2016 Man Booker International Prize - Man Booker International Prize Goes to Han Kang's 'The Vegetarian'

South Korean author Han Kang has won the prestigious Man Booker International Prize for her "unforgettably powerful" novel 'The Vegetarian' which deals with a woman's rejection of human brutality and giving up of eating meat.

Han Kang (right) and her British translator, Deborah Smith, with the winning book, The Vegetarian

 

Han Kang beat writers including Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk and international bestseller Elena Ferrante to win the 50,000-pound award on Monday night which she shared with her the novel's translator Deborah Smith.

Published by Portobello Books, 'The Vegetarian' was selected unanimously among 155 books by a panel of five judges chaired by noted critic and editor Boyd Tonkin who described Kang's work as "lyrical and lacerating".

The Man Booker International Prize celebrates non-English language books translated and published in the United Kingdom. According to the Man Booker website, the work can be "written in any language as long as it was widely available in English." This is the first year the prize was awarded on the basis of a single book instead of an author's body of work.

Told in three voices from three perspectives, the novel was selected from 155 titles. Judging panel chairman Boyd Tonkin called the novel a "concise, unsettling and beautifully composed story" of a woman's rejection of family traditions and societal norms told in a style "both lyrical and lacerating."

The judging panel recognized translator Deborah Smith for her "perfectly judged translation," saying it mirrored the original prose's "uncanny blend of beauty and horror at every turn."

"This compact, exquisite and disturbing book will linger long in the minds, and maybe the dreams, of its readers," Tonkin said.

The Man Booker International shortlisted titles

 

Note

The prize is awarded every two years to a living author who has published fiction either originally in English or whose work is generally available in translation in the English language. 


Last year's Man Booker International Prize was won by Hungarian author Laszlo Krasznahorkai.