2023 Int Booker shortlist - Whale

[endrju]

Thank you Alwynne for your post. I understand better where the novel's coming from now, though it changes nothing about what I think and feel.

[Alwynne]

Thanks for yours and David's too, all of your points are totally valid. I do find it worrying that the way the book's being promoted via the Booker that David highlighted, does seem to gloss over the problems with the novel particularly when read now and out of its original context. It seems to suggest that the novel has some kind of unquestionable, universal resonance and appeal, and that notion does seem to indirectly and unthinkingly endorse the less palatable and politically dubious aspects of the narrative.

[Paul]

The author is doing a talk in London on 19 May if anyone is interested, at the Korean Cultural Centre.

https://londonkoreanlinks.net/2023/05...