Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature

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10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono

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Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature



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Kimberly T. Kono



Rom a nc e , Fa m i ly, a n d Nat ion i n Ja pa n ese C ol on i a l L i t e r at u r e

ROMANCE, FAMILY, AND NATION IN JAPANESE COLONIAL LITERATURE

Copyright © Kimberly T. Kono, 2010. First published in 2010 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN® in the United States—a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010. Where this book is distributed in the UK, Europe and the rest of the world, this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries. ISBN: 978–0–230–61989–0 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available from the Library of Congress. A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library. Design by Newgen Imaging Systems (P) Ltd., Chennai, India. First edition: March 2010 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Printed in the United States of America.



All rights reserved.



For my grandmother, Sadako Kase (1913–2009)




Acknowledgments

ix

Introduction

1

1 2 3 4 5

Performing Ethnicity, Gender and Modern Love in Colonial Manchuria

15

(Re)writing Colonial Lineage in Sakaguchi Reiko’s “Passionflower”

43

Looking for Legitimacy: Cultural Identity and the Interethnic Family in Colonial Korea

75

Marriage, Modernization, and the Imperial Subject

99

Colonizing a National Literature: The Debates on Manchurian Literature

119

Conclusion: Significant Others in Japanese Colonial Literature

143

Notes

153

Works Cited

195

Index

209



C on t e n t s




I

have benefited greatly from the advice and support of many people throughout this project. First and foremost, I want to thank my teachers in the United States and Japan. Alan Tansman generously offered suggestions and encouragement. His sensitive guidance and sage critiques were vital in helping me see this project through to its completion. Sharalyn Orbaugh planted the idea of graduate school in my head, and through her research has modeled some of the exciting possibilities in this field. I also want to thank my other teachers while at Berkeley: H. Mack Horton, Caren Kaplan, Joshua Mostow and Donna Storey. In Tokyo and Yokohama, Kawamura Minato and Yonaha Keiko kindly shared their knowledge and resources and pointed me in the right direction. I feel very fortunate to have had such a wonderful community in graduate school. I thank David Averbach, Marilyn Bolles, Stefania Burk, Kirsten Cather, Don Choi, Michael Foster, Larissa Heinrich, Yukari Ishizaka, Gretchen Jones, Wakae Kambara, Katsuya Kinjo, Yasuko Konno, Chris Laughrun, Sayuri Oyama, Zeli Rivas, Keiko Sakatani, Christine Shippey, Kenji Tierney, and Natasha Wild for making those years such a pleasure. Colleagues at Smith College in the Department of East Asian Languages and Literatures, the Program in East Asian Studies, and the Program for the Study of Women and Gender have provided a welcoming and supportive environment for teaching and research. In particular, I would like to thank Marnie Anderson, Sharon Domier, Rob Eskildsen, Suzanne Gottschang, Marguerite Harrison, Maki Hubbard, Ann Jones, Yuri Kumagai, Megumi Oyama, Tom Rohlich, Marilyn Schuster, Vicky Spelman, Susan Van Dyne, Paula Varsano, Sujane Wu, and Dennis Yasutomo. My students at Smith College have been an endless source of enthusiasm and creative thought. Special thanks to the students from the Writing Empire seminars for their intellectual rigor and thoughtful contributions. Over the past decade, the research and writing of this book was funded by the Japan Foundation, the University of California, 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


