The Vegetarian: Chapter 2: Mongolian Mark Summary & Analysis

This section is narrated by the brother-in-law, who is attending a dance piece two years later. He is disappointed by the performance: the poster presented men and women displaying their naked backs, covered in painted flowers—an image that he’s been obsessed with for over a year. But the performance hadn’t been what he was looking for: it had been too overtly sexual. He is looking for something “quieter, deeper, more private.”

The brother-in-law knows he should go home to Ji-woo and In-hye, but he instead goes to the studio that he and other video artists use. He sits at the computer and opens his sketchbook, which is filled with images of naked bodies brilliantly decorated with flowers, having sex. He notes that the images aren’t provocative like pornography; their bodies have “a stillness and solidity that counterbalanced the arousing nature of the situation.”

The images had come to the brother-in-law from a chance conversation: he had noted Ji-woo still had a Mongolian mark while giving him a bath. In-hye had remarked that Yeong-hye still had a Mongolian mark when she was 20, and possibly still has it. In that moment, the brother-in-law was struck by the image of a blue flower on a woman’s buttocks. He began to draw a man with his arms around a woman’s neck as the man thrust himself into her, and became aroused. He knew that the woman was Yeong-hye, and that he was the man in the image.

The brother-in-law had quickly become obsessed  with the image, and back in the studio he decides that the only thing he can do is make the image a reality. He resolves to rent a studio from a friend, install lighting, and get body paints. He wonders how he might convince Yeong-hye to participate, and quickly realizes that the video he planned would likely be categorized as pornography. In the studio, another artist, J, comes in, and the brother-in-law leaves. On the way out, he sees his reflection and is struck by an urge to smash in his own face.

When the brother-in-law returns home, he finds In-hye, exhausted. She had gone back to a full-time job at work, and only asks him to keep Sundays free to spend time with her and Ji-woo. The brother-in-law has been avoiding her because he can only see Yeong-hye’s face when he looks at her. He prefers Yeong-hye’s eyes, her voice, her clothes. He knows that his wife might be called more beautiful, but to the brother-in-law Yeong-hye radiates energy “like a tree that grows in the wilderness.”

In-hye tells him how overloaded she’s been, as she hadn’t heard from the brother-in-law all day, Ji-woo has a cold, and she’s worried about Yeong-hye, who was just served divorce papers. The brother-in-law asks if he should call Yeong-hye, and In-hye is delighted by the prospect. He tells In-hye he will call her sister tomorrow. He then goes to the bathroom, and, having become aroused at the idea of seeing Yeong-hye, masturbates thinking about her.

It had been two years prior that Yeong-hye had cut herself. The brother-in-law is haunted by how she had screamed, and remembers carrying her and watching as she received medical treatment. He recalls wondering in that moment what her survival might mean, as attempting to take her own life had been a turning point. He thinks that all of the people in that room were “distant strangers, if not actual enemies” to her.

When the brother-in-law took a car from the hospital, he had thought about his most recent video work, which was a montage of things he loathed: ads, clips from the news, ruined bridges, vagrants, and the tears of children. The images “had come to feel like a form of violence” as he thought about them and the reality they portrayed. He thought, “life revolted him,” and he felt like he didn’t know himself.

In the present, the brother-in-law calls Yeong-hye and tells her that In-hye is worried. He recalls how, after she had been hospitalized, Mr. Cheong had commented that she was “always so submissive.” The brother-in-law asks if Yeong-hye is still on the line. She simply says that the water is boiling and says she has to go. Before she hangs up, the brother-in-law asks if he can come over. After a brief silence, she hangs up.

The brother-in-law drives to Yeong-hye’s apartment, bringing some fruit for her to eat. When he arrives, he climbs to her apartment and realizes the door is unlocked. He walks in and looks around, and finds her coming out of the bathroom naked. She dresses calmly, and he stares at her, unable to look away from her body, which has rounded out now that she is eating more.

The brother-in-law apologizes for staring, but Yeong-hye says it’s okay, explaining that she just likes being undressed when she’s on her own. The brother-in-law gets an erection thinking about this and tries to conceal it. He suggests they eat the fruit he had brought, and they sit down and begin to talk. As she eats, she tells him that she recently had a job interview at a department store. Inside his mind the brother-in-law battles two desires: he reproaches himself for using her as a kind of “mental pornography,” but as they talk he imagines licking her fingers and undressing her.

The brother-in-law invites Yeong-hye for a walk and buys her a shaved ice from a nearby café. He stares at her, filled with lust as she licks the ice. He then says he has a favor to ask of her, and asks if she will model for him. He tells her she’ll have to take her clothes off, and he’ll paint flowers on her body. He watches as her eyes flicker at what he is saying. He also asks her if she’ll keep it a secret from In-hye. She gives no sign of assent, but does not refuse.

