- Overview
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This story about pigs being culled due to foot-and-mouth disease gives readers the opportunity to consider how humans treat other forms of life.
- Book Intro
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In the winter of 2010, an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in Korea ended with the culling of around 3,320,000 pigs and about 150,000 cows. Most of those 3,470,000 animals were buried alive. It was a great tragedy for humans, too. In particular, the people who actually carried out the killings suffered from fears and guilt for a long time. Why did this awful thing happen? What did the animals feel? How did they die?
An “ordinary” pig farm appears when you open the book. Inside, is a maternity barn divided into sections. A mother pig, who just gave birth to piglets, is feeding her babies. At a glance, it’s a peaceful scene. But the mother, confined in a farrowing crate that restricts her movements, can neither lick nor hug her babies.
But it was not too bad. After three weeks, she parts with her babies and returns to her narrow stall. Soon after, people in protective clothing with clubs and electric sticks take the pigs somewhere. The final stop of this first and last outing for the animals is a big hole. They are pushed in with an excavator and buried alive. Even in this desperate time, the mother pig looks for her separated babies.
While the pictures show the feelings of the mother pig, the words calmly explain why and how this tragedy happened, how pigs are born and reared, and what happens inside what looks like a normal pig farm.
Although the book only shows reality itself, we are faced with uncomfortable questions when we close the book: Is this right? Is it inevitable? Why do we have to read an uncomfortable book like this? What should we do?
The book does not have a clear answer. Perhaps it can’t. Humans are animals too, and we survive by eating others. It’s the destiny of humans. But humans have the power to think and look back on their actions. Humans also have the ability to sympathize with other living things. With this power and ability, we need to find the right way to treat other beings.
- About the Author
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Yoo-Ri
(English) Yu-Ri was born and raised in Yeoju, Gyeonggi Province, on a farm surrounded by a small forest. The time she spent with the farm animals in nature became one of her greatest assets. She majored in ceramics at Kookmin University's College of Design and studied picture books and illustrations at HILLS (Hankuk Illustration School).
(French) Je suis née et a grandi à la maison autour des forêt basses à Yeoju, Gyeonggi-do. Cette enfance où je passais dans la nature est la plus grande expérience profitable pour devenir écrivain. Pour mes oeuvres, il y a "L'histoire du cochon", "Un jujube", "L'étoile, Caca de chiot" etc. et elle a remporté un prix Culturel de Publication Coréen en 2015 pour son oeuvre "Un jujube".
- Selection
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Publication Industry Promotion Agency of Korea (KPIPA), 2013, Good Plan Support Project