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| yna@yna.co.kr 2022-05-23 10:42:39
SEOUL, May 23 (Yonhap) -- After the Booker Prize was over in London, England on the 22nd (local time), a middle-aged man ran to Chung Bora holding the English version of her book, "Cursed Bunny" to get her signature.
The man pointed to the back of author Chung and asked the reporter "Is she Chung Bora?" before running to her after getting confirmation. It seemed like he was waiting on the exit of the building that officials for the event used, and missed his chance.
The college student who was sitting at an event tried to get a chance for author Chung's autograph, but ended up going to the lobby without it.
The girl majoring literature at a University in Delhi, India, and is now an exchange student at King's College London, took out the book "Cursed Bunny" that was underlined with a highlighter to ask the reporter's opinion.
Although she did not learn Korean, she read the works of Korean writers including Han Kang, and said that "Cursed Bunny" felt similar to Kafka's novel, making it feel more friendly.
In addition, there were those who only had "Cursed Rabbit" in their hands.
The reading session held at the Queen Elizabeth Hall of the Southbank Centre in London on the afternoon of the same day was an event in which the finalists of the Booker Prize International read a passage of their work along a question-and-answer session with the host.
Claudia Pineiro of Argentina, Geetanjali Shree of India and Mieko Kawakami of Japan participated in person. Olga Tokarczuk of Poland, who won the Nobel Prize in literature at 2018, and Jon Fosse from Norway on the other hand, sent their message through a video. Among these, "Cursed Bunny" was the only short story.
Writer Chung Bora and translator Anton Hur (Hur Jung-beom) took the first turn with matching blue and purple color T-shirts that had the words "Team Cursed Bunny" in English. These T-shirts took the colors from the cover of the English version of the book.
Author Chung read out the part where the main character experiences her first marriage arrangement meeting (where a woman and a man meets up for the first time for a date in consideration of marriage) from "Cursed Bunny" in Korean. The same content was then translated by the Translator Anton Hur.
When the main character asked the person she saw for the first time whether he would be the father of her child, the audience began to laugh.
In the question-and-answer session, the host asked, “What are the difficulties that young protagonists face?". To this, Author Chung answered, "To be Killed."
The host then said, "It looks like the world is harsher on the young protagonists than it was in the past." Author Chung added, "The society is being more cruel, and it is even worse now than it was in our time."
In an interview with Yonhap News Agency after the event, author Chung said, "The Korean society drives young people into competition and educates them as if one could only survive if they have talent. While everyone deserves to enjoy the life that they have been given, they tell them not to sleep in order to study and not to eat in order to be thin."
"I wanted to tell them that young people could really become unhappy as they are more vulnerable because they do not have the experience, the wisdom that comes from it, and the material resources that can be collected over time," she continued. "In fact, I wrote them when I was in my 20s"
"It was a question that I wasn't told about beforehand. It was a unique question that I did not expect."
Translator Anton Hur said in the Question and Answer section, "I tried to add a lot of different flavors while translating it. Author Chung's work really has the power to break through translation."
"I know that the response is good with the books being displayed in major bookstores," he added.
Booker Prize winners will be announced on the evening of the 26th.
The Booker Prize, along with the Nobel Prize for Literature and the French Competition Prize, are considered one of the world's three major literary prizes, and was called the Man Booker Prize until 2019. The international section, established in 2005, are for the works that has been translated into English of non-English-speaking authors, and the prize money (£50,000/about 80 million won) is paid equally to the authors and translators who has contributed to the work together.
In 2016, writer Han Kang won the first award for "The Vegetarian."
Last year's award-winning book sold five times more, with even the former president of the United States, Barack Obama adding it to his summer reading list.
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