The White Book
About the Book
The White Book
From Booker Prize-winner and literary phenomenon Han Kang, a lyrical and disquieting exploration of personal grief, written through the prism of the color white
While on a writer's residency, a nameless narrator wanders the twin white worlds of the blank page and snowy Warsaw. THE WHITE BOOK becomes a meditation on the color white, as well as a fictional journey inspired by an older sister who died in her mother's arms, a few hours old. The narrator grapples with the tragedy that has haunted her family, an event she colors in stark white --- breast milk, swaddling bands, the baby's rice cake-colored skin --- and, from here, visits all that glows in her memory: from a white dog to sugar cubes.
As the writer reckons with the enormity of her sister's death, Han Kang's trademark frank and chilling prose is softened by retrospection, introspection, and a deep sense of resilience and love. THE WHITE BOOK --- ultimately a letter from Kang to her sister --- offers powerful philosophy and personal psychology on the tenacity and fragility of the human spirit, and our attempts to graft new life from the ashes of destruction.
The White Book
- Publication Date: February 19, 2019
- Genres: Fiction
- Hardcover: 160 pages
- Publisher: Hogarth
- ISBN-10: 0525573062
- ISBN-13: 9780525573067