6: The Boy’s Mother, 2010 Quotes
If you'll please allow me.
Middle-school boys all had their hair cut short back then,
[…] As you walk along the straight white line that follows the didn’t they, but it seems to have gone out of fashion now. That’s
center of the road, you raise your head to the falling rain. how I knew it had to be you—I’d know that round little chestnut
Don’t die. of a head anywhere. It was you, no mistake. Your brother’s
Just don’t die. handme-down school uniform was like a sack on you, wasn’t it?
It took you till the third year to finally grow into it. In the
mornings when you slipped out through the main gate with
Related Characters: Seon-ju (speaker), Dong-ho, Eun-sook, your book bag, and your clothes so neat and clean, ah, I could
Jin-su, Seong-hee have gazed on that sight all day. This kid didn’t have any book
bag with him; the hands swinging by his sides were empty. Well,
Related Themes:
he must have put it down somewhere. There was no mistaking
those toothpick arms, poking out of your short shirt sleeves […]
Page Number: 174
It was definitely you.
Toward the end of her chapter, Seon-ju expresses some of Related Characters: Dong-ho’s Mother (speaker), Dong-ho
the guilt Jin-su and Eun-sook share—that she could have
saved Dong-ho by highlighting the extremity of their shared Related Themes:
circumstance, chastising him instead of feeding him. But
rather than beating herself up for the past, Seon-ju decides Related Symbols:
to reframe her sense of survivor’s guilt. If she is “still alive,”
she reasons, then she needs to find a purpose for her life Page Number: 175
(the “why” Dong-ho seems to ask about). For Seon-ju, her
survival then takes on both personal and political meaning. Explanation and Analysis
She will return to her old friend Seong-hee (whom she calls A full 30 years after the 5:18 massacre that killed her son,
“onni”, or older sister), mending their bond in order to Dong-ho’s mother still imagines that she sees her beloved
express gratitude for her still-going life. And it also means child in the crowds of middle-schoolers that pass by her on
that she will “raise [her] head to the falling rain,” quite the streets. As she follows this strange child through the
literally “facing up”—and probably testifying—to the streets, Dong-ho’s mother is struck primarily by the
memories she has so long repressed. vulnerability this young boy shares with Dong-ho himself:
It is also important here to note the way this passage, and he is too small for the school uniform (complete with
Seon-ju’s section of the novel in general, uses second- symbolic trackpants) that hangs “like a sack,” with “toothpick
person perspective. At first, the “you” very clearly refers to arms” that seem too frail to even carry a bookbag. Tragically,
Dong-ho. Then it shifts, and the “you”—“you experienced,” then, it seems that the quality Dong-ho’s mother most
“you […] remember”—seems to be Seon-ju herself, as if she is associates with her son is his vulnerability, his pre-
talking to herself in a mirror. And then the “you” begins to pubescent body a symbol of all the growing he never got to
refer to Seon-ju’s old friend and co-organizer Seong-hee. do.
The second-person thus creates, on a formal level, the same Yet even as this section implies that Dong-ho’s mother is
feelings of connection and loss of self that Seon-ju and the distorting reality, the back and forth of her thoughts also
other characters feel on the level of experience; readers,

suggests that she is fully possessed of her senses. She central “you” of the novel—not only in content but in form.
knows that this boy in 2010 has a different haircut, that he And while the poems Dong-ho might have written will never
lacks Dong-ho’s signature backpack; even as she assures be seen, the prose he inspired can now reach readers all
herself that this boy is Dong-ho, readers can sense the over the world.
overcompensation in phrases like “it had to be you” and “it
was definitely you.” More than just missing Dong-ho, it
seems, his mother is trying to manifest him, as if by longing Epilogue: The Writer, 2013 Quotes
for him with all her might she can create his presence.
There was something meek and gentle about those single-
Finally, after Seon-ju’s shifting use of second-person lidded half-moon eyes. The traces of infancy still lingered in the
perspective and the tell-tale word “you,” it is worth nothing soft line of his jaw. It was a face so utterly ordinary you could
how consistently Dong-ho’s mother addresses her words to easily have mistaken it for that of another, a face whose
her son. By having Dong-ho’s mother speak exclusively to characteristics would be forgotten the moment you turned
Dong-ho himself, Han once again emphasizes how squarely away from it.
this woman has devoted the remainder of her life to her
murdered child.
Related Characters: The Writer (speaker), Dong-ho, Eun-
sook, Seon-ju, Dong-ho’s Mother
“I don’t like summer but I like summer nights”: that was Related Themes:
something you came out with the year you turned eight. I
liked the sound of those words, and I remember thinking to Page Number: 198
myself, he’ll be a poet. Times when you three boys sat out on the
bench in the yard, sharing watermelon with your father on hot
summer nights. When your tongue groped for the sticky sweet To research an upcoming book about the 5:18 uprising, the
remnants smeared around your mouth. writer—a close stand-in for the novel’s author Han
Kang—returns to her hometown of Gwangju, where she
visits the 5:18 Research Institute. This real place, a public
Related Characters: Dong-ho’s Mother (speaker), Dong- museum that focuses on the horrors that happened in May
ho, Jeong-dae, The Middle Brother, Dong-ho’s Father of 1980, features pictures and videos of many of those
killed in the massacre. In the story, one of these pictures
Related Themes:
appears to be of Dong-ho, with his youthful features (“the
Page Number: 189 traces of infancy” that “still lingered in the soft line of his
jaw”) and his gentle gaze.
Explanation and Analysis Fascinatingly, however, the writer does not emphasize the
Recently widowed and still desperately missing her son, traits that make young Dong-ho distinct. Instead, she
Dong-ho’s mother has created a morning ritual: she traces describes his physical appearance as “utterly ordinary,” the
her finger over Dong-ho’s school ID and recalls her favorite exact same words Eun-sook used to describe the brutal
memories with him, separating his life as much as possible interrogator. There is nothing about Dong-ho that
from the 1980 state violence that killed him. Here, Dong- suggested he would behave with such incredible
ho’s mother remembers Dong-ho biting into a juicy selflessness and bravery—he possessed no physical
watermelon, when his body could still metabolize food and “characteristics” that indicate he would play such a
find delight in it. The memory signals Dong-ho’s youth—he memorable role in history. Yet just as Eun-sook’s chapter
loved “sticky sweet” things, it seems, whether that was emphasized that “utterly ordinary” people could be capable
watermelon or Sprite or sponge cake. It also recalls his of great cruelty under one set of circumstances, the writer’s
friendship with Jeong-dae, who loved watermelon. reflection here shows that even the most seemingly
But perhaps most importantly, this reflection frames Dong- “forgettable” person can rise to an occasion in unforgettable
ho as a budding “poet.” If Dong-ho loved the “sound” of ways. And though Dong-ho’s face might blur if the writer
words, playing with language even as an eight-year-old boy, turns away from it, she—like Eun-sook and Seon-ju and
then a well-crafted novel is the perfect container for his Dong-ho’s mother before her—will never let themselves
memorial. Each moment of stylization in Human Acts, each “turn away.”
instance of literary flair, thus pays tribute to Dong-ho—the

As it turned out, none of my relatives died; none were Permission? Yes, you have my permission, but only if you do it
injured or even arrested. But all through that autumn in properly. Please, write your book so that no one will ever be
1980, my thoughts returned to that tiny room at one end of the able to desecrate my brother’s memory again […]
kitchen, where I used to lie on my stomach to do my homework, Whenever we had a toe war, I always won.
that room with the cold paper floor—had the boy used it to
spread out his homework on its cold paper floor, then lie He was really ticklish, you see.
stomach-down just as I had? The middle-school kid I'd heard All I had to do was poke his foot with my big toe and he’d start
the grown-ups whispering about. How had the seasons kept on squirming.
turning for me, when time had stopped forever for him that At first I couldn’t tell whether he was grimacing like that because he
May? was ticklish, or because it really hurt…
But then he would turn bright red and laugh.
Related Characters: The Writer (speaker), Dong-ho, The
Writer’s Father
Related Characters: The Middle Brother (speaker), Dong-
Related Themes: ho, The Writer, Dong-ho’s Mother, President Chun Doo-
hwan
Page Number: 205
Related Themes:
While the writer and her family were able to move to the Page Number: 209
capital city of Seoul several months before the worst Explanation and Analysis
violence in Gwangju, many of the writer’s family
members—like Dong-ho and his family—remained in After some initial hesitance, the middle brother here agrees
Gwangju during the 5:18 uprising. But though the writer’s to an interview with the writer, giving his blessing to her as
relatives all survive, her sense of connection extends far she starts to write her book about Dong-ho’s life. Tellingly,
beyond her own immediate bloodline. Instead, the writer in insisting that the writer “write [her] book so that no one
begins to view her own active childhood in parallel to Dong- will ever be able to desecrate my brother’s memory again,”
ho’s lost youth, comparing her normal routines (lying the middle brother directly equates language with memory
“stomach-down” to do homework, making dinner) with the and power. In other words, by telling Dong-ho’s story and
absence of routine in his life. “do[ing] it properly,” the writer can use language to reclaim
and re-remember the personal and large-scale history
As the writer wonders why “the seasons kept on turning” Chun’s government worked so hard to erase.
for her even as they cease for Dong-ho, she is echoing the
feeling of survivor’s guilt that nearly every character in the It is also important to note what specific details the middle
novel seems to struggle with. Crucially, however, the writer brother chooses to share with the writer (or at least which
never met Dong-ho: she feels kinship with him because she of those details the writer opts to include in her final book).
feels kinship with the people of Gwangju and because she The middle brother emphasizes Dong-ho’s youth, but he
understands herself as a member of a metaphorical crowd. also emphasizes his playfulness, his “squirming,” giddy
Thus even in the absence of physical protest action, the approach to these childhood games. By asking the writer to
writer grows up with the same group mentality that her include such seemingly irrelevant minutiae, the middle
young counterparts in Gwangju put into practice. brother is ensuring that Dong-ho’s life will be told outside of
the context of its brutal ending. And more than that, Dong-
ho at last emerges as an individual, defined not by his
circumstances but by his “bright red” laughter.

I didn’t pray. I didn't close my eyes, or observe a minute
silence. The candles burned steadily. Their orange flames Dong-ho himself appeared in front of her, guiding her
undulating soundlessly, gradually being sucked into the center through the snow and to the “flowers” (though she quickly
and hollowed out. Only then did I notice how incredibly cold my reminded herself that no such thing is possible). Yet staring
ankles were. Without realizing it, I’d been kneeling in a at the flame, it is clear within the novel’s symbolic
snowdrift that covered Dong-ho’s grave. The snow had soaked framework that Dong-ho’s soul is somehow present. Since
through my socks, seeping in right through to my skin. I stared, Dong-ho lit candles back at the Provincial Office, flickering
mute, at that flame’s wavering outline, fluttering like a bird’s candle flames have been a symbol for the soul’s “fluttering”
translucent wing. persistence. And just as Dong-ho’s grandmother’s soul
seemed to be a “bird’s translucent wing,” the writer now
implies that Dong-ho’s spirit has just taken this kind of avian
Related Characters: The Writer (speaker), Dong-ho
shape in front of her.
Related Themes: Ending the book this way has several important
implications. First, the writer’s sense of connection to
Related Symbols: Dong-ho’s soul, as well the sense of comfort she gets from
the “steady” burning of that symbolic candle, overrides her
Page Number: 212 temporary physical pain (her “incredibly cold” ankles).
Second, by finishing with this “fluttering” outline of Dong-
Explanation and Analysis ho’s soul, the writer asks her readers to picture the book’s
In this passage, which concludes the novel, the writer protagonist separate from the violence he suffered—and to
ventures through the snow to visit Dong-ho’s gravestone in see him in their own lives, in every candle’s flame.
Gwangju. Moments before, the writer hallucinated that

SUMMARY AND ANAL

ANALYSIS
YSIS
The color-coded icons under each analysis entry make it easy to track where the themes occur most prominently throughout the
work. Each icon corresponds to one of the themes explained in the Themes section of this LitChart.
CHAPTER 1: THE BOY, 1980

It’s 1980, and Dong-ho, identified only as “the boy,” is standing From the very first moments of the story, the gruesome
outside the Provincial Office of Gwangju. It looks like it’s about circumstances of the Gwangju uprising—the endless stream of
to rain, but the clouds have yet to break. Nearby, a young bodies, the constant threat of violence—stand in contrast to Dong-
activist is talking about all the people shot and killed in protest ho’s youth. Even as Dong-ho takes in this horror, then, he can only
today. Dong-ho, who has seen row after row of dead bodies process it as the middle-school “boy” he is. For example, his thoughts
brought to the Provincial Office for burial, listens closely. His about rain distract him from the protest messages, and he can’t stop
middle brother has warned him to come home, telling him that wondering whether he should listen to his mother’s scolding.
the city center is not safe—but Dong-ho feels he cannot leave
now, in the midst of all this violence.
Earlier that morning, Dong-ho asked how many coffins they Just as Dong-ho is swept up in the chaos of these protests, readers
would have to arrange today. It is Dong-ho’s job to keep a are dislocated, too, given little information about why these corpses
record of who is in each coffin and to record which bodies have are being killed or who Dong-ho is working for. But the steadily
been memorialized and which have yet to receive a “group increasing number of coffins suggests that the situation is getting
memorial service.” Yesterday, Dong-ho had to record 28 bodies. worse, not better.
Now, he is told to expect 30 coffins.
The rest of the older students working in the Provincial Office Dong-ho is still pre-pubescent, but now, it becomes obvious that
have gone to the group funeral, but Dong-ho stays behind. even the people in charge of this protest movement are not much
From a distance, he hears the funeral-goers sing the strains of older. Dong-ho’s longing for his family’s backyard speaks to his
the national anthem, and he starts to sing along. The word longing for normalcy, while the impending rain adds to the
“splendid” in the anthem makes Dong-ho think of the protestors’ sense of foreboding.
hollyhocks in his family’s backyard, and he closes his eyes to
picture them more carefully. When he opens his eyes, the trees
are blowing in the wind—but no rain has yet fallen.
Dong-ho hears the funeral-goers observe a moment of silence. Over and over again, the characters must contend with the physical
He, too, is silent for a minute, before he heads into the gym realities of death—the scents and sights of decomposition loom
where the coffins are being stored. The smell makes him large, and the speed with which human lives become smelly corpses
nauseous, even though there is a scented candle placed by is both an unignorable fact and an important symbol of the state’s
every body to try and mask the odor. The most mangled bodies violation.
are covered by sheets, though occasionally people will uncover
the corpses in order to identify them.
Dong-ho is always startled, when he pulls back the cloth, by Though the scale of the violence has necessitated group funerals,
how quickly bodies compose. There is one corpse, a young certain details—like the precision of this girl’s pedicured toes—help
woman’s body, which particularly “stuns” him: there are stab preserve individuality even in the face of mass death. It is also worth
wounds all down her face and breasts, and her toes, perfectly noting the gendered nature of this violence, a specific threat that
pedicured, have swollen to triple the normal size. Dong-ho will recur for several of the novel’s female protestors.
lights a new set of candles, trying his best to ignore the stink.
©2023 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com Page 22

