Han Kang's Nobel Prize Banquet Speech (2024)

Your Majesties, Your Royal Highnesses, Dear Laureates, Ladies and Gentlemen, I remember the day when I was eight years old.

As I was leaving my afternoon abacus lesson, the skies opened in a sudden downpour.

This rain was so fierce that two dozen children wound up huddled under the eaves of the building.

Across the street was a similar building, and under those eaves, I could see another small crowd.

If I could see another small crowd, it was almost like looking into a mirror.

Watching that streaming rain, the damp soaking my arms and cuffs, I suddenly understood.

All these people standing with me, shoulder to shoulder, and all those people across the way were living as an 'I' in their own right.

Each one was seeing this rain just as I was; this damp on my face, they felt it as well.

It was a moment of wonder—this experience of so many first-person perspectives.

Looking back over the time I have spent reading and writing, I have relived this moment of wonder again and again, following the thread of language into the depth of another heart.