"'Vegetarian' Is Youth Hazardous, Get Out of School'...10,000 parents signed on

ⓒYTN

A group of parents issued a statement opposing the provision of the school library of Han Kang's novel "The Vegetarian," which won the Nobel Prize for literature.

On the 22nd, the National Association of Parents (Jeon Hak-yeon) opposed the provision of elementary, middle, and high school libraries by Han Kang's novel Vegetarian, saying, "Just because the '19 Golden Adult Film' won the 'Academy Award' cannot be a youth-viewable film."

"Most of the people who have not read Han Kang's novels may have been happy to win the Nobel Prize for Literature, even though they do not know what it is, but many of those who read the book say they do not want to recommend it to adults," Jeon Hak-yeon said.

As for the "vegetarian" who won the 2016 Man Booker International Prize and put the Han River on the list of international writers, he said, "My brother-in-law draws a picture on his sister-in-law's naked body, describes sex scenes starkly, and contains somewhat violent content. Parents are shocked that such works will be placed in elementary, middle and high school libraries just because they won the Nobel Prize."

According to Jeon Hak-yeon, the "vegetarian" campaign against the provision of children and youth books received signatures from 10,474 individuals and 195 organizations in a single day.The debate over whether

'vegetarian' will have a school library was also addressed at the National Assembly's parliamentary audit on the 22nd. The controversy continued last year as "vegetarian" was discarded at a school library in Gyeonggi Province due to sexual description issues.

Lim Tae-hee, superintendent of Gyeonggi-do, said of "The Vegetarian," "It is a work that contains deep thinking written in very deep thinking," but added, "I felt a little embarrassed to the students in terms of the Mongolian spot in the book."

Kim Min-jeon, a member of the People's Power, also said, "Han Kang's Nobel Prize in Literature is really great and happy, but I don't agree that it should be read by anyone."

Chung Eul-ho, a lawmaker of the Democratic Party of Korea, pointed out that it was "anachronistic book censorship," and Ko Min-jung, a lawmaker of the Democratic Party of Korea, criticized, "The Gyeonggi Office of Education's sending of official documents containing phrases such as "submission of a list of books as a result of handling educational books" to schools three times last year is a censorship or coercion."

Reporter Lee Yu Na from Digital News Team.