Before he steps outside, Dong-ho wonders what happens to a Throughout the narrative, the idea of the soul will be a subject of
person’s soul when their body dies: “mightn’t the person’s soul much thought and debate. On the one hand, the concept of a
also be there by the body’s side,” he thinks, “looking down at its human soul allows survivors to feel their loved ones’ presence even
own face?” But then the smell comes back, and he decides there after they have been killed. On the other hand, the sheer brutality of
are no souls here, only “silenced corpses.” the Gwangju massacre makes it difficult for Dong-ho to see
anything more than the shot down, “silenced” bodies in front of him.
The first time Dong-ho came into contact with these bodies, Initially, this makeshift moratorium Dong-ho is working in might
they were still being stored in the Provincial Office, having not have seemed somewhat official to readers. Now, however, it is
yet been moved to the gym. He had wandered into the Office evident just how slapdash these efforts are. With a sudden
and seen two young women there, drenched in sweat with their onslaught of killing and no infrastructure to handle the dead bodies,
faces masked. Dong-ho explained that he had come to see a young people like Dong-ho and these two women in masks have had
friend, yet when he looked at the line of unidentified bodies, to come together to fill in the bureaucratic gaps. The friend Dong-ho
Dong-ho was not able to find his loved one. The two young is talking about will later be revealed to be Jeong-dae.
women suggested that the friend might still be alive, but Dong-
ho was certain his friend had been killed, having heard from
one of his neighbors.
One of the women, still in a school uniform, cleaned the body of The use of second-person narration here (“you became”) is
a young man whose throat has been sliced with a bayonet. As important: it both places readers in Dong-ho’s shoes and reframes
she worked, she invited Dong-ho to join them, helping them the whole story as something that is being written to Dong-ho, as if
deal with the crush of corpses. “From that day on,” Dong-ho the book is a letter (or even a eulogy) rather than a novel.
reflects, “you became part of the team.”
The two women, Dong-ho learns, are Seon-ju and Eun-sook. Though Dong-ho, Eun-sook, and Seon-ju are all teenagers, they are
Eun-sook is in her final year of high school, while Seon-ju works almost instinctively committed to helping each other, forming a
in a dressmaker’s shop. Both had rushed to the Provincial joint barrier against the atrocities going on outside the Provincial
Office to give blood to the wounded. But when they realized Office doors.
how confused and understaffed the Office was, they stepped
in, helping to clean, categorize, and cover the corpses.
Dong-ho is only in his third year at middle school, and he is Again, the narration juxtaposes Dong-ho’s bravery and
small for his age: he always sits in the front row of class, and competence—he immediately leaps into action in this urban
puberty has not yet lowered his voice. Jin-su, the quiet, “almost graveyard of sorts—with his youthful innocence. The mention of Jin-
feminine” leader of the Provincial Office volunteers, was su’s femininity, which will later shape his treatment at the hands of
initially surprised that a boy so young as Dong-ho would want soldiers, again foreshadows the gendered expression of so much of
to work here. But Dong-ho persisted, keeping a ledger of all of the soldiers’ cruelty.
the bodies and helping mourning families identify their loved
ones.

Everyone splits the labor at the Provincial Office: Eun-sook and In this important moment, Dong-ho struggles with what it means to
Seon-ju work to clean the bodies, Dong-ho covers them, and be a part of a collective. On the one hand, the seamless unit he
Jin-su creates the posters that inform the people of Gwangju creates with Eun-sook, Seon-ju, and Jin-su feels comforting and
who has died. The thing that confuses Dong-ho is his fellow empowering, allowing them to (literally) tend to atrocities none of
activists’ insistence on singing the national anthem. He is also them could handle on their own. But this kind of groupthink can
mystified by the fact that the Taegukgi, or the national flag, is also be dangerous, as Dong-ho sees in the images of state violence
placed over the coffins. Dong-ho wonders why his fellow that the national anthem evokes in him.
activists sing the national anthem in mourning when the state is
responsible for all this death.
When Dong-ho poses this question to Eun-sook, she assures Even as dictator Chun Doo-hwan and his soldiers enact
him that the soldiers are only acting on orders from their immeasurable pain, Eun-sook and others (like Yeong-chae in a later
superiors and that they do not truly represent the nation. But chapter) maintain their love for South Korea. Rather than framing
as Dong-ho listens to people sing the anthem over and over protest as dissident, then, the novel suggests that activism can be
again, he cannot overcome this dissidence, nor does he feel any intensely patriotic—that “the nation” can be made and remade by
closer to understanding “what the nation really was.” the kinds of crowds within it.
When the Provincial Office started filling up with bodies, Dong- Dong-ho’s instinct to move the corpses outside reflects both his
ho tried to move some of the corpses outside. When Jin-su saw eagerness to help and his naivety. The “still-adolescent” gingko tree,
this, he immediately worried about what would happen if it which will be cut down by the story’s end, also symbolizes Dong-
rained. Jin-su then got a group of men to take the bodies in a ho’s own youthful state.
truck, moving them from the Office into the gym. Dong-ho
remembers watching the truck arrive as he played with the
branches of a “still-adolescent gingko tree.”
Soon after Jin-su transported the bodies to the gym, some It is important to note how practical and competent Jin-su is in the
grieving families began decorating each coffin with a framed early days of the Gwangju uprising; though his time in jail will
picture; some also started using empty Fanta bottles as vases eventually leave him broken and dissolute, this first encounter with
and candleholders. It was Dong-ho who came up with the idea an almost impossibly in-control Jin-su makes that contrast
of getting candles for every corpse, and Jin-su—like especially stark. The fact that Dong-ho chooses candles as a way to
always—was able to immediately turn this thought into a honor and cope with death will take on great symbolic importance
reality. as the narrative progresses.
Now, they have gotten into a routine. In the morning, people The extent of the killing necessitates that Dong-ho, Eun-sook, and
bring in bodies who have passed away while being treated at Seon-ju take an almost business-like approach to this horrific
the hospital. In the evening, people bring in bodies of people violence: they develop shifts and routines, replacing the traditions of
the soldiers have shot in the suburbs. Seon-ju and Eun-sook a graveyard with those of a corporate “convention.” Yet even as the
frequently have to stuff spilling intestines back inside protestors try to mentally adjust to this death, the physical reality is
stomachs, which causes Seon-ju to have nosebleeds and Eun- so gruesome that organizers like Eun-sook and Seon-ju struggle with
sook to vomit. Dong-ho still manages the ledger, silently it on an almost cellular level.
recording the bodies. As he does so, he reflects that dead look
like they have gathered for a “convention.”

Now, Dong-ho wonders why the rain still has yet to come. One Since something terrible has already happened in Gwangju, it is
of the protestors is listing demands: the government must likely that these events are located somewhere in the middle of the
release their dead, free those in prison, and acknowledge the 5:18 uprising. The 5:18 uprising (also known as the Gwangju
truth about what has happened in Gwangju. The crowd that massacre) denotes a series of protests against dictator Chun Doo-
cheers these protests is getting smaller every day. Dong-ho hwan, who had recently seized office. The protests stretched
thinks back to the first day after the soldiers withdrew, when through the month of May, and each protest was met with more
100,000 people gathered to sing the national anthem. But violence than the last, leading to hundreds of civilian deaths. The
recently, there have been rumors that soldiers are going to fact that the rain still has yet to come perhaps signals, then, just
come back, and everyone is getting increasingly fearful of how much violence still lies ahead.
leaving their homes.
The protestor’s mention of bloodshed makes Dong-ho’s chest The question of afterlife—and particularly the question of whether
tighten. He thinks back to his grandmother’s death a few people have tangible souls—will become a major one in the novel,
months ago. In life, his grandmother had been quiet and kind, especially as those who survive Dong-ho mourn the young boy. It is
sneaking Dong-ho pastries from her pantry. Her death was especially worth noting the language Dong-ho here uses to
similarly quiet—“something seemed to flutter up from her face,” conceptualize what such a soul might look like. To Dong-ho, the soul
and then she was gone. Dong-ho finds himself wondering is bird-like and “flutter[ing]”: it is present, delicate, and not quite
where this fluttering thing could have gone. He doesn’t believe tangible.
in heaven or hell, or in the scary stories of ghosts he hears at
school.
Suddenly, it starts to pour, and the cold and drenching rain In the “other world” Dong-ho craves, his anxieties and
makes Dong-ho think of the tears of souls. As the trees bend to preoccupations would be radically different: he could be stressed
the rain, Dong-ho thinks about what his life might look like if about tests rather than about senseless, seemingly random violence.
“that other world continued”—it would be time for midterms Yet even as his world changes, Dong-ho’s youthful curiosity persists
now. But last week, when Dong-ho went out to buy a study as he wonders about why it rains and tries to snag some extra
book, he instead watched as a couple, seemingly newlyweds, studying time.
were murdered on their way to church. Even in the memory,
Dong-ho cannot fully reconstruct how it happened. The
violence feels like “too much to process.”
Eun-sook returns to the gym, pulling Dong-ho out of his Dong-ho’s hunger for the sweet sponge cake and yogurt speaks both
reverie. She gives him a sponge cake and yogurt, explaining that to his childish preferences and to the fact that he is still very much a
the aunties at the protest were handing some food out. As growing boy. Dong-ho’s sudden self-consciousness about how he
Dong-ho eats, ravenous, Eun-sook tries to persuade him to might smell further gets at his pubescent mindset.
return home and get some rest. Dong-ho feels self-conscious:
he hasn’t showered in a while, and he knows he stinks of sweat
and the stench of the corpses.
Eun-sook announces that the soldiers are coming back tonight: The characters in the novel all know what physical, embodied death
“if you go home,” she warns, “stay there.” As Dong-ho looks at looks like. But the hollowness in Eun-sook’s eyes also suggests that
her, with her furrowed brow and her hollowed eyes, he trauma can mutate the soul (again described as “fluttering”) in more
wonders where the “fluttering” soul resides while people are subtle ways, squashing and contorting the life force of those still
still alive. Dong-ho wolfs down another yogurt. living.

A while later, Seon-ju arrives, this time bringing gimbap for When the rice of the gimbap gets caught in Dong-ho’s throat, it
Dong-ho. Though he eats with gusto, when Seon-ju starts demonstrates how grief for a dead loved one can disrupt the most
asking about Dong-ho’s dead friend, he finds that the rice gets basic processes of life, like chewing or swallowing. Yet even as Dong-
caught in his throat. Seon-ju, who was also there on that day of ho faces Jeong-dae’s horrible absence, he continues to feel hungry,
sudden violence, hypothesizes that soldiers buried Dong-ho’s so he must continue to eat. This conflict—between grief about those
friend. Dong-ho studies Seon-ju’s composed face and wonders whose bodies no longer work and the omnipresent survival
if she will stay behind in the Provincial Office to wait for death. instinct—will become a source of frustration for many of the other
Seon-ju says that she’s tired and then goes to take a nap. characters.
Dong-ho’s mother is convinced that his friend Jeong-dae is at Dong-ho’s insistence on staying at the Office despite his parents’
the hospital, not here. Dong-ho’s mother and brothers—the warnings poses a crucial question: is Dong-ho being impossibly
oldest brother at school in Seoul, the middle brother trying to brave or impossibly naïve? And even though this section of the
pass his exams—are terrified that Dong-ho is dealing with these narrative stays close in Dong-ho’s perspective, even he does not
corpses. They are worried Dong-ho will be killed. Yesterday, seem clear about how truly cognizant he is of the risks he is taking.
they tried to persuade him to come home. But Dong-ho
refuses, insisting no one will kill him for taking notes.
The rain has stopped. Dong-ho reflects on the lie he told Eun- The fact that Dong-ho initially lied about the circumstances of
sook and Seon-ju—it wasn’t a neighbor who had seen Jeong- Jeong-dae’s death suggests that he feels some measure of guilt; after
dae die. Dong-ho thinks back to that day: he and Jeong-dae are all, he survived this first round of shooting while his equally young
at a protest together when soldiers, hidden, start firing at friend did not. This guilt then becomes an important driving force
protestors from the rooftops. Dong-ho takes cover, but Jeong- for Dong-ho’s decision to risk his life at the Office. The image of
dae is toppled. Seeing his friend on the ground, wearing the trackpants—which is part of the middle-school boys’ gym
same blue trackpants that he himself has on, Dong-ho tries to uniforms—will come to symbolize both Dong-ho’s youth and the
rush to him. But before he can do so, the soldiers shoot another almost brotherly friendship he shared with Jeong-dae.
mourner, so Dong-ho stays where he is.
It takes 10 minutes for the shooting to stop long enough for While Dong-ho is wracked with guilt merely for witnessing his
Dong-ho and others to make their escape. While they walk, the friend’s death, the soldiers actually doing the killing seem to feel no
soldiers methodically pick up and disposed of the bodies. such remorse. Dong-ho’s cheerful family life makes the reality of the
Keeping his eyes on the ground, Dong-ho hurries home, violence seem even more shocking.
heading straight to the terrace in the back of the house. It is all
Dong-ho can do to keep himself together when Dong-ho’s
father asks for a back massage.
At last, Dong-ho is able to escape to his room, where he curls First, despite his bravery in the protests, Jeong-dae is actually a very
up in the fetal position. Dong-ho can’t picture anything other normal boy: he is physically small and filled with jokes and
than Jeong-dae’s face, and his trackpants in the dirt. Like impractical plans. Second, Dong-ho’s commitment to remembering
Dong-ho, Jeong-dae is unusually small, so much so that his Jeong-dae’s life beyond the circumstances of its tragic end help
sister Jeong-mi is always trying to sneak extra milk to him. preserve his friend’s life beyond the bounds of his physical existence.
Jeong-dae hates studying, preferring to goof off. But despite
his rebelliousness, Jeong-dae is loving. Once, he stole a
blackboard eraser from school simply because it reminded his
sister of an April Fool’s prank long ago.

