The Nightmare of Refusal

A completely ordinary woman decides to stop eating meat and it destroys her entire life.

Han Kang’s The Vegetarian isn't about a diet, it is a nightmare about refusing to be human.

Yeong-hye throws out all the food in the house because of bloody dreams, and her husband

just gets annoyed that she won't cook for him. But then it spirals. Her father tries

to shove pork into her mouth, and she slashes her wrist at the dinner table.

She starves herself to become a tree while her brother-in-law develops a twisted artistic obsession

with her body. It is visceral, violent, and absolutely haunting.