/
The writer Han KangNobel Prize in Literature 2024, has decided not to make any media appearance or participate in celebrations on the occasion of this award while there are wars in the worldaccording to his father, author Han Seung-won.
The writer was announced as the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature last Thursdaybecoming the first Asian woman and first South Korean firm to receive that recognition.
After the award was announced, She was “surprised and honored” in statements reproduced by the Nobel Foundation on its X account.
“I would like to have tea with my son. I will celebrate it in a quiet way,” added the author of titles like ‘La Vegetariana’. (Penguin Random House), winner of the 2016 Booker Prize; ‘Blanco’ (Rata Books) or ‘Human Acts’ (Rata Books).
​The day before, when the author was expected to give a media appearance in South Korea, one of her local publishers published other statements in which the Han said she was “deeply grateful” and “overwhelmed by all the congratulatory messages that came in like a huge wave.”
His father held a press conference on Friday in which he explained that the author initially agreed to make a media appearance that same day but eventually changed her mind.
“He told me that with the wars intensifying and so many people dying every day, how could we have a celebration or a press conference?” he said. Han Seung-won, 85 years old and well known in his country for his literary career, in an appearance reported by local media in Janheung, at the southern end of the South Korean peninsula where the novelist was born and resides.
“I was planning to organize a party with local people, but my daughter asked me not to. He told me: ‘Please don’t celebrate anything while we are watching those tragic events (referring to wars). The Swedish Academy has not given me this award so that we can enjoy it, but so that we can keep our minds clearer,'” added the writer’s father.
Han Kang’s South Korean publishers also announced that the author will refrain from making public appearances. or interviews until December 10, when he is scheduled to give a speech at the Nobel ceremony in Stockholm.
Han, 53 years old and born in Gwangju (in the south of South Korea), was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature “for his intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life,” according to the Swedish Academy.
jk
