Crying in H mart
I think I have never been as hungry reading a book as when reading Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner. Zauner vividly describes the many Korean dishes her mother used to cook. The recipes sound fiddly and time-consuming but Zauner convinced me there is definitely a pay-off for this hard work. Whilst I have rarely eaten Korean food, and often was not familiar with the dishes Zauner described, her words made me salivate and desperate for some Korean food.
After her mother’s death in 2014, Zauner, daughter of an American father and a Korean mother, finds it difficult to legitimate her Korean heritage. Living in America, and not able to speak Korean as well as she would like, she almost feels like an imposter, claiming an identity that she does not fully feel she is allowed to claim. The death of her mother cements this feeling, and food is the one thing that keeps her connected to the Korean part of her identity.
H mart is the place where Zauner still can find glimpses of her mother. The aisles of produce and the smells found there bring a level of recognition that she is not able to find elsewhere.
For people with a mixed heritage, the loss of a parent can feel even more pronounced, as this loss not only marks the loss of the mother figure, but can also feel like losing a ticket to get access to a specific cultural identity.
Crying in H mart had me hooked from the first page. It is not only a memoir about the complexity of identity but also a memoir that reveals the complexity of the mother-figure and mother-daughter relationships. Zauner’s mother was a mother who loved her, but not a loving mother as is stereotypically portrayed in popular culture. Zauner candidly describes how neither of her parents were perfect people. And neither is/was she. Zauner does not posthumously idealize her mother, but instead highlights the reality of her relationship with her mother, which may not have been the relationship she would have liked, but was the relationship she had.
Memoirs like Crying in H Mart exist around the tension of on the one hand trying to work through grief and to explore this creatively, and on the other hand feeling uncomfortable for ‘benefiting’ from this loss, because the work is successful. Zauner always wanted to be an artist and the success she’s had with her band Japanese Breakfast is (partly) based on the songs that are inspired by the death of her mother.
In addition to a successful musical career that celebrates and remembers her mother, Zauner now also has a New York Time bestseller book that does the same. I for one am glad Zauner decided to both write down her story and to publish it. Whilst it might be uncomfortable to profit from death and loss, it is an important story that needs to be told and read by others.
Crying in H mart is a mouth-watering and engaging read that unpacks the complexity of the relationship between loss and cultural heritage and the impact creative practices, such as writing, can have in ‘working’ through your grief.