Cursed Bunny: Shortlisted for the 2022 International Booker Prize

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The 1-star is really just to rage against the longest story in the collection, "Scars", which is one of the worst short stories I've read in a long time.

Just the first sentence is amazing, and I still find myself thinking about the monster made from body matter that rises out of the toilet and forces its maker to swap places with it. We offer 1st class (express) or 2nd class (standard) postage options, and use Royal Mail as our primary postal service. Apesar desses muito gêneros agradarem de forma diferente diferentes leitores, Bora Chung consegue realizar ótimos trabalhos em cada um.The content isn’t for everyone (a lot of it is triggering) and the writing begins very very basic (with the English translation) however it picks up as you get further into the book. Em todos eles, a autora explora temas como a exploração do corpo feminino pelo patriarcado, o trauma como uma armadilha temporal que nos impede de seguir adiante, a vingança como uma faca de dois gumes e o amor como uma arma tóxica. Anton Hur’s translation skilfully captures the way Chung’s prose effortlessly glides from being terrifying to wryly humorous. Although the exceptional exists in that universe, along with some ludicrous stories and others that are more prosaic — but the lyrical writing and knack for vivid and surreal imagery would not take the enjoyment of reading this bizarre book. My toilet is no longer the safe place I once knew, and I’m never touching a bunny lamp no matter what.

The _ga cookie, installed by Google Analytics, calculates visitor, session and campaign data and also keeps track of site usage for the site's analytics report. Mostly what stuck with me since then are the first two stories – “The Head” and “The Embodiment” (and a couple of others. Some reviewers emphasize that they have never read anything like that before and I found the originality of Cursed Bunny striking. She also translates Russian and Polish into Korean while having written three novels and story collections. The title of the second story (third originally), Embodiment (몸하다) raises some translation issues as in Korean 몸 means body, but the verb 몸하다 - “to body”- can also mean to menstruate, which Hur deftly explains in the form of a dictionary entry style epigraph.

I fully acknowledge this was a personal issue with the writing, but nevertheless it took away from my reading experience. Few story collections greet their reader with an introductory sequence as disarmingly gross as the one in “Cursed Bunny. And the final story Reunion (재회) is set in Poland, with Polish text included (the author translates from the language) and is a love story of sorts with a ghostly twist. Publication dates are subject to change (although this is an extremely uncommon occurrence overall). Nevertheless, no matter whether you do or don’t like singular stories, you need to give Chung her due; her work has something to say, offers a highly original style and when the stories are good, they are truly striking.

The story is a surreally humorous yet oddly upsetting tale that it was a brilliant piece for putting the wind up with that opening. Finally, I want to congratulate the translator Anton Hur for having two of his works longlisted this year.

In this case the cursed bunny was one he made to seek his own revenge (violating his own rules) on a company who had put a friend out of business by unscrupulous means, leading to the friend’s suicide. The titular story was no better, a literal rabbit curse that sends people twitching and sitting in roads.