The White Book

曼布克國際文學獎得主，備受國際矚目作品《素食者》作者韓江最新作品首位獲得曼布克獎的韓國女作家韓江推出結合自傳及實驗性質的全新作品，故事從過去曾被暴力及戰爭所壟罩的城市華沙開始。主角發現自己一直被她年幼時早夭的姊姊所困擾，破碎的記憶片段不斷被各種白色的事物圍繞，白色的包巾同時也是姐姐的裹屍布，濃稠、白色的母奶卻再也無法哺餵姐姐，主角嘗試將許多空白和零碎的片段重組，展開一個充滿生命力量與詩意的精鍊之作。當主角漫步在陌生且白雪皚皚的街道，周遭都是因為慘遭二戰荼毒的破舊建築，對於自我認同感到困惑的主角不禁問著：「我有能力把生命與力量注入這殘破不堪的一切嗎？」這是韓江截然不同的全新作品，以白色作為全書主題，描述人類精神的韌性與脆弱，以及人們如何從餘燼之中淬鍊自我，重新植入全新的生命與力量。 From the winner of the Man Booker International Prize for The VegetarianBoth the most autobiographical and the most experimental book to date from South Korean master Han Kang. Written while on a writer's residency in Warsaw, a city palpably scarred by the violence of the past, the narrator finds herself haunted by the story of her older sister, who died a mere two hours after birth. A fragmented exploration of white things - the swaddling bands that were also her shroud, the breast milk she did not live to drink, the blank page on which the narrator herself attempts to reconstruct the story - unfold in a powerfully poetic distillation. As she walks the unfamiliar, snow-streaked streets, lined by buildings formerly obliterated in the Second World War, their identities blur and overlap as the narrator wonders, 'Can I give this life to you?'. The White Book is a book like no other. It is a meditation on a colour, on the tenacity and fragility of the human spirit, and our attempts to graft new life from the ashes of destruction.