Dong-ho gets up and goes to the annex of his hanok (a Just as Dong-ho (irrationally) blames himself for Jeong-dae’s death,
traditional style of Korean home), where Jeong-dae and Jeong- Jeong-dae reacts to his panic over Jeong-mi’s disappearance by
mi have been staying. He recalls the day before, when Jeong- feeling guilty. The fact that both Jeong-dae and Jeong-mi have
dae was in a panic, trying to locate Jeong-mi. Dong-ho knows disappeared (and been killed) in such a short time again testifies to
that if Jeong-mi is still alive, she will fault Dong-ho for not doing the ever-faster pace of the violence.
more to protect her brother. Though she is quiet, Jeong-mi is
known for her stubbornness, too.
Jeong-mi had lived in Dong-ho’s house for a year, but the two Jeong-mi’s life, too, exemplifies the gap between an old reality—in
had never had a real conversation. Jeong-mi was always getting which the adolescent pitfalls of school and studying were all-
back late from the textile factory where she worked, too tired consuming—and this new, terrifying one. Jeong-mi’s commitment to
to do anything other than ask for Dong-ho’s help starting a fire. education even in the face of logistical hurdles also suggests that
One night, however, she had surprised Dong-ho by asking him school and the written language of textbooks help to provide an
for his old first-year textbooks. Jeong-mi admitted that she escape from the brutality of daily life in Gwangju.
hoped to one day be able to go back to school, so she was
studying for the high school entrance exam.
Dong-ho was skeptical that Jeong-mi could keep her studies a Dong-ho’s crush on Jeong-mi forces readers to imagine a
secret, but he lent her his book anyway. That night, and many counternarrative—one in which Dong-ho gets to come of age
nights to follow, Dong-ho had imagined kissing Jeong-mi and normally, navigating his newfound desire for his friend’s sister rather
holding her tightly. In the coming mornings, Dong-ho would than searching for her dead body. But what could be a classic
crawl to the door just to hear her washing her face. coming-of-age story is in fact a much darker tale.
Back in the present, another truckload of bodies pulls up the Jin-su’s warning is clear: when the soldiers come back, anyone
gym. Jin-su is firm that the soldiers are coming back found tending to the dead is in grave danger of being killed. The fact
tonight—and that by 6:00 p.m., all the bereaved will need to that Dong-ho hears this warning and decides to remain by the
leave in order to ensure their safety. As Jin-su goes to break the bodies anyway suggests his amazing sense of courage (and naivety).
news to the grieving families, Dong-ho hears some of them
arguing, vowing that they would rather die than leave their
children.
Privately, Dong-ho wonders if the young girl’s body in the Even though Dong-ho knows that Jeong-mi is probably dead, he still
corner could be Jeong-mi. He has no evidence for this, but he feels a sense of responsibility to her. This collectivist mindset, which
wants to be able to prove that Jeong-mi is safe. Dong-ho knows many of the characters share, perhaps also explains why Eun-sook,
that if the roles were reversed, Jeong-mi would have gone to Seon-ju, and Dong-ho are willing to endanger themselves to care for
every hospital in order to track Jeong-dae down, just as she did strangers’ corpses—any one of these bodies could be the body of
every time they had a fight. Even though Jeong-mi was someone they love and feel they owe something to.
laughably stubborn, she was also tender. At night, Dong-ho
would hear “low laughter and shared sighs” coming from the
annex, as argument between the siblings gave way to warmth.
Back at the gym, Dong-ho is making posters of the missing This dialogue is in some ways a familiar conversation for a child to
when his mother arrives. In a panic, Dong-ho’s mother grabs his have with his parent; indeed, the phrase “be home for dinner”
wrist roughly, begging him to come home. Dong-ho jerks away borders on cliché. But here, the stakes of Dong-ho returning home
but promises that he will return to his house at six o’clock, when for dinner are literally life and death.
the gym closes. Dong-ho’s mother makes him promise to be
home for dinner.

An hour later, an old man enters the gym, struggling to walk. He Nowhere does the narrative suggest that this man might be Jeong-
explains to Dong-ho that he has come from far in the mi and Jeong-dae’s grandfather—but once more, the loss of a
mountains, having heard that his son and granddaughter might brother and sister makes Dong-ho associate the dead strangers with
have been killed in the recent violence. As the families pack up his own closest friends.
their supplies and prepare to evacuate, Dong-ho leads this old
man through the bodies. Though he inspects each one, the old
man does not recognize his relatives.
Dong-ho hates this part of his job. He has nightmares about The image of the “phantom bayonet,” which will recur for the writer
pulling back the cotton sheets to reveal decomposing faces. at the end of the novel, suggests that physical violence wounds not
Sometimes, he feels as if he, too, is being stabbed by a only those directly hurt but also those who bear witness to others’
“phantom bayonet.” When Dong-ho pulls up a sheet on a body injuries. Dong-ho’s feeling that there will be no “forgiveness” again
in the corner, he can tell, without words, that this is the old speaks to his sense of collective responsibility—he feels that if he
man’s granddaughter. Dong-ho wonders again how long souls was not able to save Jeong-dae, he cannot save anyone, and
stay by their bodies. He thinks that, in the moment of killing, he therefore he himself does not deserve to be saved.
would have run away from anyone—his mother or father or
brothers. “There will be no forgiveness,” he decides. “Least of all
for me.”
CHAPTER 2: THE BOY’S FRIEND, 1980

The recently murdered Jeong-dae explains that all of the dead In Dong-ho’s section, the young boy wondered what kind of soul still
bodies, including his own, have been thrown together on a pile. “flutters” on earth when a person’s physical body ceases to function.
Jeong-dae’s soul is still attached to his body, so he can see what Now, Jeong-dae’s portion of the narrative answers that question
is happening to it: he is loaded into a military truck with others though a stylistic choice: author Han has Jeong-dae write from
and jolted along. People used to say they would meet again in beyond the grave, suggesting that human personality persists even
the afterlife, but Jeong-dae thinks that sentiment is now foolish beyond physical violence and bodily collapse.
and untrue. He does not sense any other souls here.
Jeong-dae watches as the blood flows out of his own face. The By allowing Jeong-dae’s soul to separate from his body, the novel
truck drives up a hillside, eventually stopping in front of an iron posits that each individual person is much more than the sum of
gate. Several military sentries unlock the truck and help drag their physical parts. On a formal level, then, this section of the novel
the bodies inside into a clearing, Jeong-dae’s included. As the also demonstrates the power of language to change the narrative
sentries stack the bodies on top of one another, Jeong-dae around violence, death, and loss.
realizes that his body is second from the bottom, though he
doesn’t feel the pressure now.
As it gets dark, Jeong-dae’s soul climbs to the top of the pile, Though Jeong-dae is able, through a literary trick, to communicate
hoping to catch a glimpse of the moon. Slowly, he becomes with readers, he cannot talk to the other murdered souls around
aware of the presence of other souls, though none of these him. Even as the novel points to the power of language, then, it also
spirits have any language with which to identify or highlights the limits of verbal communication.
communicate with one another. Eventually, after coming into
contact for a moment, the other souls all flit away.

The night continues, blurring into day as the grasshoppers Though the cosmology that Jeong-dae and Dong-ho seem to share
chirp. Jeong-dae wants to believe that something is watching makes room for a soul and a very tangible afterlife, neither Jeong-
over him, but he doesn’t think anyone is. Instead, he thinks of dae nor Dong-ho believes in a god-like figure (perhaps because the
Dong-ho, who’d been by his side until Jeong-dae “collapsed like amount of violence they have witnessed has made them lose faith).
a rag doll[.]”
Now, it is sunny, and the flies have begun to feed on the rotting This striking passage contrasts the truth of bodily vulnerability with
corpses. Jeong-dae notices the ants crawling on his fingers. the expansiveness of human feeling. On the one hand, Jeong-dae
Jeong-dae tries to move, but he realizes that he is bound to this cannot stop his body from stinking or from falling prey to ants. But
one spot. Jeong-dae also sees that he can sense who is still alive on the other hand, Jeong-dae finds a way to scream even without
and who is dead—Dong-ho, he knows, is still alive. But Jeong-mi his tongue and vocal cords, suggesting that bodily ruin cannot
is dead, and the pain of that knowledge is so great that Jeong- tamper with emotional pain.
dae screams, even without a tongue or voice.
Jeong-dae now loses all sense of himself and his identity. He Now, the body becomes a nuisance: instead of helping Jeong-dae
begins to feel rage, wondering why he and Jeong-mi have been accomplish his goals, his body only gets in the way of him finding his
so brutally murdered. Jeong-dae is desperate to find his sister, sister or his murderers. The idea that violence turns the body into a
but he does not know how to locate her. Jeong-dae takes liability will recur many times throughout the narrative.
comfort in the idea that once his soul is removed from his body,
he will be able to track down those who killed him.
The truck arrives again at the same time as yesterday, bringing The loathing Jeong-dae feels for the form that once nourished him is
new bodies. With a start, Jeong-dae realizes the intense stench a tragedy in and of itself. But Jeong-dae’s desire for someone to tend
his pile of corpses has begun to give off. Jeong-dae senses new to and clean his wounds is also a testament to the importance of
souls in this new crop of bodies, and he floats over to them. He Dong-ho’s work back at the gym—because of Dong-ho’s
feels jealous of a body that has been tended to, the wounds commitment to caring for the corpses, many souls will be spared the
dressed. For the first time, Jeong-dae feels true hatred for his sense of isolation Jeong-dae now feels.
body.
Jeong-dae wants to escape this present moment through This childhood memory of the blackboard eraser shows both the
dreams or memories. He thinks back to a time he stole a depth of care Jeong-dae had for his sister and the youthful
blackboard eraser from school and then left it on the innocence they both shared. Jeong-dae’s reflections also bring into
windowsill to please Jeong-mi. Then, Jeong-dae recalls falling focus the importance of mutual care: whether it is someone (likely
asleep next to his sister: how she would laugh as she drifted off, Dong-ho’s mother) continuing to water the hollyhock or Jeong-mi
and how she would always touch his face before rolling over for holding her brother’s face, living beings depend on one another to
the night. To keep himself sane, Jeong-dae focuses on every feel “loved” and to survive.
sensory detail of that night—the smell of Jeong-mi’s lotion, the
sight of the hollyhocks outside, and the sensation of his face,
which he knows Jeong-mi “had loved.”

Jeong-dae is desperate for more memories. He recalls summer For the first time, Jeong-dae explicitly contrasts the revivifying effect
nights he spent riding his bike and traveling to some nearby rice of memory—even of the most quotidian events—with the
paddies. He tries to remember the taste of sweet potato, even destruction of violence (as seen in his bleeding wound). In other
when it burned his tongue. Then, Jeong-dae’s thoughts dissolve words, memory gives wholeness and permanence to the very people
into poetry as his knowledge of the bleeding wound in his side and places the soldiers have worked so hard to harm. Jeong-dae’s
replace his memories of wanting to be taller. All he can do to desire to be taller is an especially poignant reminder of his
calm himself is think about finding the soldiers who killed him youth—not so long ago, he wanted his body to be bigger rather than
and demanding to know why. for his corporeal form to vanish entirely.
Time passes, undifferentiated by anything except the arrival of Jeong-dae can feel no strength or solidarity with the giant pile or
more and more bodies. Some of the bodies are completely bodies that surrounds him now. But when he was still alive, the
mangled, while others are almost fully intact. One time, Jeong- crowd was a source of energy—perhaps dangerously so, as Jeong-
dae sees a couple of bodies with the faces painted entirely dae struggled to retain a rational sense of caution in the swell of the
white, probably to erase the dead peoples’ identities. He national anthem.
wonders if all these bodies were once protestors, packed onto
the street alongside him. He recalls the moment of his
death—Dong-ho was panicking, but Jeong-dae, though also
afraid, just kept on singing the national anthem.
The bodies at the bottom of the pile are the first to rot, and In large groups, the novel will frequently suggest, individuals lose
Jeong-dae’s own face becomes unrecognizable, the swelling sight of their own personal values and limitations, blending entirely
erasing his “clear edges.” At the same time, however, Jeong-dae into the ethos of the whole. And here, the idea that Jeong-dae is
is getting better at recognizing the souls around him, losing his “clear edges” suggests that even in death, a large gathering
differentiating between them even if he cannot identify each blurs the boundaries between each unique, separate, person.
soul as a specific person. With more time, Jeong-dae wonders if
the souls could figure out a way to understand each other, even
in the absence of language.
Unfortunately, one rainy day, the soldiers arrive earlier than The use of the word “fluttering” here, spoken by a dead soul himself,
usual. They throw more bodies onto the towers of corpses, affirms all of Dong-ho’s suspicions about peoples’ bird-like souls.
gagging at the stench, and then cover all of the piles in petrol.
The “fluttering” souls crowd together as the soldiers sparked
their lighters. As Jeong-dae watches, the soldiers step back and
set the entire clearing aflame.
As soon as the piles of bodies catch fire, Jeong-dae realizes that In this fascinating passage, Jeong-dae realizes that he might have
the only thing keeping his soul tied to this clearing is his more in common with the soldiers than he initially thought. Just as
physical body. As “the viscera hisse[s] and boil[s],” Jeong-dae’s he got swept up in a crowd, behaving with bravery and abandon he
soul slides over to two soldiers, taking in their dilated, might not have had on his own, the youthful soldiers have lost
frightened pupils and young faces. Jeong-dae wonders where similar track of themselves. The mention of the “hiss[ing]” and
to go. He wants to visit Jeong-mi, but he has no idea where her “boil[ing]” body parts here again forces readers to contend with the
soul might be—though he hopes she is still waiting in the annex gruesome realities of mass death.
room they used to share.

Instead, Jeong-mi decides to go visit “you,” meaning Dong- On a plot level, this moment is crucial: Dong-ho’s death at the hands
ho—he is certain Dong-ho will still be asleep in the house they of the soldiers returning to Gwangju will shape every chapter to
used to share. But before Jeong-dae can make the journey, he come. But this is also an important scene on a formal level—by
hears a terrifying scream. Jeong-dae looks at the sky, where the referring to Dong-ho as “you” as he dies, Jeong-dae makes it clear
flares from guns are lighting up the night. Somehow, he knows that he is telling this story to and for Dong-ho, telegraphing his care
Dong-ho has been killed. Though he wants to find Dong-ho’s and (pre-emptively) preserving his friend’s memory.
soul and guide him through his new existence, Jeong-dae now
thinks that task is impossibly daunting.
CHAPTER 3: THE EDITOR, 1985

It’s mid-November, five years after the violence at Gwangju. Five years later, the worst of the Gwangju massacre has
Today, Kim Eun-sook, now an editor at a local publishing house, subsided—but Chun Doo-hwan remains in power, and the threat of
was slapped seven times, so brutally that her cheek bruised and violence is no less omnipresent (as those seven slaps make clear).
she lost her hearing in one ear. She decides to head home The fact that Eun-sook works in a publishing house is also worth
rather than going to work, vowing to spend one day forgetting noting—language and storytelling, in the background in the young
each slap, so that in a week this violence will be only a memory. boys’ narratives, will come even more into focus here.
When she gets home, Eun-sook lies down for 20 minutes. Then Eun-sook’s quiet, isolated coping mechanisms suggests that she is
she gets up, washes her face, brushes her teeth, and crawls still deeply traumatized by the horrors she witnessed in 1980.
back into bed. The phone is ringing, but she feels that she While Jeong-dae did his best to remember delicious foods and jokes
cannot answer and give an explanation. It is getting dark with his sister, it now becomes evident that violence is the one thing
outside by the time Eun-sook sits up in bed. She wonders how worth forgetting. But ironically, as Eun-sook’s question
she will “forget the first slap,” and she recalls waiting quietly for demonstrates, violence is one of the hardest things to forget.
the first slaps to be over, not running away.
The man who interrogated her, calling her a “bitch” and hitting It seems that Eun-sook was slapped because she worked with a
her so hard it drew blood, had “thin lips” and looked “utterly translator wanted by the state. First, then, interrogator’s violence
ordinary.” The interrogator struck Eun-sook as a middle shows just how dangerous Chun’s government understands
manager, even as he violently demanded to know where the language to be. More than that, though, the “utterly ordinary”
translator (“that bastard”) was. appearance of the interrogator suggests that anyone is capable of
brutality (just as Dong-ho’s life and death shows that anyone is
capable of great bravery).
Eun-sook met with the translator two weeks ago, on the first The translator is clearly engaged in bringing some earth-shaking
really cold day of fall. They shared tea and a pastry as the texts to the South Korean people, but he goes about this daring
translator went through the manuscript proofs and edited business with an air of ease and normalcy. In many ways, then, the
them. The translator was courteous and seemed timid, even translator is the converse of the interrogator: he seems “ordinary,”
though Eun-sook knew he was a wanted criminal. When she but he is in fact a radical, selfless figure.
asked him how to contact him to give him his royalties, he
responded vaguely, promising only to be in touch.