Ac k now l e dgm e n t s

A c k now l e d g m e n t s

Berkeley, and Smith College. Additionally, several of these chapters were substantially revised and expanded during a year as a Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow at Cornell University. I want to thank the Department of Asian Studies, the Society for the Humanities, and, in particular, Brett de Bary, for their generous support. The year in Ithaca was made even more enjoyable by the camaraderie of the Blanco family, Lieba Faier, Beth Katzoff, Sherry Martin, Christi Merrill, Anna Parkinson, Vyjayanthi and Jeff Selinger, and Rob Weiner. An earlier version of chapter 1 appeared as “Mediating Modern Love in Manchuria: Performing Ethnicity, Gender, and Romance in Yokota Fumiko’s ‘Love Letter,’ ” Japanese Language and Literature 39.1 (April 2005). Chapter 2 was published in a different version as “Writing Colonial Lineage in Sakaguchi Reiko’s ‘Tokeisō,’ ”Journal of Japanese Studies, 32.1 (2006). The editors and anonymous reviewers for these publications provided invaluable feedback during the writing process. I thank Marie Anchordoguy, Sarah Strong, John Treat, and Tim Vance. Thanks to Brigitte Shull of Palgrave and the anonymous reviewers for giving this manuscript a chance and to Lee Norton, Allison McElgunn, and the folks at Newgen for shepherding me through the publication process. Special thanks to Lucretia Knapp and Lynne Yamamoto for the author photo. I would like to thank the following for their support and critical feedback on different aspects of this project during its evolution: Elyssa Faison, Jim Fujii, Hikari Hori, Adrienne Hurley, Devin Jindrich, Faye Kleeman, Mary Knighton, Helen Lee, Namhee Lee, Debbie Lunny, Michele Mason, Julie Mencher, Dan O’Neill, Leigh Saffold, Chris Scott, Michiko Suzuki, Yoko Tateoka, Bob Tierney, Leslie Winston, and Peichen Wu. I am deeply grateful for the support and encouragement of my families on the East and West Coasts. Thank you to Richard and Grace Kono, Stacy Kono, Gabriel Martinez, Melanie and Jesse Kelsey, Ben Kase, Sadako Kase, the Berg family, and the Websters in Washington and Maine. Tim Webster provided unfailing support, invaluable critiques, and perfectly baked scones. Words cannot adequately express how much joy you bring to my life. Thank you. And finally, Kai K. Webster helped me pace the final stages of the writing process and has taught me new ways to think about family.



x

D

uring the first half of the twentieth century, Japanese colonial officials in Korea (1910–1945), Manchuria (1932–1945), and Taiwan (1895–1945) drew upon romantic and familial relations between Japanese and colonized subjects in the service of the colonial project.1 In his term as the first civilian Governor-General of Taiwan (1919– 1923), for example, Den Kenjirō encouraged intermarriages between Japanese and Taiwanese as a means of furthering the acculturation process and equalizing relations between the two groups.2 Similar messages circulated in relation to interethnic unions in colonial Korea as well, following the arranged marriage between Japanese and Korean royalty in 1920. Governor-General of Korea Minami Jirō (1936–1942) publicly cited interethnic marriage as one of three important ways to solidify the unification of Japan and Korea (naisen ittai) and, in 1941, went so far as to present interethnic couples with plaques honoring their contribution to this union.3 Throughout the empire, Japanese spouses were exhorted to contribute to the colonial project by “educating” their colonized partners in Japanese cultural practices, an endeavor that ultimately extended Japanese colonial influence into the private sphere. These relationships also took on a symbolic resonance in the promotion of the colonial project. The arranged marriage between Japanese Nashimoto Masako and Korean Prince Yi Un in 1920, for example, recast controversial political ties in a familial form and was described in the mass media as the embodiment of the harmonious union of Japan and Korea. Likewise, in Manchuria the relationship between Japan and Manchuria was alternately characterized as a “continental romance” or a “brotherhood of nations,” images that, however disparate, resulted in the same effect of distracting from Japan’s colonial efforts with romantic or familial sentiment.4 These evocations of marriage and family by government officials and the mass media in both the colonies and Japan 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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Rom a nc e , Fa m i ly, a n d N at ion

proper imbued the colonial project with the stability and positive sentiments associated with families. By contrast, literary renderings of interethnic relations in familial, marital, and romantic forms did not unequivocally celebrate colonial unions. Instead, these texts provided a more nuanced treatment of the interactions between colonizing Japanese and colonized subjects, on the one hand, and the colonies and Japan on the other. Japanese writers in Korea, Manchuria, and Taiwan recast the colonial project in various shades: as an unrequited romance, the reunion of longseparated families, an oppressive and dysfunctional coupling, and a utopian collaboration. This study explores how these literary formulations reflect the numerous ways that Japan’s imperial expansion was imagined throughout the empire. The various manifestations of romance, marriage, and family in colonial literature foreground how writers positioned themselves vis-à-vis empire and reveal the different conditions, consequences, and constraints that writers in Japan and the colonies faced in rendering Japanese colonialism. While some writers sought to reinforce the ties between Japan and its colonies, others attempted to assert individual and collective identities independent of Japan’s colonizing influence. In revealing the multiple manifestations of the colonial project, this study also explores the diverse motivations and justifications Japanese subjects deployed for participating in empire.