The brother-in-law sets up his paints, lighting, and camcorder in a friend’s studio. Close to 3 p.m., he walks to the train station to meet Yeong-hye there. He receives a call from In-hye telling him that she’s running late at the store, and he’ll have to pick up Ji-woo at 7 p.m. The brother-in-law tells her that he can only do so at 9 p.m., and she sighs and says she’ll ask a neighbor to pick Ji-woo up.

A few nights prior, after going to see Yeong-hye, the brother-in-law had been overcome by desire and pulled In-hye to him in bed. He put her hand over his mouth and imagined that she was Yeong-hye as he pulled off her clothes. When they had finished, she was crying, though he wasn’t sure exactly why. “You’re scaring me,” she had said, though the brother-in-law had already been half asleep when she said so. The next morning, she acted as though nothing had happened.

The brother-in-law brings Yeong-hye back from the station, and he instructs her to take off her clothes and lie on her stomach, which she does. He examines her body, noting that she does in fact still have the Mongolian mark. He thinks with surprise that there isn’t anything sexual about it, that its blue-green hue is “more vegetal than sexual.” He films as he paints red and orange flowers along her body.

When the brother-in-law is done painting Yeong-hye’s backside, he realizes something about her body: “this was the body of a beautiful young woman, conventionally an object of desire, and yet it was a body from which all desire had been eliminated.” He thinks that she had “renounced the very life that her body represented.”

Yeong-hye and the brother-in-law take a brief break, after which the brother-in-law resumes painting, this time on Yeong-hye’s front. He paints huge yellow and white flowers on her breasts, orange lilies on her stomach, and golden petals over her thighs. He draws out the painting as long as possible, and she is unperturbed at the painting, lying calmly.

When the brother-in-law is finished, he asks Yeong-hye to lie on her side, and he films her body, panning and zooming the camera over her curves. When they are finished, the brother-in-law suggests that they eat something. Yeong-hye assents, then asks if the paint will come off with water. When the brother-in-law tells her she’ll have to wash it a few times, she tells him she doesn’t want it to come off.

Yeong-hye and the brother-in-law find a Buddhist restaurant, which is more likely to have vegetarian food. During the meal, he asks her why she doesn’t eat meat. She says he wouldn’t understand: it’s because of a dream she had. When he asks about the dream, she says only that she dreamed of a face, and seeing his bafflement, affirms that he wouldn’t understand. The brother-in-law is unable to ask why she bares her breasts to the sun, “like some kind of mutant animal  that had evolved to be able to photosynthesize?”

The brother-in-law drops Yeong-hye off at her building and thanks her. She smiles in response, and the brother-in-law thinks that maybe she is ordinary and he is “the crazy one.” He aches with desire, realizing that even though he had spent many hours with her naked body, he had only touched her with the tip of his brush.

The brother-in-law picks up the sleeping Ji-woo from his neighbor at 9:20 p.m. and carries him to the apartment, though as soon as he lays him down in the bed he can hear Ji-woo sucking his thumb. In-hye calls, and says she’ll be home at 11:00 p.m. The brother-in-law tells her that he needs to pop into the studio to finish something, assuring her that Ji-woo is sound asleep. In-hye starts to cry quietly, then says if he wants to go he should go—she’ll close up the shop and head home. The brother-in-law feels a pang of guilt, but heads to the studio anyway.

The brother-in-law works through the next day, cutting the tapes into a five-minute movie that he labels “Mongolian Mark 1.” He thinks about the next movie he wants to make, with a painted man and a woman having sex. He thinks that he can’t be the man in the film, as he is too insecure about his aging body. He wonders who might agree to do it, and how Yeong-hye would react. He knows that he has reached a point of no return, but can’t bring himself to stop.

The brother-in-law has a dream about Yeong-hye, lying in front of him, her whole body covered in green paint. He opens her legs, and when he enters her a green sap starts to flow from her vagina. When he pulls out of her, he sees his penis is stained green and his entire pelvic area is covered in a blackish sap.

The next day, the brother-in-law calls Yeong-hye again, asking if she’s washed the paint off. She says she hasn’t, as it’s stopping her dreams from coming, and hopes that if it comes off later he’ll paint her again. The brother-in-law asks if she would come to the studio again tomorrow, telling her that there would be a man there too who would be painted naked. She agrees.

The brother-in-law calls In-hye, telling her that he’d be busy until the following night. She simply says, “I see. Well… don’t work too hard.” He wishes that she would scream at him, feeling her resignation suffocating him. But once his guilt passes, he calls J and tells him that he wants to show him what he’s been working on.