In the interrogation room two weeks later, as the slaps The spurting fountains at the Provincial Office, an important image
continued, Eun-sook thought back to the fountain in Gwangju. throughout Eun-sook’s narrative, are so painful in part because they
Then, at 18, she had seen the glittering jets of water as an suggest that people are trying to move on from the 5:18 losses. In
attack. Eun-sook had called the Provincial Office in tears, turning on the fountain jets, Eun-sook thinks, the Gwangju city
wondering how the fountain—which had been turned off since government is glossing over the memory of all people lost in the
the beginning of the uprising—could now be turned on again, as massacre. By pairing this memory with the interrogator’s slaps, Eun-
if nothing had changed. Years later, as the first slap came, Eun- sook seems to suggest that forgetting the murdered protests is itself
sook couldn’t believe it: “surely he’s not going to hit me,” she’d a violent act, almost akin to being hit.
thought, until the interrogator hit her with so much force her
neck seemed to snap.
In the present, Eun-sook is back at the office. Noticing her face, As Eun-sook’s boss, the publisher likely could have taken
Eun-sook’s publisher offers to take her out to barbecue. Eun- responsibility for her work with the translator—but he did not, and
sook wonders if his friendliness might be guilt—is he the one Eun-sook was then slapped seven times. The publisher’s guilt here
who turned her in to the authorities? After all, the publisher has a faint echo of the guilt Dong-ho feels about Jeong-dae and
had gone to the police station only minutes before she had, Jeong-mi, as if by not taking the bullet himself he was partially
even speaking with the same interrogator. responsible for their deaths.
Eun-sook declines the publisher’s offer of barbecue—she finds Like the narrator will say in a later chapter, Eun-sook’s hatred of
the sight of meat cooking revolting. But the publisher convinces meat is likely linked to the human carnage she witnessed during the
her to let him take her out to lunch. Aa they finish their meal, 5:18 uprising. The publisher here appears as a character perched
the publisher offers to go to the censor’s office in Eun-sook’s between bravery and cowardice: he wants to get the controversial
place tomorrow. Eun-sook knows the publisher feels guilty, literature to press, but he is not quite courageous enough to face the
even though he had probably only stuck to the facts (“Kim Eun- consequences himself.
sook is the editor in charge”). She tries to smile to reassure him,
but her bruise makes the smile look grotesque.
After work, Eun-sook walks home. Now, she thinks about the Eun-sook now tries to make sense of something senseless—how
second slap—why did the interrogator use his left hand when could she ever give logic to something so outside the bounds of
he used his right hand for everything else? She feels intense normal human language and contact?
nausea. Again, Eun-sook recalls the fact that she did not move
when she was hit.
The next day, Eun-sook arrives at the censor’s office. As always, Already, several characters have lost sight of their individual selves
someone searches her bag. “At such moments,” Eun-sook in the heat of a crowd. But what Eun-sook experiences here is
reflects, “a part of one’s self must be temporarily detached from different: the shame and discomfort of state surveillance causes her
the whole.” The security guard examines her residence card, to dissociate, “detach[ing]” from her “self.”
her tube of Vaseline, and her sanitary pads.

Eun-sook recalls another such search that happened soon after Here, Eun-sook’s history in the past five years comes clear. After
she had arrived at Seoul for college. She had been in the protesting in Gwangju as a high school student, she got caught up in
cafeteria when plainclothes policemen rushed in, beating similar protest movements in college. Even when she tries to avoid
students and throwing furniture. Without thinking, Eun-sook protest, therefore, it seems as if activism is baked into Eun-sook’s
picked up a flier on the floor. The flier’s big block lettering read: existence. It is also worth noticing that the lettering on the flier is, to
“DOWN WITH THE BUTCHER CHUN DOO-HWAN.” But as the state police, a threat—language always has real power, so
soon as her hand closed around the leaflet, the police pulled language always must be quashed.
her hair, dragging her from her chair.
Now, in the censor’s office, Eun-sook stares up at the framed The fact that all texts must pass through the censor’s office speaks
picture of Chun Doo-hwan. She wonders how a face can to Chun’s government’s fear of the written word. Whether it is
conceal so much evil and brutality. Eun-sook waits as the criminalizing translators, brutalizing editors, or crossing out
censors, hard at work, make their way through a variety of sentences in books, Chun’s administration is determined to erase all
texts. Finally her name is called, though by the way the desk of the language that questions it.
manager asks her to sign, it is clear that something unusual has
happened with Eun-sook’s text.
Eun-sook goes to the censor’s office all the time, and usually a Just as it felt violent to Eun-sook when the fountains in Gwangju
dozen words have been crossed out or rearranged. But this were turned back on, the act of censorship carries its own brutality,
time, she feels as if “the pages have been burned.” More than “burn[ing]” the pages (and making their editor feel scorched, too).
half the text has been crossed out. Sometimes, as if going Even as pens and ink are tools of power and protest in the right
through the text sentence by sentence is too exhausting, the hands, then, when state officials wield writing implements, they
censors use an ink roller to black out an entire page. Eun-sook become dangerous weapons.
knows that the plays can never be published like this.
Unbidden, some of the sentences from the text’s introduction The glimpses of text that Eun-sook reflects on now suggests that the
pop into Eun-sook’s mind (“after you were lost to us, all our play in question is meant to honor and parallel the 5:18 massacre.
hours declined into evening”). As her cheekbone throbs, Eun- Thus, erasing this narrative, like turning on the jets in the fountains,
sook wonders again how the fountain in Gwangju could ever be almost further violates those already killed.
on again. “What could we possibly be celebrating?” she muses.
Now, it is four days since the slaps, so Eun-sook is devoted to Many of the consequences of the Gwangju massacre were
forgetting the fourth slap. It is a Saturday, but instead of making embodied and immediate. But Eun-sook’s loneliness is no doubt a
weekend plans with friends or a date, Eun-sook will just finish result of the fear and torment she was subjected to as a student
work (she gets out early today), make dinner, and then go to activist, both in high school and at university.
sleep. She does not have any friends from university that she
could see, even if she wanted to.
Before the work day is done, Eun-sook’s Mr. Seo, the producer Once more, the state censor’s ink roller is a weapon, working
from the theater, arrives, interrupting Eun-sook’s thoughts. metaphorically to cause pain but also bringing Eun-sook to very
Having heard that the censors ink-rolled much of the text, Mr. literal tears. Mr. Seo’s determination to save the play hints at the
Seo has come to see for himself. Eun-sook presents him with desperation these protestors feel to communicate their message,
the proofs. As Mr. Seo sees the damage, Eun-sook begins to cry. even against the state’s widespread, efficient silencing.
She keeps apologizing, though Mr. Seo assures her she has
nothing to apologize for. Eun-sook almost spills her coffee on
the proof, and Mr. Seo snaps it up—“as though it still contains
something.”

On Sunday, Eun-sook plans to sleep in, but as always, she is On the one hand, Eun-sook is desperate to find anything that could
wide awake by 4:00 a.m. It is time to do laundry, so she throws block out the memory of these slaps. But on the other hand, the
her clothes into the machine and tries to go back to sleep. Now, sheer work of survival—doing laundry, hanging clothes—feels
she wants to forget the fifth slap, which drew blood to the frustratingly pointless to Eun-sook, who often struggles with the
surface of her skin. As the washing machine finishes and Eun- idea that she survives when so many of her loved ones were
sook hangs her clothes up to dry, she wishes these simple murdered.
household chores would take up more of her time.
In her youth, people often complimented Eun-sook for being Even in the first days of the Gwangju uprising, Dong-ho noticed that
cute. But after the Gwangju uprising, no one praises Eun-sook’s Eun-sook looked to be “hollow[ing]” out, as if her soul was
looks anymore. And she herself just wants to speed up the disappearing in front of him; now, that process seems complete. In
aging process, hoping life will come to an end soon. As Eun- her frustration with eating, Eun-sook is struggling with what could
sook makes breakfast, she resents that she still feels hungry, be called survivor’s guilt—how can she continue to eat when the
even after all the horror and grief she has witnessed. dead cannot?
After the violence in Gwangju, Eun-sook’s mother begged her Frequently, the narrative points out that people behave differently
to move on. So Eun-sook went to university—but even at on their own than they do when in crowds or mobs. But it is still
university, there were always policemen around, beating worth noting that Eun-sook seems almost biologically, inevitably
student protestors and smashing window. Eun-sook suffered drawn to protest: she moves from activism in Gwangju as a high
from terrible nightmares after the violence in Gwangju, and it schooler to sit-ins in college to publishing work that represents a
was almost a relief when returned home to tend to her ailing subtler form of protest. In other words, while many might have
father. Soon, Eun-sook dropped out of school and took a job at moments of protest under the right circumstances, only rare people
the publishing house. She was grateful not only to spare her like Eun-sook do so consistently.
family the financial burden but to know that now, she could not
join student protests—and so she would not be killed.
The day the army returned to Gwangju, Eun-sook had not “set Even with years of reflection, Eun-sook struggles to make sense of
her mind on surviving.” She remembers that fateful evening: her motivations and thought processes on the night that Dong-ho
after dinner, she sneaks out from her house, returning to the died. Whether or not she chose to “survive” is an open question, just
Provincial Office. When she gets there, the women are arguing as Eun-sook and others will agonize over whether Dong-ho knew
about whether they should carry guns. Seon-ju, always quiet, the risks he was taking.
says very little, though she flashes Eun-sook a smile as she
argued that the women should be armed.
Jin-su arrives, asking three of the women to stay behind as Jin-su insists that women should be treated with a kind of chivalry,
guards. Though all of the women initially want to stay as a show even though (as Seon-ju’s chapter will reveal) some of the worst
of solidarity, Jin-su convinces them that it would look bad for violence in this era of Korean history was against women.
the resistance if too many were killed. To her surprise, Eun- Interestingly, Eun-sook’s fear of death is not as much about the
sook finds that her time around dead bodies has made her absence of life as it is about the gruesome bodily decomposition she
more afraid of death: “she didn’t want her last breath to be has witnessed. Eun-sook understands just how fragile bodies are,
from a gaping mouth.” and that makes her all the more afraid of damaging her own.

Seon-ju stays behind, as does Dong-ho (“you”), wearing his gym There are three important ideas in this passage. First, Eun-sook
sweater and his blue trackpants. Eun-sook tries to convince addresses Dong-ho as “you,” making it clear that this section, too, is
the other soldiers to send him home, explaining that he is only written as a kind of letter to the murdered little boy. Second, Eun-
in middle school. But Dong-ho remains. (“Had she ever had sook mentions her “soul”—but it has lost the lightness and
such a thing as a soul,” Eun-sook reflects in the present, “that “fluttering” flexibility that Dong-ho saw when his grandmother died.
was the moment of its shattering.”) Third, for Dong-ho, the loose-fitting trackpants were a symbol for
his beloved friend Jeong-dae; for Eun-sook they represent Dong-ho
in a similar way.
Eun-sook leaves, hiding herself in a nearby hospital with a Eun-sook and her unnamed friend are both young, but in this
friend whose aunt is a patient. Sheets are hanging from all the moment of confusion, no one can really “know” anything. This
windows, and it is pitch black, but all the patients and nurses moment thus inverts the usual pattern of life: many of Gwangju’s
fear that they might be killed. Each time the friend’s aunt asks a young people end up taking care of the old instead of the other way
question, the friend can only reply, “I don’t know, Aunty.” No one around.
can tell how much time has passed.
Finally, a voice over the loudspeaker announces that the army Returning to the Provincial Office would meet certain death, so the
is returning. The voice implores all citizens to come in front of fact that Eun-sook stays put amounts to a decision—she is choosing
the Provincial Office, explaining that “we have resolved to fight to survive. But though Dong-ho similarly longs to survive (“you
to the end.” Eun-sook stays put, listening to the sounds of wanted to live,” Eun-sook recalls), he does not choose safety when
combat boots and shooting and trucks. In the present, Eun- the time comes. Instead, his childlike inability to act rationally on his
sook’s thoughts shoot back to Dong-ho. Eun-sook remembers fear is one of the reasons his death continues to strike Eun-sook as
that Dong-ho’s eyelids quivered, “because you were afraid. the greatest tragedy of all.
Because you wanted to live.”
Now, it is six days since the slaps, and the publisher has just Dong-ho, like the others killed that night at the Provincial Office,
received an invitation to the premiere of the censored play. was only given one chance to be brave—which is part of the tragedy
Eun-sook wonders how staging the play will be possible, since of that loss. But because the publisher continues to live and work,
so much of it has been removed. But when the published book he is able to make up for his earlier cowardice at the interrogator’s
arrives, Eun-sook is surprised to see that only a few paragraphs office by ignoring the censors now. The publisher also puts himself
have been excised. And instead of the wanted translator’s name at risk by lying about who did the translation (presumably so that
on the cover, Eun-sook sees that the translation has been the state will not immediately condemn the plays for their
credited to the publisher’s cousin in America. The publisher association with the wanted translator).
seems proud, though Eun-sook notices the fear in his eyes.
A few hours later, Eun-sook is alone in the office. She finds a This vital excerpt gives theoretical backing to the groupthink Eun-
book about the psychology of crowds, which focuses on protest sook and the other organizers have long intuited: being in a crowd
movements and wars throughout history. The book argues that almost always “magnifies” each individual’s kind or cruel traits. The
large groups lead to more nobility and barbarism, “through that fact that the censors have crossed out the question about humanity
magnification which occurs naturally in crowds.” In the next makes the violent symbolism of the censor’s pen literal—here, the
paragraph, the censor has drawn his pen over two sentences: state is literally crossing out “humanity” as an idea.
“what is humanity? What do we have to do to keep humanity as
one thing and not another?”