Family Fictions Representations of romance, marriage, and family appear in other literary traditions for nationalist and colonialist purposes and are not unique to the Japanese colonial context. For example, literary scholar Doris Sommer discusses an “erotics of politics” in nineteenth-century Latin American fiction whereby images of heterosexual romance and marriage functioned as allegories for the consolidation of national identities.5 During this period, Latin American writers crafted narratives of love and marriage that united subjects from different racial, economic, and political backgrounds in the service of promoting the “imagined community” of the nation.6 In eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Germany, literary portrayals of interracial romance and family functioned as “colonial fantasies” that prepared the nation for colonial conquest through the establishment of a uniquely German national identity in opposition to its colonial Others.7 These examples reveal the powerful resonance of the sentiments associated with romance, family, and marriage within these cultural contexts and their use in mobilizing nationalist consciousness. 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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In a similar fashion, familial and marital tropes have played an integral role in Japan’s assertion of itself as a modern nation since the late nineteenth century. Through the family-state (kazoku kokka) ideology, officials and intellectuals of the Meiji period (1868–1912) rendered the family as a microcosm of the nation and the nation as an extension of the familial.8 Officials described the nation of Japan as an extended family with the Emperor as the grand patriarch and his subjects as his descendants. This linking of the nation with the family allowed officials to draw upon intimate sentiments to mobilize the nation. Specifically, as feminist critic Aoki Yayoi notes, the rendering of the nation in a familial form “inextricably bound” national loyalty with Confucian filial duties.9 Thus, contributing to the nation became the fulfillment of the primary Confucian virtue of respecting and supporting one’s household and ancestors. Subjects of the nation were obligated to their biological relatives as well as to the nation of Japan, their extended family. During the Meiji period, representations of marriage and family pervaded Japanese literature, as evidenced by the popularity of serialized household novels or katei sh ōsetsu at the time.10 As Ken K. Ito notes in his expansive study on the family in Meiji-era melodrama, these “fictive families” served as responses to the “pressures and challenges of modernity.”11 More specifically, Meiji writers of domestic fiction and other genres commented on Japan’s efforts at national consolidation through representations of marital, familial, and romantic relations. In his novel Hototogisu (The Cuckoo, 1898), Tokutomi R ōka, for example, presents different models of family that underscored the interplay of gender and class in the construction of national lineage.12 Likewise, Shimazaki Tōson’s novel Ie (The Family, 1910– 1911) participates in what Michael Bourdaghs calls the “rhetoric of national imagination” by both producing and challenging the notion of a “Japanese national family.”13 In other words, Tōson and other writers helped create the notion of the family rather than simply representing an already existing entity. Through their representations of family and marriage, these writers actively participated in discussions about Japan’s status as a modern nation and the (re)construction of ideas about romantic and familial relations. The use of romantic and familial tropes in the colonial context attests to the pervasive and persuasive power of these narratives of intimacy. Similar to their Meiji counterparts, colonial officials evoked these images to solidify Japan’s identity, this time as an imperial power. Through the association of colonialism with images of family and romance, officials imbued the colonial project with stability, legitimacy, and sentiment that it otherwise lacked in the eyes of many 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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colonial subjects. This intertwining of the family and colonialism also meshed with the aforementioned Confucian notions of statehood, a set of norms that were widely accepted throughout East Asia. As Louise Young observes with the language promoting Japanese emigration to Manchuria, “colonies became kinsmen, and the familystate became the family-empire.”14 Positive representations of intermarriage and interethnic families further affirmed and even naturalized the Japanese presence in the colonies. The portrayal of Japan’s relationship to its colonies in a familial (and familiar) form signified a change in Japan’s image from that of an outside occupier to an intimate with an accepted place in the colonies. In this context, Japan’s desire for colonial union could be differentiated from the imperialist ambitions of Western nations in Asia. While Britain, France, or the United States were foreign occupiers, Japan’s purportedly familial ties distracted from its actual position as an “outsider.” In addition to rendering colonial relations as “natural” (af)filiations, tropes of family and marriage also contributed to the regulation of colonial society through their justification for colonial hierarchy. Postcolonial critic Anne McClintock discusses the use of the trope of the family in nineteenth-century Britain in providing an organizing structure for social hierarchy and naturalizing the resulting exclusion and subordination of certain gendered, racialized, and ethnicized subjects.15 Citing the image of the Family of Man, McClintock explains how the rendering of this map of human evolution into a familial form naturalized racial hierarchy, allowing for the colonizing races to take a paternalistic role in relation to the infantilized colonized population.16 The imposition of the hierarchy of the family, presumed to be natural or, in McClintock’s words, “beyond history,” upon the colonial relationship, justified colonial hegemony as a mere continuation of this natural order. In the Japanese case, the stratification of colonial society depended upon the affirmation of Japan’s preeminence over the colonized population, occasionally in racialized terms but more frequently in levels of modernity. Unable to wholly rely upon racial difference to distinguish itself from its subjects, the Japanese colonial government instead focused upon a hierarchy of “social progress” in the form of modernization. Within official colonial discourse, Japanese subjects were situated farther along the scale of modernization than their colonized counterparts and, as a consequence, seemingly justified in their assuming positions at the head of these colonial “families” as arbiters of civility and culture. The tropes of family and marriage further



