Experiencing the ‘Other’: An Ethical and Ontological Inquiry into the Characterization of Yeong-hye in Han Kang’s The Vegetarian

Abstract

Any discussion on the concept of ‘difference’ entails within itself the understanding of the subject’s existence in the world through his experience of the ‘other’. What branches out as a result of this encounter is a myriad of possible experiences through which one tries to apprehend the world in which they live. Han Kang’s The Vegetarian, published in Korea in 2007, is in her own words, an attempt to contemplate the ‘spectrum’ that is humanity. To do so, the author delves into a deeper inquiry into the ontology of human existence as validated by the perspective of the other. The three-part novel, narrating the perspectives of three different people in their attempts to understand its principal character, Yeong-hye, provides a broader methodological framework for the author’s exegesis. This paper seeks to engage closely with these narratives to probe a further inquiry into the ethics of subjective expression and its consequent effect on the ‘other’.