Eun-sook has “no faith” in humanity anymore. She thinks back Eun-sook’s loss of faith seems to stem from two things. First, the
to the day after the soldiers slaughtered so many people in methodical, uncaring nature of the violence made her lose hope in
Gwangju, when they went door-to-door asking parents if their people. Then, the fact that everyone in Gwangju seemed to move on
children had been involved in the demonstrations. Eventually, from the atrocity (as seen by the jetting streams of the fountain)
Eun-sook learned from her mother that all of the corpses were made her give up on humanity forever.
being deposited in a single mass grave. The fountain was still
dry that day. But now, no matter how any times Eun-sook calls
the Provincial Office, no one will turn the fountain off.
Instead of trying to forget the last two slaps, Eun-sook goes to If these policemen could beat Mr. Seo, then Eun-sook is surely in
see the censored play. The play begins almost like a dance, as a danger as well. But staying true to the collectivist mindset she has
woman and a man, both dressed in mourning clothes, pass each had since high school, Eun-sook fears more for the others around
other silently. Eun-sook looks around, taking in the journalists her than she seems to fear for herself.
and other artists in the packed audience. She also notices plain-
clothed policemen, and she fears that the policemen will beat
Mr. Seo and the actors in the play will be beaten when they see
that they have defied the censors.
But rather than say the censored lines, the actors only move If erasure of language is one of Chun Doo-hwan’s central ways of
their lips—“after you died I could not hold a funeral,” the actress maintaining power, then the persistence these actors show—making
mouths silently, “and so my life became a funeral.” After a few the shapes of censored words even if they do not say their
moments, the lights come up on the audience, and Eun-sook sounds—is one of the most powerful forms of protest. In staging the
sees a little boy wearing trackpants, surrounded by older play this way, therefore, Mr. Seo is demonstrating that even in the
actors who are shrieking and moaning. The little boy, who is absence of language, South Koreans will find ways to make their
carrying a skeleton, reminds Eun-sook of Dong-ho. dissent known.
Gradually, all the actors stop moving. Finally, there’s just one This little boy wearing the trackpants that Eun-sook and others so
old woman frozen onstage. The little boy jumps on her back, associate with Dong-ho seems as though he is Dong-ho’s soul (or
“like the spirit of someone dead.” Funeral odes, written on “spirit”) made tangible. Though this image is deeply painful for Eun-
scraps of paper, begin to fall from the ceiling. Eun-sook is sook, it is also galvanizing—Eun-sook knows this is a pain she
weeping, her memories of Dong-ho fresh, but she does not look cannot look away from. And in seeing Dong-ho’s “silence” reenacted,
away. Instead, she “stares fiercely at the boy’s face, at the Eun-sook feels newly “fierce.”
movement of his silenced lips.”
CHAPTER 4: THE PRISONER, 1990

A university professor is interviewing an unnamed narrator. In Eun-sook’s chapter, pens and ink were symbolic instruments of
The narrator recalls being tortured with a black Monami Biro, violence. But here, Chun Doo-hwan’s repressive state itself makes
an otherwise ordinary pen that became an instrument of that symbolism literal, as the fancy pen mutilates the narrator’s
tremendous pain. Over and over again, the interrogator would hand. It is also important to note whom this narrator is speaking to:
jam the pen into the narrator’s left hand, leaving his right hand for the first time, the novel’s words are being directed not to Dong-
undamaged so he could write his confession. By the end of the ho but to this mysterious professor.
torture, the narrator’s left hand was a pulp of “raw meat.”

When the narrator was first arrested, none of the prisoners Though the narrator is speaking in 1990, he seems to reflect on
dared to ask where they were or even to speak. Each torture that took place some time ago. Poignantly, just as Jeong-dae
interrogation began with some physical torture, confirming to felt that his body was holding him back, the narrator now feels that
the narrator “that my life had been taken out of my own hands, the sensory “experience” of bodily pain has nullified his “life”—his
and the only thing I was permitted to do now was to experience inner thoughts and feelings and dreams. In other words, by forcing
pain.” The interrogators would ask questions calmly, but the him to be aware of his bodily vulnerability, the state torturers have
answers the prisoners gave them were never sufficient. And made the narrator lose his sense of interior self.
when the interrogators sent the narrator back to his cell, they
made him sit completely straight against the wall as guards
shouted at him and the other prisoners, denying them food and
water. The men weren’t even allowed to fall asleep.
Three times a day, the guards fed the prisoners. The narrator Now, the narrator’s place in the story becomes clear: this is the
was paired with Kim Jin-su, who ate little. As they shared their same Jin-su who supervised Dong-ho, and the narrator seems to
small portions, the narrator felt Kim Jin-su’s eyes follow him, have been arrested for his own participation in the Gwangju
devoid of life. Now, Jin-su has recently died, having taken his uprising. The narrator’s guilt about his survival mimics Eun-sook’s,
own life. As the narrator speaks with the professor, he wonders as does his complicated relationship with his own natural metabolic
why he was able to survive while Jin-su was not. processes and cravings for food.
The narrator becomes frustrated, wondering why the Like Eun-sook, the narrator wants to forget the worst of the
professor would want to dredge up all his most painful violence—even though it seems that the trauma he endured has
memories with this interview. Besides, Jin-su’s experiences seared every detail of that violence into his brain. The fact that Jin-
were not identical to the narrator’s. Because of Jin-su’s su received extra harsh treatment because of his “feminine” traits
somewhat feminine features, he was subjected to whole other once more suggests that the violence under Chun was often
forms of torture, as when the guards would unleash ants to gendered, enacting the regime’s regressive vision of male
nibble on his genitals. dominance.
In 1980, during the uprising, Jin-su was still only a freshman in Jin-su’s clarity of conscience, decency to others, and sense of
college. The narrator did not know Jin-su well, so he was bravery is clear in nearly every anecdote about him—at least before
surprised when Jin-su decided to stay behind that night the the state’s brutal torture. Though the narrator and Jin-su were not
soldiers came back into town. The narrator recalls that night: personally close, the bonds of a shared cause nevertheless made
together, he and Jin-su make wills, preparing for death. Even them ready to die together.
after Jin-su is ordered to escort the women home, he comes
back, ready to face the army as bravely as he could.
But as the army approaches, Jin-su suddenly finds himself This strange sleepiness could be read in many ways: as young
overcome with tiredness. He lays down, and soon the rest of people’s lack of awareness about the situation they would soon face,
the protestors join him, as if Jin-su’s sleepiness is contagious. as a kind of preparing for death and afterlife, or even simply as
At one point in his nap, the narrator wakes to see Dong-ho exhaustion with the state’s endless brutality. It is crucial to note that
crawling in beside him. Jin-su is scolding Dong-ho, telling him to Jin-su does not want Dong-ho to be there, risking his life in this
go home. When Dong-ho refuses, Jin-su only make him way—and that, hoping to protect Dong-ho’s life, Jin-su gives him the
promise that when the soldiers come, he will surrender right specific directions on how to surrender that will later lead to Dong-
away. ho’s death.

The narrator was 22 at the time, one of the oldest members of The narrator’s relative maturity perhaps explains why he can give
the resistance. Even though the narrator knew rationally that such a balanced, straightforward recounting (unlike Dong-ho and
the army wildly outnumbered them, he could not help feeling Jeong-dae’s more piecemeal, emotionally driven stories). But even
the force of “conscience, the most terrifying thing in the world.” at 22, the narrator was still unable to entirely accept his situation,
Similarly, even as a spokesman for the student militia told feeling hope instead of a much more realistic awareness of the
journalists that everyone was prepared to die, most of the danger he was in.
students themselves felt more hope that they would survive
than fear that they would be killed.
When the narrator first started protesting, he was amazed by The narrator likely has not read Eun-sook’s book about crowd
the sense of strength and unity he found in crowds, singing the psychology, but here, he describes what it feels like to live such a
national anthem as if he could feel “the sublime enormity of a phenomenon. In the crowd of protestors at Gwangju, the narrator
single heart.” But when the bullets and tanks came, that unity was able to give and gain strength from everyone around him,
was shattered. As the narrator faced the fallout the next day, feeling almost as if their blood was coursing through his own
the lines outside the hospital and the looted guns, he wanted veins—as if they shared “a single heart.” And in a way that felt
only to regain his feeling in the crowd—“the miracle of stepping almost “mirac[ulous],” the narrator was able to leave behind the
outside the shell of our own selves.” fragile “shell” of his individual selfhood (with its cowardice and
caution) to find something more “sublime” and powerful in the
crowd.
The narrator and Jin-su were old enough to make this decision Dong-ho may have been insistent with his mother that he wanted
for themselves, but Dong-ho was not. He was more concerned to stay at the Provincial Office, but the narrator is now the second
with sponge cake than with this grave choice. The narrator character to affirm that Dong-ho was not ready to die. And even
doesn’t know exactly what happened when the soldiers arrived. though Jin-su encourages Dong-ho to protect himself, Dong-ho
He only knows that no one in the resistance fired their guns could not—the logistics and stakes of the situation would be almost
(because they did not know how to) and that Jin-su made impossible to understand as a young boy.
Dong-ho promise to “look for a way to live.”
Later, the narrator found out that the army had been given The scale of Chun Doo-hwan’s violence is now revealed to be even
800,000 bullets—enough to shoot every person in Gwangju larger than previous characters have understood. The narrator’s
twice. The narrator knows that the people in the student militia insistence that the student militia’s resistance saved others, while it
who were killed that night spared many more others from a might be true to some extent, also reflects his anxiety that all of the
similar fate. Those who were not killed were jailed, punished losses did not mean anything.
according to whether they were found holding guns.
Those who were not holding guns were released in batches. The logic behind the narrator’s desire to bring meaning to his co-
But those whom the soldiers had found holding guns protestors’ deaths now becomes clear: he is trying to counteract the
experienced even more extreme forms of torture: “hairpin state’s torture, which reduces everyone to their painful, embodied
torture” and a horrific procedure known as the “roast chicken.” instincts. Only by continually dwelling on the causes he and his co-
Looking back, the narrator begins to realize the purpose of protestors fought for can people like the narrator salvage
such tactics—the army was trying to make these men feel themselves from the state’s violence.
ridiculous, as if their resistance was only ever a joke. The
narrator thinks back to his hungry, horrible days in prison.

The youngest prisoner, a quiet, brave boy with a stutter, is Yeong-chae should immediately remind readers of Dong-ho: both
named Kim Yeong-chae. Every so often, Jin-su talks to Yeong- are young, quiet boys, and both swerve between steely bravery and
Chae; he tells Yeong-Chae he does not need to use honorifics childlike yearnings for sweet treats. Yeong-chae’s breakdown at the
with him, as they are around the same age and come from the mention of sponge cake is particularly poignant—such simple
same region. As the narrator gets to know Yeong-Chae, he pleasures now feel so alien in this world of torture and starvation.
learns that the boy lost his cousin in a protest. But though Like Dong-ho, Yeong-chae was not old enough to know exactly what
Yeong-Chae tells the story of his cousin’s death with dry eyes, he was choosing—namely, a life that could never hold small
when Jin-su asks his favorite foods—sponge cake and pleasures again—when he stood in those crowds of protestors.
Sprite—he bursts into tears. Yeong-Chae is being tortured, too.
In the present, the narrator tells the professor that every time In the crowd at the Provincial Office, the narrator felt principled.
he sweats in summer, he remembers how he felt in this era of But since the interrogations, the narrator is too aware of his own
torture: that he was no more than sticky flesh and pus. In those fragility—of the sweat and pus inside of him—to care about those
times, as his shoulders or toes were forced apart, the narrator principles or about anything other than ending the torturers’
would do anything to end the pain; he remembers shouting “for escalating pain.
God’s sake stop, I did wrong.”
A few months later, the narrator recalls, the soldiers convened Yeong-chae’s decision to sing the national anthem reflects both the
a makeshift court. Thirty men were sentenced at a time, as unique bravery of youth and his belief, widely shared in the novel,
guards forced them to bow their heads and patrolled the seats that protesting is patriotic. After months of torturing individual
of the courtroom with their guns. The prisoners were told that prisoners, this show of unity perhaps intimidates the soldiers.
if they spoke or even lifted their heads, they would be
immediately killed in their seats. But on the day of the
narrator’s group trial, Yeong-Chae began to sing the national
anthem. The rest of the men soon joined in, singing softly but
clearly. To everyone’s surprise, the soldiers let their prisoners
finish the song.
The narrator explains that he was given a nine-year sentence, Though little was known about the narrator’s life before his torture,
and Jin-su was given seven years. But these sentences didn’t readers have seen time and again that Jin-su used to be a highly
really mean anything: the men were released in batches, as if competent person. But the torture has left its mark, and though Jin-
even the soldiers knew the charges were absurd. Two years su and the narrator are no longer in physical pain, the emotional
after being released, the narrator sees Jin-su again. But though wounds block them from ever forging normal lives (a seemingly
time has passed, neither man has been able to accomplish common phenomenon for survivors of the Gwangju uprising).
anything—not go back to school, move out, or even date. The
memory of the interrogation room is still too fresh.
In the present, both men have become reliant on alcohol to get Memories of life before and after violence can provide comfort,
any rest, so they split a bottle of soju until neither of them are but—as was true for Eun-sook and Jeong-dae as well—violence is
really conscious. Then, this becomes a ritual: for years, Jin-su something at once necessary and impossible to forget. Jin-su’s
and the narrator meet to lament their loneliness and inability to comment that none of the protestors could actually fire their guns
work, as they swap alcohol or painkillers and try their best to again points to these young peoples’ innocence and to their utter
forget. Neither man can even fathom the idea of taking naivety about what they might have to face.
revenge—they are too exhausted. Every so often, Jin-su laughs
at the fact that they thought guns—which none of them had
ever fired—could protect them.