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strengthened this stratification by drawing upon both Confucian relationships positioning fathers as the educators of their sons, and normative constructions of womanhood that held Japanese wives and mothers responsible for the education and care of their families. Official evocations of interethnic marriage and family thus interwove seemingly disparate discourses on gender, society, and modernity to promote the colonial project. Japanese writers of the late colonial period used these familiar tropes of romance, family, and marriage but rendered them in alternative forms that provided a very different portrait of colonial relations. Instead of portraying images of unity and stability, the texts addressed in this study depict personal and political struggles in the colonial context. In the case of eighteenth- and nineteenthcentury German colonial fantasies, Susanne Zantop notes that images of romance and marriage shifted according to historical changes, with, for example, fantasies of the legitimating union of marriage emerging in times of colonial resistance and portrayals of broken relations appearing after decolonization.17 Similarly, in the Japanese colonial context, official promotion of intermarriage occurred following heightened periods of anti-Japanese sentiment. For example, the arranged marriage of Japanese and Korean royalty took on greater resonance in the year after the March First Movement in Korea. At the same time, however, the images of unrequited romance and broken families treated in this study appear in the latter years of colonialism, suggesting that the texts discussed here function not so much as idealized fantasies of a potential colonial future but rather as commentaries on the colonial present negotiating with a recent colonial past. Shōji S ōichi’s novel Chin fujin (Madame Chen, 1940) portrays the difficulties experienced by an interethnic couple living in Taiwan with the husband’s family. Yuasa Katsue’s short story “Natsume” (Jujube, 1937) depicts the struggle of a boy of Japanese and Korean parentage searching for his identity in colonial Korea. Sakaguchi Reiko’s novella Tokeis ō (Passionflower, 1943) shows the attempts of a Japanese-aboriginal Taiwanese young man to reconcile with his Japanese father who abandoned him as a young child. The difficult marriages and the broken families that appear in these texts clash with the official forecasts for harmonious colonial union, thus revealing individual perspectives on the colonial project that diverge from official accounts. Such narratives thus indicate the multiple visions of colonialism circulating throughout the empire.



