Author: Jung Young-moon
Translated by: Jung Yewon
Publisher: Deep Vellum, 2016
Original title: 바셀린 붓다, 2010
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“If someone in the future asks in frustration, ‘What has Korean literature been up to?’ we can quietly hand them Vaseline Buddha.” — Pak Mingyu
A tragicomic odyssey told through free association scrubs the depths of the human psyche to achieve a higher level of consciousness equal to Zen meditation. The story opens when our sleepless narrator thwarts a would-be thief outside his moonlit window, then delves into his subconscious imagination to explore a variety of geographical and mental locations—real, unreal, surreal—to explore the very nature of reality.
Jung Young Moon, 2005 alum of Iowa’s International Writing Program, is one of South Korea’s most award-winning, eccentric, and handsome authors, often compared to Kafka and Beckett.