India Reads Korea

Books, comics and webtoons by Korean writers and creators-Indian enthusiasts welcome them all

- Vineetha Mokkil

TWO months ago, when the Nobel Committee chose South Korean writer Han Kang as the 2024 Nobel Literature laureate, bookstores across India were flooded with requests for her books. Bahrisons, a favourite haunt of booklovers in Khan Market, Delhi, ran out of copies in a flash and had to restock all her titles. Sure, the Nobel was the immediate trigger, and a "shared sense of Asian pride" could have set off the wave, but Han is one among many Korean authors Indians love to read. Korean writers delve into a wide range of topics and genres. Many experiment with style, offering readers startling revelations and insights about the human condition. Their popularity has shot up in India over the last six to seven years.

"Korean-American author Min Jin Lee's Pachinko (2017) was a phenomenon," says Mithilesh Singh, Floor Manager at Bahrisons. Readers in India were hooked to the novel, making the epic family saga a constant presence on bestseller lists here. Beginning in Korea in 1910, Pachinko tells the stories of four generations of a Korean family which immigrates to Japan. “Pachinko came along and changed the destiny of Korean writing in India,” Singh declares. “Some books are like that…” Han Kang’s boundary-defying Booker wiiner The Vegetarian, published in South Korea in 2007 and translated into English in 2015 by Deborah Smith, is another such destiny-defining book. Indian readers may have different takes on it, but most have read it. Others say it is at the top of their to-read lists.