Han Kang Quotes

“How long do souls linger by the side of their bodies? Do they really flutter away like some kind of bird? Is that what trembles the edges of the candle flame?”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“Even after I'd lost so much blood that my heart finally stopped, the blood had continued to drain from my body, leaving the skin of my face as thin and transparent as writing paper. How strange, to see my own eyes shuttered in that blood-leached face.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“Yearning to be taller.
To be able to do forty push-ups in a row.
For the time when I would hold a woman in my arms. That first woman who would permit such a liberty, whose face I didn't yet know, how I longed to extend my trembling fingers to the outer edge of her heart.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“The one stage in the process that you couldn't quite get your head around was the singing of the national anthem, which took place at a brief, informal memorial service for the bereaved families, after their dead had been formally placed in the coffins. It was also strange to see the Taegukgi, the national flag, being spread over each coffin and tied tightly in place. Why would you sing the national anthem for people who'd been killed by soldiers? Why cover the coffin with the Taegukgi? As though it wasn't the nation itself that had murdered them”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“whereabouts in the body is that bird when the person is still alive? In that furrowed brow, above the halolike crown of that head, in some chamber of the heart?”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“How can anyone go up against a gun with nothing but an empty fist?”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“In any case, the waking hours that stretched out in front of you were far more frightening than any dream.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“Far from being the type to thrash anyone, her light tread and quiet voice make it impossible to imagine her ever getting properly angry.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“...those affable eyes. That exhausted smile.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“If only your eyesight was worse, so anything close up would be nothing more than a vague, forgiving blur. But there is nothing vague about what you have to face now.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“Mine was second from the bottom, jammed in tight and crushed still flatter by every body that was piled on top. Even this pressure didn't squeeze any more blood from my wounds, which could only mean that it had all leaked out already.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“It must have been about midnight when I felt it touch me—that breath-soft slip of incorporeal something, that faceless shadow, lacking even language, now, to give it body. I waited for a while in doubt and ignorance, of who it was, of how to communicate with it. No one had ever taught me how to address a person's soul.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“My shadow's edges became aware of a quiet touch; the presence of another soul.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“We would lose ourselves in wondering who the other was, without hands, feet, face, tongue, our shadows touching but never quite mingling.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“Every time I felt a shadow slip from me, I looked up at the night sky. How I wanted to believe that cloud-wrapped half-moon was watching over me, an eye bright with intelligence—in reality nothing more than a huge, desolate lump of rock utterly inert.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“It was as that strange, vivid night was drawing to a close, as the faint blue light of dawn had begun to seep into the sky's black ink, that I suddenly thought of you, Dong-ho.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“Hidden birds began to trill their morning song.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“My soul-self had no eyes; where was that blood coming from, what nerve endings were sparking this pain?”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“Now there were no such things as bodies for us; presumably physical proximity was no longer necessary for the two of us to meet. But without bodies, how would we know each other? Would I still recognize my sister as a shadow?”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“All the same, there was something infinitely noble about how his body still bore the traces of hands that had touched it, a tangible record of having been cared for, been valued, that made me envious and sad.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“From that moment on, I was filled with hatred for my body. Our bodies, tossed there like lumps of meat. Our filthy, rotting faces, reeking in the sun.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“If I could close my eyes.
If I could escape the sight of our bodies, that festering flesh now fused into a single mass, like the rotting carcass of some many-legged monster. If I could sleep, truly sleep, not this flickering haze of wakefulness. If I could plunge headlong down to the floor of my pitch-dark consciousness.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“If I could hide in dreams.
Or perhaps in memories.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“The moment our eyes met and we laughed, carefree.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“That was the memory I had to cling to, there in the pitch-dark thicket.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“I needed more memories.
I needed to keep spinning them out, quicker, in a continuous stream.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“I think of the festering wound in my side.
Of the bullet that tore in there.
The strange chill, the seeming blunt force, of that initial impact,
That instantly became a lump of fire churning my insides,
Of the hole it made in my other side, where it flew out and tugged my hot blood behind it.
Of the barrel it was blasted out of.
Of the smooth trigger.
Of the eye that had me in its sights.
Of the eyes of the one who gave the order to fire.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“The days and nights that passed then did so without note. A succession of dawns and dusks went by, each half-light the selfsame shade of blue.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“What happened to those two pairs of feet bouncing gently in the air, almost unseemly in their nakedness?”
― Han Kang, Human Acts

“Biz, ateş bile edemeyen silahlı çocuklardık.”
― Han Kang, Human Acts