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This study uses the categories of Manchurian literature first theorized by cultural critic Kawamura Minato, and extends them to colonial literature as a whole. Accordingly, “colonial literature” hereby encompasses (1) writings by subjects who traveled to the colonies and used their impressions and experiences as the basis for fiction or travel writing; (2) work by those who had lived in the colonies; and (3) work written in the postwar period by former colonial residents.18 This study focuses primarily on the second category, but following is a brief discussion of the other two categories. Kawamura’s first category refers to the different genres of Japanese-language writing about the colonies, such as travel writing, produced since the early years of colonization by Japanese visitors. For example, numerous literati, such as Natsume Sōseki and Yosano Akiko, wrote of their travels to the gaichi (the colonies) for readers in the metropole.19 These works record the impressions of visitors that are circumscribed by the limits of travel. Kawamura groups together literary texts that reference the colonies but whose authors lack the experience to provide a knowledgeable or authentic portrayal. Works that reference the colonies as an exotic setting or use colonial imagery also fit into this category of writing about the colonies. During the height of Japan’s imperial expansion, many authors evoked the colonies as a shorthand for cultural otherness. For example, the character of Takao in Uno Chiyo’s novella Irozange (Confessions of Love, 1935), who lived in Korea for several years, is described as an independent, sexually voracious young woman. Her “deviance” from gender norms may be loosely associated with her time abroad. Similarly, in Tanizaki Jun’ichirō’s Tade kuu mushi (Some Prefer Nettles, 1929) the mixed parentage of Louisa, the Eurasian mistress of the protagonist Kaname, and her travels abroad in Russia, Korea, and Manchuria enhance her allure as an exotic “other.” Such brief literary references solidified the prevailing image of the colonies as a space of cultural difference that could foster dangerous deviance or provide escape from stifling societal norms. Kawamura’s third category includes postwar writing by former residents and their families. Writers who lived in the colonies, including Abe K ōbō, Hayashi Kyōko, and Kajiyama Toshiyuki, present different perspectives on Japan’s colonial efforts that range from nostalgia to critique.20 It must be noted, however, that in the case of work written in the postwar period, these perspectives on colonialism can be colored by both complex feelings of loss and contemporary



Colonial Literature

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attitudes toward Japanese imperialism. As a result, while these texts provide detailed insights into the colonial experience, they may not accurately reveal the beliefs and experiences of Japanese colonial residents during the colonial period. Thus, an examination of works produced during the colonial period is necessary in order to create a detailed portrait of the views of Japanese in the colonies. The second category consists of writing by those who lived in the colonies during the years of empire (1895–1945). Some writers, including Ushijima Haruko and Sakaguchi Reiko, became active in colonial literary circles after moving there as adults.21 Others, such as Yuasa Katsue and Shōji Sōichi, spent several years in the colonies but eventually moved back to Japan, where they engaged in literary activity.22 Writings by colonized subjects such as Yang Kui (Taiwan), Chang Hyok-chū (Korea), and Imamura Eiji (Manchuria) portray diverse perspectives on the political, economic, and cultural effects of colonialism.23 The shared characteristic of colonial residency ostensibly imbues their writings with the authenticity of experience. In addition, it is important to note that writers in the colonies did not limit themselves to their geographical and cultural environs. A quick scan of colonial literary journals reveals short fiction set in rural Japan and critical essays on topics ranging from the work of Anton Chekhov to commentary on the late Heian period tale Torikaebaya monogatari (The Changelings). Yet, despite the wide range of topics covered by writers in the colonies, this study focuses on works explicitly addressing issues specific to the colonial context in order to explore the development of diverse colonial identities. Japanese-language literary circles first emerged in Taiwan during the 1920s. By the 1940s, journals such as Taiwan bungaku (Taiwanese Literature) and Bungei Taiwan (Literary Arts Taiwan) published both Japanese and Taiwanese writers. The majority of Japanese writers, including Nishikawa Mitsuru and Hamada Hayao, wrote for the latter journal, while a few, such as Nakamura Tetsu, Nakayama Susumu, and Sakaguchi Reiko, published their work in the former.24 While Japanese writers contributed to Taiwan bungaku, this journal was the main showcase for Taiwanese writers such as Zhang Wenhuan, Yang Kui, Lü Heruo, Zhou Jinpo, and Wu Zholiu, all of whom used the Japanese language abilities acquired under assimilation policy to write literary works in Japanese.25 With their focus on issues and concerns specific to the colonies, these journals aimed at a colonial readership in Taiwan but maintained ties with literary circles in Japan, which, according to Faye Kleeman, validated their literary endeavors.26



