CURSED BUNNY
SynopsisPlot
By turns thought-provoking and stomach-turning, here monsters take the shapes of furry woodland creatures and danger lurks in unexpected corners of everyday apartment buildings. But in this unforgettable collection, translated by the acclaimed Anton Hur, Chung’s absurd, haunting universe could be our own, illuminating the ills of contemporary society.
Story
About this book
Cursed Bunny is a short story collection by South Korean author Bora Chung, translated into English by Anton Hur. The stories blend horror, fantasy, and dark comedy, drawing on folk tale structures while addressing modern concerns such as patriarchy, corporate power, and surveillance technology. Creatures and objects that seem harmless at first turn threatening in ways that are often grotesque and surprising.
The settings range from ordinary apartment buildings to stranger, less recognizable places. Several stories use animal or object transformations to explore how systems of control shape daily life. Chung's writing frequently shifts tone, moving between dark humor and genuine unease within the same piece. The collection was shortlisted for the International Booker Prize in 2022, bringing wider attention to Chung's work outside South Korea.
Chung, who holds a PhD and writes in both Korean and English, constructs each story around a single unsettling premise and follows it to its logical extreme. The results are compact and deliberate, with a tendency toward body horror and surreal imagery. The translation by Anton Hur preserves the directness of the original Korean prose.
