Winter in Sokcho by Elisa Shua Dusapin6/10/2023 ![]() ![]() Winter in Sokcho – in its first English translation the novel was originally published in French in 2016 – takes place over a few weeks either side of Seollal (Korean New Year), during which the protagonist finds herself drawn towards a guest at the hotel: Yan Kerrand, an enigmatic French comic artist who, having wandered the world for years, has arrived in this small border town to finish the last of a comic book series.Įlisa Shua Dusapin’s first-person narrative is formed of crystalline sentences that favour lucid imagery to describe themes of loneliness, familial obligation, identity (the protagonist’s mother is a Korean fishmonger, but she doesn’t know her European father), societal pressures and sexuality. Unsure of what she wants in life, she is adrift. She works in a quiet, dilapidated guesthouse in Sokcho, a fishing town and popular holiday destination in northern South Korea. She doesn’t have a name, or at least no one speaks it. ![]() By Elisa Shua Dusapin, translated by Aneesa Abbas Higgins, Daunt Books Originals, £9.99 (softcover) Reviewed by Fi Churchman ![]()
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