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In Korea, colonial literary production by Japanese writers was limited to newspapers and such Japanese-administered journals as Ryokki (Green Flag).27 Japanese-language contributions from Korean writers such as Yi Kwangsu and Kim Seong-min also appeared in Ryokki, but as a result of the journal’s political focus these works were later censured as shin-nichi bungaku (pro-Japanese literature). Another main venue for Koreans writing in both Japanese and Korean was Kukmin munhak (National Literature), which editor Ch’oe Cheseo at one point identified as a venue for the “regional literature” (chih ō bungaku) of Korea as opposed to the colonial-centered focus of Ryokki.28 Similar to colonial literary publications in Taiwan, these journals also aimed their work at “local” audiences, engaging in commentary on colonial life and debating the purpose of “colonial literature.” Literary circles in Manchuria, despite developing much later than their counterparts in Taiwan and Korea, garnered audiences in both Manchuria and Japan proper. The coteries surrounding the journals Mansh ū rōman (Manchurian Novel) and Sakubun (Composition), composed of both novice and professional writers, initially catered to a small minority of intellectuals in Manchuria.29 However, due to the increased circulation among Japan and its colonies by the late 1930s, Japanese literati began paying attention to their colonial counterparts. Such literary luminaries as Satō Haruo and Kawabata Yasunari actively sponsored the publication of colonial literary works in the metropole.30 For writers in Manchuria, such attention eventually culminated in a “continental literature boom,” where these works acquired an audience in Japan proper. Romance, Family and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature examines late colonial era writings and reveals distinct differences among colonizing subjects, their conceptualization of the colonial project, and their subsequent representation of these ideas in a literary form. Their differing attitudes result not from their locations inside or outside the colonies, but rather of their visions of the colonial project—its purposes, priorities, and actors. Some writers in this study viewed colonialism as a collaboration between Japanese and colonized, while others embraced their privilege as colonizers along with their presumed roles as educators of the colonized. This study examines several of these texts and pursues questions about their centrality in the negotiation of individual and communal identities in the Japanese colonial context: What was the colonial project (or projects)? How do their visions of empire reflect upon their notion of Japan? What do these different versions say about the consolidation of national and colonial identities at this time?



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This study focuses on texts produced during the late colonial period (1937–1945) because of their complex engagement with Japanese and colonial identities. By the 1920s, formal literary spheres comprised of both Japanese and colonized subjects began to develop within Korea, Manchuria, and Taiwan. Liao Ping-hui notes that the expansion of print culture in colonial Taiwan is evidenced by the rapid increase in the print media, the high literacy rate, and the large number of poetic and literary texts produced during 1920–1945.31 Literary production from the colonies spanned a range of styles from avant-garde poetry to literary romanticism and proletarian realism. Moreover, by the latter years of empire, a significant number of these works incorporated images and issues unique to the colonies and contributed to the development of colonial literary identities.32 These texts also reveal attitudes toward the colonies and the colonial project(s) that differed greatly from their metropolitan counterparts.

Significant Others Although resistance to Japanese colonialism persisted throughout the colonial period, challenges to the legitimacy of the colonial administration were particularly prominent during its twilight years. AntiJapanese sentiment occasionally boiled over into violence, as manifest in the Musha Incident of 1930 in Taiwan, where a group of 300 aboriginal Taiwanese killed 134 Japanese. Anti-Japanese resistance groups directed similar attacks on Japanese settlers in Manchuria and Korea.33 Such visible defiance challenged the legitimacy and the stability of the colonial administrations. Furthermore, by the later years of colonialism, the Japanese presence in the colonies came under heightened opposition and critique from colonial and international sources. Such resistance undermined attempts to legitimize the Japanese colonial authority. In addition, colonial policies of assimilation, which had a direct and visible impact upon colonized subjects, also affected Japanese subjects in the colonies. Assimilationist discourse proposed that anyone could become Japanese by enacting certain cultural practices, such as taking on a Japanese name and speaking Japanese.34 Such promises implicitly questioned the privileged colonizer status of Japanese in the colonial context by offering a potential path to parity between colonized subjects and Japanese residents. However attractive this may have been to colonized subjects, some Japanese colonial officials expressed dismay at the thought of teaching the Japaneselanguage to their colonized counterparts. If everyone spoke Japanese,