When the brother-in-law shows J the tapes, J calls it the brother-in-law’s best work. The brother-in-law  then asks J if he would model for another video the next day. J is hesitant, but the next morning he agrees to be the model. J arrives at the studio, quite nervous, and Yeong-hye returns, still covered in flowers. The brother-in-law paints J, first in purple hydrangeas on his back, then on his front, with a large crimson flower surrounding J’s penis. Yeong-hye sits and watches as the brother-in-law paints. The brother-in-law notices as he works that J’s penis has stiffened.

When the brother-in-law has finished painting, Yeong-hye takes her clothes off once more. She and J kneel together, and she moves close to him without being asked. The brother-in-law turns on his camera, then tells J to sit Yeong-hye on his knees, and to start touching her. But before J can do anything, Yeong-hye starts to straddle him, then strokes him and cranes her neck around his. J’s penis stiffens.

The brother-in-law continues to direct J and Yeong-hye, telling them to lie on top of each other. Yeong-hye gently pushes J down and slowly lies down on top of him. The brother-in-law continues filming; an immeasurable amount of time passes. The brother-in-law then asks hesitantly if they might have sex for real. Yeong-hye doesn’t react, but J immediately gets up and pushes Yeong-hye away, saying he doesn’t want to be a part of a porn film. The brother-in-law apologizes, then tells J simply to continue as he had been doing.

J continues, but his and Yeong-hye’s sexual tension has dissipated, and J’s movements are forced. The brother-in-law is frustrated: he can see that Yeong-hye’s body is “flushed with desire,” and he feels sure that she would have had sex if J had agreed. The brother-in-law gives one last direction, for J to make Yeong-hye lie down on her stomach and for him to pose behind her. J gets up, refusing to do any more. He dresses quickly and leaves.

After J leaves, the brother-in-law apologizes to Yeong-hye. She starts to laugh as she dresses; when he asks why, she replies, “Because I’m all wet.” The brother-in-law immediately rushes to her and starts to pull her pants back down. She shoves him away and says no. When he asks why, she says that she only wanted to do it because of the flowers on J’s body. The brother-in-law asks if she would have sex with him if he painted himself. She laughs, “as if limits and boundaries no longer held any meaning for her.”

The brother-in-law quickly drives to a former girlfriend’s apartment, a fellow artist he refers to as “P.” All the while, he continues to think, “I wish I were dead. So die” to himself as he races along the highway. He meets up with P and explains what he wants, showing her his sketches. P paints flowers along his whole body. When she finishes, she gives him a quick kiss goodbye. The brother-in-law feels as though he were about to cry, but he can’t tell whether it is because of the relationship they once shared, or “fear of the boundary he [is] soon intending to cross.”

The brother-in-law returns to his studio, where Yeong-hye is waiting naked. Forgetting the lighting and the camcorder, he lays her down “with a snarl,” stripping off his clothes and immediately pushing her legs open and entering her. He hears a “constant panting sound, as if from a wild animal”—before realizing the sounds are coming from him. He comes immediately.

The brother-in-law apologizes; their sex had been very one-sided and hadn’t lasted five minutes. Yeong-hye turns on the light so she can see him, and starts stroking the flowers on his chest. The brother-in-law pulls away, then sets up the lighting and the camcorder. He asks her to lie down, and she does so. He lowers himself on top of her, thrusting into her from behind, just as he had imagined in his sketches. As they have sex, Yeong-hye bursts into tears. The brother-in-law gets up and switches off the camcorder. When her tears subside, he lays her back down on the sheet. In their final minutes of sex she gnashes her teeth, screams, and yells “stop.” At the end, she cries once more.

As dawn approaches, the brother-in-law licks Yeong-hye’s Mongolian mark. He thinks that he wants to swallow Yeong-hye. She asks if her dreams will stop. She explains that she thought the dreams were related to eating meat, that becoming a vegetarian would stop the faces from returning. She says now that she knows the face is inside her own stomach. The brother-in-law doesn’t understand what Yeong-hye’s saying, and he plunges into sleep.

When the brother-in-law wakes up at 1 p.m., Yeong-hye is still asleep. He puts on pants, then realizes that the camcorder is gone. He looks around the studio, and sees In-hye sitting there with the camcorder. She tells him that she hadn’t heard from him or Yeong-hye, so she thought to stop by the studio. She fights to conceal her emotion as she explains that she saw them asleep naked in the studio, then took the camcorder and watched the tape.

The brother-in-law puts on a shirt as he tries to explain, but In-hye stops him and tells him that she’s called emergency services, as both he and Yeong-hye are clearly in need of medical treatment. She asks how he could do this when Yeong-hye clearly isn’t well. Just then, Yeong-hye gets up and walks out onto the veranda, opening her legs and showing her breasts to the sun. The brother-in-law thinks about throwing himself over the railing and falling three floors down, but he is “rooted to the spot,” staring only at “the blazing flower that was her body.”