In 1989, the narrator finally starts working as a taxi driver. One Time moves much faster in this section than in other chapters,
rainy night, Jin-su approaches the narrator after his taxi shift. giving readers a sense of the blurry, monotonous way that the
Jin-su looks even more devastated than usual, and as the narrator and Jin-su experience life. Jin-su’s deep pain at Yeong-
narrator welcomes Jin-su into his apartment, he feels real fear. chae’s hospitalization, even years after they knew each other, once
Finally, Jin-su explains that there was a trial, and Yeong-chae more reflects the lifelong connections that this month of activism in
has been sentenced to life in a psychiatric hospital. Apparently, 1980 created. And losing Yeong-chae, whom he met in his youth,
Yeong-Chae tried to kill someone after trying to kill himself six likely reminds Jin-su of Dong-ho’s death.
times. The narrator can’t bear to hear this story, so he pours
himself a glass of soju, excuses himself, and goes to bed.
As he told this story, Jin-su wondered aloud what a soul was, In this vital passage, Jin-su echoes the idea that humans really do
desperate to know what Yeong-chae lost when the torturers have souls. But while Jeong-dae explores how souls can persist even
abused him. “It was only when we were shattered that we after death, Jin-su seems aware that souls can vanish even in life if
proved we had souls,” Jin-su reflected. After the torture, “what someone experiences significant trauma. And when the strength of a
we really were was humans made of glass.” soul vanishes, all that is left is a vulnerable, physical body, fragile as
though “made of glass.”
Shortly after that visit, the narrator reads about Jin-su’s death The fact that Jin-su leaves a photo of murdered children with his
in the newspaper. There are not enough coffin-bearers at Jin- suicide note directly links his death to the 5:18
su’s funeral, so the narrator volunteers, though he leaves massacre—indicating that the violence of the past is hurting for
before the service is over. The narrator never read Jin-su’s victims long after 1980. The phrase “psychological autopsy” will
suicide note, nor did he look at the photo that accompanied the reverberate for other characters, as the professor expands his
note, which showed several young children dead in a straight interviews to as many survivors as he can reach.
line. Now, in the story’s present, the narrator is livid that the
professor is asking him about these things, even if it is for the
purpose of his scholarly, “psychological autopsy.”
On that day in Gwangju, the narrator and Jin-su lay with their For the soldiers, this kind of violence is almost a game— some of
faces down while the soldiers taunted them (“I was in Vietnam, them have even gone from war to war, finding power and pleasure in
you sons of bitches”). Eventually, five of the youngest members repeated group brutality. More importantly, this revelation shows
of the resistance came down, including Dong-ho. None of these why Jin-su blames himself so directly for Dong-ho’s death—he told
boys had any weapons, and they all walked out in a straight line Dong-ho to stand in a school-like formation, emphasizing his youth,
with their arms up. In the present, the narrator tells the and Dong-ho wound up dead in that very line.
professor that the kids were lying in a straight line because
they were shot in a straight line—“with both arms in the air, just
like we’d told them to.”
The narrator reflects that “some memories never heal.” The narrator has long known that human beings can be reduced to
Instead, these rare memories are so painful that everything “raw” flesh, their bodies in so much pain that they begin to feel like
else fades away. The narrator wonders if “the experience of nothing but “a lump of meat.” But here, he reflects that just as
cruelty” is the only thing every human being shares: the idea anyone can become the sum of their fragile body parts, anyone can
that “each one of us is capable of being reduced to an insect, a also be like that soldier, pushed by the swirl of the crowd toward
ravening beast, a lump of meat.” Once, a soldier in Busan acts of unimaginable “cruelty.”
revealed to the narrator that the army incentivized extra
brutality with cash prizes.

Indeed, the narrator believes that many of the soldiers who The narrator’s utter distrust of the world is painfully evident here.
came to Gwangju were remembering moments in the Korean After all, why should he trust the professor’s commitment to telling
or Vietnam wars where violence was met with a “handsome his story with written words when the state’s terrifying pen still
reward.” The narrator feels that every member of the human scars his hands? And how can he rely on “a human being” like the
race is capable of such cruelty—including people like himself professor—or even more terrifyingly, himself—when he has seen how
and the professor. Every day, the narrator looks at the scar on powerless or brutal all humans can become? All it takes is torture,
his hand from the pen. “So tell me professor,” the narrator asks, being interrogated, or even just standing in a crowd for humans to
“what answers do you have for me? You, a human being just like step outside of themselves.
me.”
CHAPTER 5: THE FACTORY GIRL, 2002

It is 2002, but Seon-ju can’t stop thinking about years ago, More than 20 years have now passed since the Gwangju uprising,
when she would spend all her time with Seong-hee and their but like the narrator and Eun-sook, Seon-ju still feels almost
other labor union friends. Now, reflecting on that time—when physical pain from her memories. Interestingly, though, Seon-ju did
they would talk about the moon and lounge around on not begin protesting during the 5:18 uprising, as the others did. Her
rooftops—only makes Seong-hee sad. In the present day, in her activism started years earlier, with Seong-hee’s group of young
office, Seon-ju checks her email and smokes a cigarette. female labor organizers.
Everything feels difficult, as if she is underwater.
In a flashback that she labels as “Up Rising,” Seon-ju remembers In these poetic, experimental, “Up Rising” sections, Seon-ju reflects
the sound of footsteps. She recalls waking up in the middle of on the vague outline of a young boy, one who seems to resemble
the night and hearing a child. Back in the present, Seon-ju Dong-ho (or at least an abstracted version of him). The translation
thinks about how she ended up in this office. For years, she had of these sections as “Up Rising” is particularly telling: the words
worked with Seong-hee in the labor rights organization. Ten testify both to the force of memories when they “rise” to the surface
years ago, however, she got a call from a man named Yoon. and to Seon-ju’s life of protesting (rising up). In linking these two
Yoon was hoping to do a “psychological autopsy” on Seon-ju’s ideas through language, the “Up Rising” sections suggest that
old student militia unit, and he wanted her help. memory is its own form of protest. On a plot level, it is important to
note that Yoon is almost certainly the same professor interviewing
the unnamed narrator for his aforementioned “psychological
autopsy.”
At first, Seon-ju declined. But after talking to Yoon more Language was once a tool to hurt Seon-ju and her activist friends,
recently, she learned that seven of the ten surviving members but Yoon’s project—in which he gets survivors to bear witness to the
of the militia had agreed to a series of interviews. When Seon- truth of what happened in Gwangju—hopes to reclaim language as
ju still expressed hesitation, Yoon merely sent her his a tool of healing and strength. The footsteps and dripping water
dissertation and a set of tapes, hoping she could at least record might allude, however vaguely, to Dong-ho’s morning routine back
her voice even if she couldn’t bear a sit-down interview. Seon-ju at his family’s hanok.
has another flash of the “Up Rising” memory, imagining
footsteps and dripping water.

Though Seon-ju works all day categorizing and transcribing Like Eun-sook, Seon-ju has continued her life of activism long after
various audio and video recordings, the cassette tapes Yoon the events at Gwangju. But though Seon-ju now works as an
has sent her to record on still feel overwhelming. Seon-ju’s environmental activist, studying the long-lasting effects of radiation,
work focuses on environmental disasters, namely deaths and she knows that the realities and impacts of the Gwangju violence
disease caused by radioactivity. She wonders how Yoon will be are even harder to talk about.
able to stand the stories of bayonets and drill bits and cudgels.
Already, the first interview described in his dissertation
involves torture, as the unnamed interviewee describes being
taken captive and brutalized in a nearby university.
The first interviewee survived. In his interview, he explains that As Eun-sook experienced when she went to college, it’s mostly
though he had never prayed before, his prayers to be released students who hold protests against Chun Doo-hwan. And while
from torture were answered relatively quickly. But he cannot students are, in some ways, the most courageous members of
forget the faces of others who were not so lucky, like a pair of society, they’re also the most vulnerable and unprepared. Also of
college girls gunned down on their campus. These faces haunt note here is that, as with Eun-sook, the details of corpse
his nightmares, just as the dead bodies Seon-ju used to clean decomposition linger in Seon-ju’s mind long after any specific bodies
and sort at the Gwangju Provincial Office haunt her memories. have been buried.
That night, Seon-ju wakes up long before dawn, disturbed by Seon-ju’s hesitancy at sharing space with another person—not to
what she has read. She is almost 42, but she has only lived with mention physical or emotional intimacy—gestures toward the
a man once, and that only lasted one year. After all, living alone sexual violence she will later acknowledge having suffered.
means Seon-ju can wake up whenever she needs to without
fear of disturbing another person.
A few days later, Seon-ju is staying late at work when her boss, Like Eun-sook, Seon-ju spends much of her time alone, desperate to
Park Yeong-ho drops by. Park is cramming, hoping to shut down fill the hours to avoid thinking about painful memories. Clearly, her
a nearby nuclear reactor. He wonders why Seon-ju has cranked “human search engine” approach to her environmentalist job is one
up the heat in the office so high. All of the other employees are more way Seon-ju has found to distract herself from what happened
younger than Seon-ju, and they speak to her with a kind of all those years ago.
quiet deference. Only Park ever questions her or teases her,
calling her “a human search engine.”
When Park notices that Seon-ju is using the Dictaphone, Now, Seon-ju’s past work as a labor organizer starts to come into
smoking cigarettes, and drinking coffee, he assumes she is just focus. Though she and Seong-hee were both schoolgirls when they
cramming to meet a deadline, too. Park apologizes for the long began protesting the major factories, they ended up leading a
hours and meager pay, confessing that he and the other national movement. Even two decades later, Seong-hee remains an
employees are curious about what motivates Seon-ju. Park important model for progressive activists like Park. But though the
wonders about Seon-ju’s relationship with Seong-hee, who is stories of such protests seem enviable after the fact, in reality they
“the stuff of legend” to him and other, younger labor organizers. were more complicated—not just because Seon-ju had to witness
Seon-ju feels too tired to explain her relationship to Seong-hee, great carnage, but also because her relationship with Seong-hee
or to tell Park about all that she has seen. does not seem to have survived these activist actions.

The “Up Rising” memory comes again, as Seon-ju reflects on Seon-ju’s words here almost exactly echo Dong-ho’s anxiety that he
the ways she is different from Seong-hee. While Seong-hee will never be “forgiven” for letting Jeong-dae die. It is perhaps not a
believes in a god of some kind, Seon-ju struggles to pray. “I coincidence, then, that Seon-ju has this thought soon after the
forgive no one,” she vows, “and no one forgives me.” Dong-ho-centric “Up Rising” poem recurs.
Back in the present, Seon-ju pretends to go home when Park Despite their closeness before and during the labor protests, it is
leaves the office. But secretly, she turns around, planning to now evident that Seon-ju and Seong-hee are estranged from each
stay in the office so she can record the tapes for Yoon. Seon-ju other. Moreover, the fact that Seon-ju feels the need to record her
has recently learned from the newspapers that Seong-hee is in testimony for the professor before seeing Seong-hee suggests that
the hospital. She calls her old friend for the first time in years, their estrangement had something to do with how the two women
and the two talk, only briefly. For her entire life, except for the remembered and discussed their activist history differently.
two years when she was in prison, Seon-ju has buried herself in
her work. It feels easier and safer to be solitary. But now, Seon-
ju feels a deep need to connect with Seong-hee. For some
reason she can’t quite explain, Seon-ju believes that she must
record the tapes for Yoon before she can visit Seong-hee in
person.
Seon-ju thinks back to the factory labor she did as a teenager, As Seon-ju thinks about her entry into protest, she takes a
which was so physically punishing and exhausting that she had remarkably intersectional lens. Rather than seeing her conflict with
to take pills to stay awake. Back then, the guards would search the South Korean government as purely one of citizens vs. their
her every night, lingering on her private parts. There were no state, Seon-ju sees how class and gender also impact the power
weekends, and Seon-ju was always getting sick from the factory structure she is fighting against. And to those marginalized both as
fumes. Women only made half of the men’s already-low pay. No women and as working-class factory employees, it’s no wonder that
wonder that Seon-ju found solace in Seong-hee’s labor rallies, Seong-hee’s declaration of “we are noble” felt so radical.
which helped factory workers insist that “we are noble.”
When Seong-hee had organized enough laborers to go on Even as Chun Doo-hwan and his predecessor Park Chung-hee seem
strike, she and the other young women formed a human wall in to advocate for traditional gender roles, they also disrespect and
front of the factory. As policemen and strike-breakers violate their country’s most longstanding ideas about women’s
approached, Seong-hee instructed the women to take off their bodies and purity. It is also worth noting that all of the events Seon-
clothes—young women’s bodies were sacred, so the activists ju reflects on here occurred before the protests at Gwangju. Unlike
were sure they would be safe if they were naked. But to Dong-ho, Seon-ju knew what she was getting into when she stayed
everyone’s shock, the police still attacked, dragging the naked at the Provincial Office that night—she had already lived through a
girls to the ground and beating them with cudgels. Seon-ju was version of the state’s violence.
brutalized so much that her intestines ruptured.
After Seon-ju healed, she decided to return home to Gwangju Traditionally, hanja characters would have been used in fancier,
rather than continue to fight with the other factory workers. upper-class writing. But by teaching themselves to use hanja even
She was now blacklisted from most factory jobs, so she had to without formal education, Seon-ju and Seong-hee find another way
get a job at a dressmaker’s shop. The pay was even worse now, to use language as protest, challenging the rigid class divides of their
but Seon-ju found comfort from writing back and forth with society.
Seong-hee, taking her time to write in hanja (traditional
Chinese) characters as Seong-hee had taught her.

After three years, Seon-ju finally worked her way up to being a Many of the younger characters (from Dong-ho to Yeong-chae to
machinist in the dress shop. But as soon as she got this new job, Jeong-dae) seem to have fallen into the protests almost by accident.
Seon-ju was devastated to learn that a young factory worker But Seon-ju has a more expansive, historical way of thinking, as she
had died in the riots, slitting her own wrists in protest. Quickly, links her own experience as a factory worker to state violence
Seon-ju begins to link the violence she experienced at her happening all over the nation.
factory to similar incidences in Busan and Masan. She knows
that the person responsible for all of this violence is President
Park Chung-hee.
That October, Park Chung-hee was assassinated, and soon Park Chung-hee was assassinated in 1979, and Chun Doo-hwan
after, Chun Doo-hwan rose to power as the next president. began to slowly accrue power over the next year, so Seon-ju is likely
Rather than lessening the violence, Chun Doo-hwan had even recalling the early months of 1980, just before the 5:18 uprising. In
more frightening plans than his predecessor. Seon-ju became both the words of the newspaper and the block letters of this
glued to newspapers, trying to understand what would happen protest sign, language is a critical tool for gathering young people
next. One day, walking along the street, she saw a bus full of into a strong, vocal, crowd of protestors.
young factory girls. They were chanting protest slogans and
holding a sign which read “END MARTIAL LAW. GUARANTEE
LABOR RIGHTS.”
Feeling entranced by the chants, Seon-ju followed the bus all Though violence was common in the factory riots, flat-out murder
the way to the Gwangju Provincial Office. Though the protests was still unusual. In other words, at this point in Chun Doo-hwan’s
in Gwangju had begun with university students, now, the rise to power, death was not yet normalized—and Seon-ju, like the
square in the front of Office was filled with people of all ages. rest of Gwangju, is still able to fully take in the tragedy and shock of
At the front of the protest were the bodies of two young people each loss.
whom soldiers had gunned down.
In the present, as Seon-ju approaches a hospital, time seems to For Jeong-dae, memories were usually comforting; for the narrator,
blur together. Seon-ju can still hear the girls’ protest song in her they were almost impossible to bear. Seon-ju locates herself in the
head, “carrying down through the years.” Seon-ju enters the middle of these two figures, finding strength in the recollections of
hospital while she recalls the words “we are noble,” chanted the “we are noble” chant even as she hides from reflecting on the
over and over again. Seon-ju climbs to the roof of the hospital, “nightmares” she once lived through.
then jumps off. But rather than dying, Seon-ju revives, only to
repeat the process again—this is a recurring nightmare
Unfortunately, being awake is not much better. “Memories are
waiting,” Seon-ju knows. “What they call forth cannot strictly be
called nightmares.”
Seon-ju once felt proud that she was able to repress her The narrator gave his testimony 12 years before Seon-ju considered
memories—she was angry with Yoon for wanting to dig up her doing so, suggesting that the professor Yoon has been at this project
recollections of the past. In fact, her entire falling-out with for more than a decade. If testimony and language were always a
Seong-hee hinged on this disagreement. Ten years ago, Seong- big part of Seong-hee’s testimony, it makes sense that she would be
hee encouraged Seon-ju to make her story public, and Seon-ju hard on Seon-ju for refusing to share her story with the professor.
was outraged. Now and always, Seon-ju feels that she is failing Lastly, Seon-ju’s memories of her husband further hint toward her
Seong-hee. For a moment, Seon-ju remembers the man who self-isolation in the years after the uprising.
had been her husband for eight months, his kind eyes and his
worried insistence that she sometimes scared him.