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how could officials ensure their privileged positions at the peak of the social pyramid? Furthermore, in discussions of imperialization, or k ōminka, there are instances where Japanese subjects professed anxiety at their own deficiencies as “good imperial subjects” in comparison with their assimilating Taiwanese counterparts. The supposed fluidity of the boundaries of Japanese identity engendered myriad questions: Who qualified as “Japanese?” How was Japanese identity defined? In light of the multiple ways that Japanese-ness was expressed, which definitions prevailed and why? Japanese subjects contributed to this instability by questioning their own ties to Japan and the colonies. Despite their ethnic identity as Japanese, some settlers held mixed feelings about their relationship to the “motherland.” In Sakaguchi Reiko’s short story “Shunjū” (Spring and Autumn), the Japanese protagonist, after settling in rural Taiwan, worries about his ancestral spirits in Japan, and wonders whether his homeland (furusato) is in Taiwan or Japan.35 As a result of the development of communities and identities unique to the colonial context, new affiliations emerged and complicated already fractured national and cultural identities. Many second- and thirdgeneration settlers, for example, lacked firsthand knowledge of the naichi (Japan proper); this fact subtly attenuated their purported affiliation with Japan and exacerbated their already unsteady position of colonial privilege. These frail linkages to Japan engendered anxiety in colonial officials, who tried to reinforce their connection to Japan in the private sphere through such venues as personal hygiene or the domestic sciences.36 Postcolonial theorist Robert Young notes that the move to fix or define national identities emerges in situations of instability and conflict in response to “continual (contestation)” as a way to “mask its uncertainty, its sense of being estranged from itself, sick with desire for the other.”37 Particularly in the colonial context, where Japanese subjects found their status as colonizers challenged, the need to assert a fixed Japanese identity held great importance as the basis for colonial hierarchy. Literature represented one venue for articulating a stable colonial identity, Elleke Boehmer discusses how British colonial settlers attempted to write a colonial history and devised particularly colonial modes of expression in order to assert their own legitimacy in the colonial context. Marginalized by the metropole, settler writers sought to “legitimate from their particular geographic and cultural perspective a subjectivity distinct, even if adapted, from Europe.”38



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Possessing a history justified their presence in the colonies and provided proof of their authority. By the later colonial period, in the Japanese context as well, Japanese writers residing in the colonies asserted a unique colonial identity through their literary practice. Through an exploration of the different treatments of the family and marriage in colonial literature, this study also examines the diverse identities that emerged in the colonial context. Many Japanese subjects, caught between their colonial residences and “homeland” of Japan, invented uniquely colonial identities. Some embraced a colonial Japanese identity that emphasized the difference from colonized subjects and Japanese in the metropole. Others adopted their new residence and distanced themselves from other Japanese colonizers who possessed different views of the colonial project and of their purpose in the colonies. The emergence of such alternative identities, in part, reflected the anxieties and dissatisfaction with colonialism held by some Japanese subjects. These “other” subjectivities indicate how Japanese negotiated their relationship to the colonial project and their position in both the colonies and in empire. This study approaches these texts as imaginative works of fiction that reflect and respond to the conditions in the colonial context. While colonial literary production included works of fantasy and abstraction, the texts addressed in this study veer closer to the side of realism. Each chapter discusses the ways that a certain text intersects with colonial discourses on marriage and family, providing insight on the different colonial projects. Many scholars of colonial studies have noted that there was not a unified vision of Japan’s imperialist expansion, nor did officials have a monopoly on these visions of empire. These literary texts reveal the ways that Japanese envisioned the colonial project and their own roles within it. By understanding these competing configurations of colonialism, we can then take steps to comprehend the stories that buttressed the participation of Japanese who embraced the colonial enterprise. While some Japanese writers used their writing to support colonial policy, others struggled to create a more nuanced portrayal of everyday life in the colonies. Still others endeavored to show the gradual disintegration of the foundations of colonial discourse. The portrayals of broken families and unrequited romance—while subscribing to the expectations for their genres—also cast a critical gaze upon the colonial project. By attending to these literary renderings of the problems in intermarriage and interethnic romance, this study reveals writers’ own complex positions in relation to Japanese colonialism.



