Those numbers were glaring at me, clenching their teeth shut tight. Not the place where I live, not the door I pass through every day, not even, damn it, my life. Along this collection of straight and curved wounds rust had spread, a vestige of violence, like long-dried bloodstains, hardened, reddish-black. Finally, 1, a long, deep-gouged line, taut with the effort of its making. I could make out each individual stroke: 3, itself three hand spans high 0, smaller, yet gone over several times, a fierce scrawl that attracted attention. Someone-perhaps another in a long line of temporary occupants-had used some sharp implement, maybe a drill bit, to scratch the number into the door’s surface. But there was also the way its number, 301, had been inscribed. And if that had been all, I would have remembered it as nothing more than a scruffy old door.

It was a mess when I saw it, paint flaking off in patches to reveal the rust beneath. Its metal door had once been white, but that brightness had faded over time. This was something that happened a long time ago.īefore signing the contract for the lease, I went to look at the apartment again. Shortlisted for the 2018 Man Booker International Prize, The White Book is a lyrical and disquieting exploration of personal grief, written through the prism of the color white. The following excerpt is from Han Kang’s The White Book, translated by Deborah Smith and out this week from Hogarth.

The white book by han kang