In the present, Seon-ju is at the hospital—in reality now instead Over and over again, characters in the novel have lamented that the
of in her dreams. As Seon-ju waits for the doctor to arrive, she violence at Gwangju cut short the lives of young people. But here,
thinks back to her youth in Gwangju, to a friend named Jeong- Seon-ju adds a new dimension to that narrative, pointing out that
mi who had wanted to be a doctor. Seon-ju knew Jeong-mi the unfair conditions they were protesting were also destroying
would never realize this—the factory would destroy her body dreams (like Jeong-mi’s aspiration to be a doctor).
before she even got time to study for the middle school exams.
Seon-ju washes her face, brushes her teeth, and applies lotion. Seon-ju’s friendship with Seong-hee signals just how close
She wonders what Seong-hee will look like—it has been 10 protestors could become over the course of their activism.
years since they last saw each other, and Seong-hee sounded so Specifically, the image of the two women curled up next to each
different on the phone. Seon-ju recalls moments in their other echoes the image of Jeong-dae and Jeong-mi, snuggling for
protest days when she and Seong-hee, not caring about warmth in the annex of the hanok.
propriety, slept curled next to each other for comfort and
warmth. Seon-ju remembers that Seong-hee always snored
loudly.
Still in the hospital waiting room, Seon-ju falls into a restless There have been several suggestions that much of the soldiers’
sleep. She dreams of the phrases from Yoon’s emails: violence was gendered, but only now do readers learn the full extent
“testimony. Meaning. Memory. For the future.” Seon-ju knows of the sexual assault Seon-ju had to suffer. The scale of this trauma
Yoon wants her to “bear witness” to her own suffering, but how helps make sense of Seon-ju’s hesitancy to give “testimony,” even
is she supposed to bear witness to the rifle that was pushed up though she knows words can be a vital form of “memory” and a way
her vagina, to the various abuse so intimate it left her forever to bear “witness.” But no words could suffice to capture the degree
unable to have children? How can Seon-ju explain that the of invasion and pain she suffered at the hands of these soldiers.
violence was horrific enough that she became afraid of touch
and affection, even friendship?
When Seon-ju wakes to the sound of a hospital patient Tragically, this passage makes clear just how much the violence has
moaning, she decides to leave. In the middle of the night, she altered Seon-ju’s experience of the world: even the simple, natural
crosses the damp grass and heads home. As she walks, she pleasure of grass makes her think of death. Though Seon-ju has yet
thinks again of the two college girls murdered on the grass. to mention Dong-ho’s name, footsteps will later become a signifier
With horror, another moment of “Up Rising” comes to Seon- of the young boy’s tangible presence (or soul) for his mother and the
ju—in this moment, the footsteps are just outside her door, writer.
coming towards her.
Seon-ju recalls driving around with the other female students, The fact that most residents of Gwangju will not even turn on their
begging the residents of Gwangju to at least turn on their lights reflects just how terrifying it could be to defy the soldiers.
lights. The soldiers eventually apprehended them, arresting the Upsettingly, the interrogators match Seon-ju’s more global view of
various protestors. Because Seon-ju had a gun and was the protests, linking Seon-ju’s straightforward call for labor rights to
involved in labor rights organizing, they called her “Red Bitch,” the tension of the Korean War 30 years earlier.
insisting that she was a spy from North Korea. The military
police interrogated Seon-ju for so long that she could barely
think.

After several years, Seon-ju was able to track down Seong-hee, When a young person dies, Seon-ju’s memory of Jeong-mi seems to
who had also been in prison. Both women have been gravely suggest, those who survive them mourn the innocent life lost. But
aged by their years of arrest and torture. When they reunited, they also mourn the person that young boy or girl had yet to
Seong-hee told Seon-ju that Jeong-mi, after protesting and become—maybe Jeong-mi would have been a doctor, or Jeong-dae
being blacklisted from the factory, had disappeared. Now, would have been taller, or Dong-ho (as his mother will later
Seon-ju struggles to remember the contours of Jeong-mi’s speculate) would have been a poet.
face; all she can think of is the phrase “I want to be a doctor.”
In the present, the “Up Rising” memory comes again. Seon-ju Dong-ho’s face is a galvanizing image for the activists who knew
recalls that she came back to Gwangju “to die.” At first, the city him, but the photo of this young boy becomes a call to protest even
looked similar, until she noticed the quiet in the streets, the for those who were less personally involved. For Seon-ju, as for Eun-
bullet holes in the walls of the Provincial Office. But on a walk sook decades earlier, the memory of Dong-ho is energizing and even
one day, Seon-ju noticed a picture of Dong-ho plastered onto a life-“saving.” In remembering Dong-ho, Seong-ju suggests here, she
wall of a Catholic Center. She took down the picture as quickly remembers what she is fighting for, and therefore why she must
as she could, walking fast to avoid the police’s prying eyes. “You survive to fight.
saved me, Dong-ho,” Seon-ju thinks, “you made my blood seethe
back to life.”
In the present, as Seon-ju continues her walk away from the Part of Chun Doo-hwan’s success in quashing the uprisings was to
hospital, she thinks back to Dong-ho asking why she and Eun- make them feel pointless—but like the unnamed narrator, Seon-ju is
sook placed the Taegukgi over the dead bodies in the gym. committed to giving meaning to the activists’ lives, both those that
Seon-ju does not remember Eun-sook’s answer, but privately, continue and those that have been cut short. Fascinatingly, Seon-ju
she thinks it is because they were trying so hard to make the does not assign the young footsteps to Dong-ho. It is possible that
deaths mean something. Seon-ju feels that she can never by viewing these footsteps as more universal, Seon-ju—always an
return to this time again—to a time before she knew what organizer of giant groups—is placing her story in the context of the
torture felt like. When the “Up Rising” feelings come again, she thousands of others like herself.
realizes she might never know who the footsteps belong to.
As she thinks of Dong-ho and Jin-su, Seon-ju reflects that she Crowds of any size (from the protestors in front of the Provincial
has “the capacity for neither bravery nor strength.” She blames Office to the teenaged friend group on Seong-hee’s roof) give
herself for leaving the factory after she was beaten, and she “bravery” and “strength” to those who do not have it on their own.
also blames herself for leaving Seong-hee’s labor movement And so while Seon-ju cannot find the strength to think about Jin-su
later in life to go work with this environmental group. Seon-ju and Dong-ho when she is by herself, memories of being with her
knows that one day she will have to face danger head on, and community give her the energy she needs to honor those two
she thinks back to that night on the roof when she was victims of the massacre.
seventeen, eating peaches with her friends and staring at the
moon.
With the hospital behind her, Seon-ju thinks the thought she Like Eun-sook, Jin-su, and later Dong-ho’s mother, Seon-ju blames
has been avoiding: that she is responsible for Dong-ho’s death. herself for the fact that Dong-ho stayed behind that fateful night.
If she’d sent him home, begged for him to leave as they ate But rather than seeing this possibility as literally soul crushing, like
gimbap together, maybe he would not have stayed and lost his Jeong-dae did, Seon-ju sees it as a responsibility to keep surviving.
life. Seon-ju walks on, raising her head to the rain. As she walks, As she promises to stay alive and raises her head to the rain, Seon-ju
she thinks, “don’t die. Just don’t die.” seems newly committed to her causes, fighting for justice and
leading out the life that Dong-ho didn’t get to live.

CHAPTER 6: THE BOY’S MOTHER, 2010

It is the early 2000s, but Dong-ho’s mother still thinks she sees As Seon-ju and Jeong-dae have both seen, memory can bring
her son. As she follows the little boy, trying to keep up with his purpose and comfort in times of distress. But now, 30 full years
fast pace, she has to admit that there are many differences after Dong-ho’s death, his mother learns just how unsatisfying
between him and Dong-ho: for instance, they have different memory can be. Her recollections of Dong-ho are so strong that she
haircuts and different backpacks. But they have the same can overlook a different haircut and a more modern backpack just
energetic walk, and the same small bodies that have not yet to pretend the boy in front of her is her son. But even as she chases
grown into their hand-me-down trackpants. “You’d come back the memory, represented by those too-big trackpants, she knows
to me this one time,” Dong-ho’s mother thinks, “and this that she cannot ever “catch” her slain child.
doddery old woman couldn’t even catch you up.”
After walking for hours behind the little boy, Dong-ho’s mother Dong-ho’s mother’s desperation here echoes the ancient Greek
feels nauseated, so she sits down on the ground to rest. She story of Orpheus and Eurydice, one of the most important allegories
realizes that she has been walking through a construction site, for grief and memory in the literary canon. Also, like those glittering
and the dust is making her sick. From then on, every time fountain jets Eun-sook complained about, the construction around
construction happens, Dong-ho’s mother stands in the streets, Dong-ho’s mother shows that life in Gwangju will inevitably move
hoping to see that little boy, so like her son, walk by. She wishes on from the massacre.
she had called Dong-ho’s name when she saw that little boy,
and that he had just turned around so she could see his face.
At the same time, Dong-ho’s mother knows this little boy can’t Dong-ho’s mother’s willingness to eat grass, like her willingness to
be her son. After all, she buried Dong-ho herself. Once, she ate chase this stranger boy, demonstrates how much mourning defies
a handful of the grass on his grave just to feel closer to him. language and other traditional forms of logic or communication. In
Dong-ho’s mother cannot forget how pale Dong-ho was, his comparing the bloodless face of Dong-ho to the angry, prematurely
face ashen from losing so much blood. Nor she can forget how wrinkled face of his older brother, Dong-ho’s mother again implies
Dong-ho’s middle brother vowed revenge. Years later, the that the soldiers’ violence had indirect physical impacts even on
middle son looks so much older than he should—his anger has those they never touched.
aged him.
While Dong-ho’s middle brother remains enraged, his older Structurally, it is important that this sketch of Dong-ho’s early life
brother is friendly and bubbly, visiting Dong-ho’s mother every comes so late in the narrative. By beginning with the violence and
so often to bring her food and cheer her up. The older brother working backward to happier memories, the novel ensures that
looks just like Dong-ho. As a child, he would rush home from readers will be left with an image of Dong-ho as a full person rather
school, eager to play with the new baby or hold him on his lap. than as a young boy shot down by state soldiers.
During one visit, the older brother accused the middle brother On the one hand, Dong-ho’s mother’s refusal to intervene here
of failing to save Dong-ho’s life. In response, the middle brother shows her general sense of apathy. But on the other hand, her
howled in pain, violently dragging the older brother to the floor. reaction hints that she might agree with the older brother—is the
When Dong-ho’s mother saw this fight between her two adult middle brother to blame for not bringing Dong-ho home that day?
sons, she could not find it in herself to break it up. Instead, she Or worse, does Dong-ho’s mother think she herself is at fault?
walked on into the kitchen, making pancakes and cooking meat
for breakfast.

Consumed with doubt and regret, Dong-ho’s mother thinks Interestingly, Dong-ho’s mother is the only character in the story
back to the day of her youngest son’s death. Dong-ho promised who was an adult at the time of the Gwangju uprising. What
to be home by six, but when the 7:00 p.m. curfew rolled around seemed intuitive to the other central figures thus feels like youthful
and Dong-ho still wasn’t home, Dong-ho’s mother and his folly to Dong-ho’s mother. And rather than seeing the student
middle brother walked the 40 minutes to the gym to retrieve militia’s “stubborn[ness]” as courageous conviction, she sees it as
him. But when they arrived, the young members of the student childish braggadocio.
militia guarding the doors refused to let them in. “Only the
young can be so stubborn,” she thinks.
The middle brother wanted to go inside the gym to retrieve Now, Dong-ho’s mother’s refusal to intervene in the fight between
Dong-ho, but Dong-ho’s mother refused: she couldn’t bear the her sons makes more sense: she was the one who prohibited the
thought of losing the middle brother, too. It was getting darker, middle brother from doing more to save Dong-ho. Whereas
and the soldiers could come from anywhere. So, insisting that characters like Seon-ju and the narrator work to give meaning to the
Dong-ho would be home soon, Dong-ho’s mother and the lives lost in the 5:18 massacre, Dong-ho’s mother sees it all as
middle brother walked home, tears streaming down their faces. “futile.” After all, Chun stayed in power for almost another decade
“Why did they refuse to let me in?” Dong-ho’s mother wonders after the protests.
now. “When they were going to die such futile deaths, what
difference could it possibly have made?”
Dong-ho’s mother blames herself for inviting Jeong-mi and The image of Dong-ho and Jeong-dae in their matching school
Jeong-dae to live with them all those years ago. She had initially uniforms gives further weight to the symbolism of the trackpants:
loved the idea that Dong-ho would have friends his age in the the very friendship that once made Dong-ho’s mother so happy
house, and she loved watching Dong-ho and Jeong-dae head ultimately led to both boy’s lives being taken.
off to school in their matching uniforms. Later, after both
children disappeared, Jeong-dae’s father came to Gwangju to
look for them. He stayed in the annex of the hanok for a year,
getting drunk and searching for his children even after it was
clear they were no longer alive.
Eventually, Dong-ho’s mother thinks, Jeong-dae’s father must Even though Dong-ho’s mother differs in her coping mechanisms
have passed away from the effort of searching for his missing from Jeong-dae and Jeong-mi’s father, both find the weight of the
children. She hates herself for renting out the annex, but then loss and memory of their children completely all-consuming. Like
she thinks of hearing Jeong-dae and Dong-ho laughing or Seon-ju, Dong-ho’s mother knows that the line between memories
playing badminton, and she forgives herself. For a moment, and dreams (and nightmares) is porous: sometimes, it is impossible
Dong-ho’s mother thinks of Jeong-mi: how pretty she was, and to comprehend that such tragic reality really did happen.
the sight of her walking across the courtyard “like the dreams
of a previous life.”
Dong-ho’s mother recalls the struggle it took to keep going On the one hand, Dong-ho’s mother shares Eun-sook’s frustration
after Dong-ho died. For a time, even just putting food in her with the idea that some bodies must continue to function while
mouth felt exhausting. Eventually, though, she ended up getting others have ceased to work. But on the other hand, Dong-ho’s
involved with other bereaved parents, organizing for the day mother knows that continuing to fuel her body can allow her to
when Chun Doo-Hwan would next set foot in Gwangju. Dong- protest against the very forces that killed her son.
ho’s mother felt no fear as she prepared to throw stones and
protest the president—after all, what more could happen to
her?

