I read this at Easter, but the Easter bunny this is not. If you want to read something nice, don’t read this book. It is often an unpleasantly visceral experience.
But if you want to read something incisive, do read these short stories. Bora Chung and her translator from Korean to English, Anton Hur, were shortlisted for the International Booker for Cursed Bunny.
The bunny in the title story is far from cuddly. A man on a mission to overthrow a cruel capitalist overlord creates it to get revenge. He charms a bunny-shaped lamp to make life viscerally unpleasant to those who touch it. It’s devastatingly, untraceably effective — also on the curser.
The final story is set in Poland, with an autofictional touch. Chung’s narrator experiences locals’ surprise that someone who looks like her can speak the language. You can feel the influence of fantastic, sometimes grotesque Polish writers such as Bruno Schulz in her work. Chung herself translates from Polish and Russian into Korean.
Many of the stories explore the physical limits and pain of women’s bodies and blurred boundaries between life and death, the human and nonhuman. The latter in both cases often seems to have the upper hand. Am I me? How do I know? How do I stay that way?
Cursed Bunny is not a comfortable read, but it made a strong impression. Read it if you dare!
Translator, editor, writer, reader
found in translation 
Leave a comment