KEUM SUK GENDRY-KIM
Una aclamada novela gráfica de no ficción sobre las "mujeres de consuelo" asiáticas en la Segunda Guerra Mundial.
Hierba es la historia real de una superviviente: Lee Ok-Sun, una joven coreana que durante la Guerra del Pacífico fue explotada como «mujer de consuelo», el eufemismo utilizado por el ejército imperial japonés para referirse a sus esclavas sexuales. A día de hoy, aquel sigue siendo uno de los capítulos más oscuros del siglo XX. Partiendo de las entrevistas que mantuvo con Lee Ok-Sun en una residencia de ancianos, la autora ha narrado el devenir de su infancia en un ambiente extremadamente humilde, vendida sucesivamente a varias familias adoptivas, hasta que llegó la ocupación japonesa y en 1942 fue trasladada a la fuerza a una base aérea en China.
CÓMIC DEL AÑO para The New York Times, The Guardian, Los Angeles Times, Library Journal.
GANADOR DE LOS PREMIOS: Harvey Award, Krause Essay Prize, Cartoonist Studio Prize, Big Other Book Award, YALSA Book Award, Prix Bulles dHumanité.
FINALISTA DE LOS PREMIOS: Eisner Award, Believer Book Award, LA Times Book Prize, Ringo Award.
ENGLISH DESCRIPTION
Appeared on best of the year lists from The New York Times, The Guardian, and more! Winner of The Cartoonist Studio Prize for Best Print Comic of the Year!
Grass is a powerful antiwar graphic novel, telling the life story of a Korean girl named Okseon Lee who was forced into sexual slavery for the Japanese Imperial Army during the Second World War-a disputed chapter in twentieth-century Asian history.
Beginning in Lees childhood, Grass shows the lead-up to the war from a childs vulnerable perspective, detailing how one person experienced the Japanese occupation and the widespread suffering it entailed for ordinary Koreans. Keum Suk Gendry-Kim emphasizes Lees strength in overcoming the many forms of adversity she experienced. Grass is painted in a black ink that flows with lavish details of the beautiful fields and farmland of Korea and uses heavy brushwork on the somber interiors of Lees memories.
The cartoonist Gendry-Kims interviews with Lee become an integral part of Grass, forming the heart and architecture of this powerful nonfiction graphic novel and offering a holistic view of how Lees wartime suffering changed her. Grass is a landmark graphic novel that makes personal the desperate cost of war and the importance of peace.