When Chun Doo-Hwan actually arrived, Dong-ho’s mother was This poignant moment suggests that when older people join a young
among the rioters throwing stones and waving banners. person’s fight, they are more intentional (showing up as “the
Immediately, Dong-ho’s mother and the others were taken to mothers,” doubling down on their actions). However, they are also
jail. When a younger protestor saw them there, he burst into more physically vulnerable (as can be seen in Dong-ho’s mother’s
tears: “Even the mothers are here, too?” he asked. “What crime foot injury). The continued presence of banners, even when
have they committed?” Fueled by these words, Dong-ho’s language is criminalized, once more points to the importance of
mother leapt from her chair and tears a framed picture of Chun language in protest.
Doo-Hwan from the wall. The glass broke, and Dong-ho’s
mother got a shard in her foot.
To heal her foot, Dong-ho’s mother went to the hospital. While As Dong-ho’s mother joins forces with the other mothers, she finds
in treatment, she called her husband, instructing him to bring a strength from a crowd just as her soon did during the 5:18 protests.
banner she had made but not yet used to the following day’s And by working with the other mothers to metabolize the pain of
protest. Barely able to walk, Dong-ho’s mother leaned on their children’s deaths, Dong-ho’s mother’s actions suggest that
Dong-ho’s father as she shouted at Chun Doo-hwan, “you protest, too, can be a form of memory: a tangible way for her to
murdered my son.” After that, the mothers met often, honor her son’s life.
organizing and raising funds to go to protest meetings as far
away as Seoul. Even when police threw smoke grenades or
tried to separate them, the mothers found their way back to
each other.
The mothers vowed to continue their efforts forever, but when These poetic vignettes from Dong-ho’s life allow him to exist to
Dong-ho’s father died, Dong-ho’s mother lost steam. She both readers 30 years after he was killed, almost as vibrantly as he once
pities and envies her husband, as she wonders whether death existed to his mother. The fact that Dong-ho wanted to be a poet
brings reunions with lost loved ones, or only more emptiness. gives new meaning to the fact that so many of those who survived
Now, more memories of Dong-ho come. Dong-ho’s mother him have chosen to pay tribute to him in words, honing their prose
remembers how he nursed from her left breast, inadvertently and their testimony just as an older, writerly version of Dong-ho
reshaping her bent nipple. She remembers his eager crawling might have, had he lived long enough.
and unsteady walking. And she remembers how he insisted, “I
don’t like summer, but I like summer nights.” Dong-ho’s mother
used to wonder if her son would be a poet.
Early in the mornings, Dong-ho’s mother unwraps her son’s The death of her beloved youngest son has shaped Dong-ho’s
school ID and traces Dong-ho’s face with her fingers. mother’s life more than anything else. But here, she chooses to end
Sometimes, Dong-ho’s mother thinks back to long summertime her narrative with a continued hope in survival and growth, letting
walks with Dong-ho. Even though it was sweltering and Dong- her son’s memory “bloom” on the pages just as the flowers once did
ho was sweating, he would insist on walking in the sun—“let’s go in the sun.
over there, where the flowers are blooming,” he’d say.
EPILOGUE: THE WRITER, 2013

When the writer was nine, she and her family moved from The writer’s background parallels that of author Han Kang,
Gwangju to a suburb of Seoul. As the writer played with her suggesting that the novelist has written herself into her work in this
brothers or helps with dinner, she sometimes caught snippets final chapter. The boy the writer’s father mentions here is likely
of conversation between her parents and their friends. One Dong-ho—a few pages ago, Dong-ho’s mother mentioned her son’s
time, the writer’s father mentioned a former student of his in talent for poetry, and the writer’s father, himself a writing teacher,
Gwangju, a young boy with a talent for creative writing. Even as now identifies his student as someone with a talent for creative
a child, the writer could tell from the adults’ “awkward, drawn- writing.
out silences,” that something terrible had happened to this man.

The writer remembers her childhood home as a “typical, old- Though Gwangju eventually became a place of mass death, the
style hanok,” with its rooms arranged around a central, tiled writer remembers it before the uprising, when it was a place of
courtyard, where roses and hollyhocks bloomed. The first warm, colorful life. The presence of hollyhocks in the writer’s old
winter near Seoul, the writer cannot believe how cold it is, and hanok effectively confirms that her family sold their Gwangju house
she finds herself hungry for the heat and flowers of Gwangju. to Dong-ho’s family (as Dong-ho’s house also had tall hollyhocks in
the courtyard).
In the first weeks of that winter, two strange men arrived at the The writer’s experience of the 5:18 massacre to some extent
house in Seoul in the middle of the night. They searched the parallels the experience readers have had. In both cases, the writer
house, and though the writer’s parents never explained what and readers feel connected to the uprising (while also being at a safe
was happening, she knew that her parents’ attempts to be calm remove). Also in both cases, disorientation, graphic imagery, and
concealed their panic. In the next few months, relatives warned fear give way to an understanding that Dong-ho, a bright young boy,
her parents that their phone lines might be tapped. And the was killed in a bout of political violence. More than just describing
writer learned that soldiers had shot Dong-ho, the youngest an event, then, language can also capture how an event might have
boy in the family who’d bought the Gwangju house from them. felt.
Two years later, the writer’s father returned home from a visit The writer now begins to more explicitly parallel her own life with
to Gwangju with a photo chapbook of the murdered and Dong-ho’s. Early in the novel, Dong-ho described how witnessing
missing. After the adults looked at the chapbook, they put it on violence felt—as if he had been struck by a “phantom bayonet." And
a high shelf, trying to keep it away from the children. But one in this scene, the writer describes her own connection to the
evening, when her parents were busy with dinner, the writer massacre in Gwangju with almost exactly the same language,
snuck the chapbook from the shelf and looked through it. The referencing a bayonet and describing an emotional puncture wound.
images she saw there—of young people shot, of a woman
whose face has been slashed by a bayonet—broke “something
tender deep inside.”
Now, in 2013, the writer returns to Gwangju. She sees that the In 2013, Park Chung-hee’s daughter had recently been elected
floor of the gym—where Dong-ho and the others once stored president, adding new urgency to the writer’s mission. Like Seon-ju,
corpses—has been dug up. The gingko trees outside have been the narrator, and Professor Yoon, the writer wants to amplify the
uprooted, and the only thing that remains on one of the walls is testimony of those who participated in the uprisings (“I’m here now,”
a large, framed version of the Taegukgi. The writer does her she says, determined to bear witness). At the same time, though, the
best to conjure the coffins that once filled this space. “I started young gingko tree, a favorite of Dong-ho’s, has been uprooted, a
too late,” she thinks. “But I’m here now.” reminder that no testimony can ever make up for what has been
lost.
The writer is staying with her younger brother, who still lives in Dong-ho’s mother alluded to construction happening across
Gwangju. She has not spent time in the city in years, and she is Gwangju, and the writer now sees the effects of this—the home she
surprised by how developed it has become, how unfamiliar all loved and the history she fears are slowly being erased, replaced by
the streets feel. Even her old hanok has been torn down and new, less fraught landmarks.
replaced with a prefabricated new house. Fortunately, many of
the writer’s father’s friends still live in Gwangju, and they help
her find pictures of Dong-ho from his middle school records.

The writer then visits the exhibit at the 5:18 Research Institute, The 5:18 Research Institute is a real place in Gwangju, one that
where she studies old footage from protests and student militia author Han acknowledges as being central to her writing. “Utterly
gatherings. She thinks she spots Dong-ho’s face in one of these ordinary” is exactly the same phrase that Eun-sook used to describe
videos, but because of his “utterly ordinary” features, she the interrogator, reminding readers once again that “ordinary”
cannot be sure. people are capable of great bravery as well as great harm.
The writer throws herself into her work, reading every As these haunting dreams suggest, even the writer—despite her
document she can get her hands on and avoiding friends temporal and geographic remove—now takes on some measure of
entirely. As she immerses herself in the document, she begins blame for Dong-ho’s death (and the deaths of other protestors). The
to have nightmares. In some dreams, she imagines that soldiers fact that the writer relies so heavily on archival documents once
are chasing her with a bayonet. In other dreams, she learns that again serves to emphasize that language can play an important role
all the 5:18 arrestees are going to be executed unless she in preserving and shaping historical narratives.
herself puts an end to it. And in one dream, the writer finds a
time machine to return to Gwangju in 1980, only to discover
she has programmed the machine incorrectly.
In January of 2013, the writer attends a wedding. She feels that Just as mourning took over Dong-ho’s mother’s life, the writer now
the bright colors and celebration is incongruous with her struggles with her own form of survivor’s guilt. She also begins to see
thoughts about Dong-ho. The research throbs in her mind: the how crowds can provoke brutality across the globe, allowing soldiers
soldiers who committed brutality “without hesitation and to perform horrific acts “without regret.” After all, why would a
without regret,” the way Chun Doo-hwan’s government found person “hesitat[e]” to engage in torture when everyone around them
encouragement for violence in the Cambodian government’s is doing the same thing?
genocide of its own people.
In one interview the writer reads, a survivor compares torture This idea that trauma is cancerous echoes Seon-ju’s earlier thought
to cancer—in both cases, the memories grow and metastasize, that memories of violence have almost radioactive half-lives. Again,
as “life attacks itself.” Whenever the narrator sees police the writer’s own experience of youth is marked by the knowledge
violence, she immediately thinks of Gwangju. And with that somewhere a few hundred miles to the south, a young boy will
memories of Gwangju come memories of childhood fear. When never again get the basic experiences of childhood that seem so
she would do her homework as a little girl, lying on her quotidian to her.
stomach, the writer always wondered whether Dong-ho used
to lie like that, too.
Eventually, the writer goes to the new house where her old Both the new construction where the hanok used to be and the new
hanok used to be. The new owner is warm at first, speaking in owner’s sudden coldness demonstrate the ways in which Gwangju
the classic Gwangju dialect, but when she hears the writer’s has changed. But even as the city Dong-ho lived in is disappearing,
Seoul speech, this woman grows cold. After some conversation, those who love him and want to honor his memory—like his middle
she tells the writer that the man who sold her the house works brother, always grieving—remain.
as a lecturer at a middling “cram school.” The writer arranges to
meet with this man, who is Dong-ho’s middle brother.

The middle brother is initially hesitant to share his story with When Dong-ho’s middle brother decides to share his family’s story,
the writer. But then he thinks about Dong-ho’s mother, and he he does so with the knowledge that written words can protect
decides to speak the words that he knows she would want to “memory”—Dong-ho’s body may have been “desecrate[d],” but his
share with the world. “Please,” the middle brother implores the story will not be. It is especially important to the middle brother to
writer. “Write your book so that no one will ever be able to include the details of Dong-ho’s life before the violence, thus
desecrate my brother’s memory again.” And he tells her other defining him outside of Chun’s state brutality.
stories about Dong-ho, too—how they used to have toe wars,
and how ticklish Dong-ho was.
The writer acknowledges that just as there were some As the narrative nears its end, the writer begins to question the
especially aggressive soldiers, there were also some soldiers principle—repeated by many characters—that crowds always
who loathed violence. Like the student militias, these were the change behavior. Some soldiers resisted the brutal groupthink
soldiers who carried guns but refused to fire them, or pointed around them, for example. And while each protestor found strength
them up to the sky to avoid wounding others. The writer from the crowd, they were also all individuals, with families and
wonders if the students in the militia were true victims, or if passions and quirks. Though this novel might be written about
their commitment to death was their away of avoiding Dong-ho, a novel with as much dignity and detail could be written
victimhood—of maintaining their dignity even in the most about any one of the protestors shot down at Gwangju.
brutal circumstances.
“Dong-ho,” the writer thinks, “I need you to take my hand and This section blurs the lines between prose and poetry, between
guide me away from all this. Away to where the light shines fiction and autobiography, and between life and death. The writer
through, to where the flowers bloom.” For a moment, the writer now imagines Dong-ho in the language she has attributed to his
imagines Dong-ho guiding her through the gravestones, the mother, calling him into physical being just as his grieving parents
snow melting around his trackpants. In reality, though, the do. Importantly, just as Dong-ho empowers his mother to continue
writer simply leaves a note for her brother and heads to the living and protesting, he helps the writer finish her story. It is also
graveyard. She remembers the older brother writing to her worth noting that despite his hesitations about the Taegukgi, Dong-
about burying Dong-ho’s body. The older brother had polished ho is buried in it, perhaps a reflection of his family’s faith that his
the skull before covering Dong-ho with the Taegukgi, knowing activism would one day right their country’s past wrongs.
this task would be too painful for their mother.
At last, the writer finds Dong-ho’s grave in the Mangwol-dong At the very beginning of the novel, Dong-ho used candles to deal
cemetery. She has brought a few candles, which she now lights. with death: candles masked the stench of the corpses killed in the
As she kneels before the grave, she realizes that her ankles are massacre, but they also honored the victims’ lives. Now, the writer
getting cold—she is standing in a snowbank. But still she stands does the same thing to memorialize her subject, coming to terms
there, staring, “mute, at that flame’s wavering outline, fluttering with his death by placing a candle by his gravestone. But in
like a bird’s translucent wing.” mourning and remembering the loss of young Dong-ho, the writer
also gives tangible form to his soul—which “flutters” like a “bird,” just
as Dong-ho predicted it would.

To cite any of the quotes from Human Acts covered in the Quotes
HOW T
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To cite this LitChart: MLA
MLA Kang, Han. Human Acts. Hogarth. 2017.
Sabel, Francesca. "Human Acts." LitCharts. LitCharts LLC, 22 Nov CHICA
CHICAGO
GO MANU
MANUAL
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2023. Web. 22 Nov 2023.
Kang, Han. Human Acts. New York: Hogarth. 2017.
CHICA
CHICAGO
GO MANU
MANUAL
AL
Sabel, Francesca. "Human Acts." LitCharts LLC, November 22,
2023. Retrieved November 22, 2023. https://www.litcharts.com/
lit/human-acts.

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TRACKPANTS PENS AND INK

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Chapter 1: The Boy, 1980 Quotes

Explanation and Analysis Related Characters: Dong-ho, Dong-ho’s Mother

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Related Themes: Related Characters: The Interrogator (speaker), Dong-ho,

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longer eat. And second, Eun-sook’s pleading with Dong-ho to leave—a

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temporarily, given it up. newly “fierce” way.

Explanation and Analysis Related Characters: The Narrator (speaker)

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Related Characters: The Narrator (speaker), Yeong-chae,

Page Number: 117 Related Symbols:

Explanation and Analysis Page Number: 120

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Explanation and Analysis Related Themes:

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SUMMARY AND ANAL

CHAPTER 1: THE BOY, 1980

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CHAPTER 2: THE BOY’S FRIEND, 1980

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CHAPTER 3: THE EDITOR, 1985

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CHAPTER 4: THE PRISONER, 1990

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CHAPTER 5: THE FACTORY GIRL, 2002