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Japanese writers and directors linked the individual desire for romantic union with the drive for colonial expansion. Chapter 1 explores the work of Yokota Fumiko, who challenges idealized images of imperial relations through the asymmetries of ethnicity and gender in colonial romance. In Yokota’s story “Koibumi” (Love Letter, 1942), the unrequited love that a Manchu man feels for an unattainable Japanese woman serves as an allegory for colonizing-Japan’s selfserving perception of colonial Manchuria’s desire for Japan’s attentions. Yokota examines the intersections of popular romantic paradigms and colonial discourse in Manchuria and highlights the false promises of the colonial project, particularly the assimilationist discourse aimed at colonized subjects in Manchuria. Furthermore, Yokota’s work provides a distinct contrast to the naively hopeful and romanticized reformulations of empire in popular cinema produced by the officially sanctioned Manchurian Motion Picture Company. In particular, the popular “Continental Trilogy,” a series of romantic melodramas pairing Japanese men and Chinese women, transformed Japan’s imperialist desire for territorial expansion into innocent yearnings for love. Chapter 2 examines literary representations of colonial intermarriages and the struggles with Japanese and colonial affiliations. Writers such as Sakaguchi Reiko, who actively participated in the literary journal Taiwan bungaku, critiqued Japanese colonialism while simultaneously supporting it. Sakaguchi’s depiction of families in Taiwan and Japan reveals the contradictions of subjects who grapple with their colonial past, present, and future. In particular, her novella Tokeis ō (Passionflower) investigates the generational, ideological, and cultural divide between a Japanese father and his half-Japanese, halfaboriginal Taiwanese son. By juxtaposing a flawed colonial past with a “more humane” colonial future, Sakaguchi’s text reveals the ambivalence of many Japanese colonialists caught between their ties to their Japanese homeland and their colonial residence. Other writers negotiated their relation to Japanese colonialism by forging identities unencumbered by national and cultural affiliations. Specifically addressing imperial relations between Koreans and Japanese, chapter 3 shows how the pervasive nature of national affiliations consistently interrupted the assertion of colonial identities. Yuasa Katsue’s short story “Natsume” (Jujube) depicts an illegitimate son’s attempts at gaining recognition, legal and otherwise, from his



Interethnic Relations in Japanese Colonial Literature

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Japanese mother and Korean father. Through this narrative of a broken family, Yuasa reflects the problem of “legitimacy” that colonial subjects faced in relation to both Japan and the colonial territory. The work reveals the difficulty for both individual subjects and colonial territories of forming an identity independent of the burdens of Japanese and precolonial local culture. Written almost two decades after the 1920 arranged marriage between Japanese and Korean royalty, heralded as the harmonious union of Japan and Korea, Yuasa’s literary rendering of the divisiveness and ultimate alienation of colonial subjects casts a shadow on the royal marriage’s promise of unity, suggesting instead a darker future for the Japanese empire. Acknowledging the problems of Japanese colonial rule did not lead to a rejection of the colonial project as a whole. Rather, such critiques indicate a shift in definitions of colonial identities. Chapter 4 explores the ways that Shōji Sōichi’s novel Chin fujin (Madame Chen) reformulates Japanese empire as a mutually constitutive effort by East Asian subjects, rather than a consequence of Japanese domination. By relocating the process of becoming an “imperial subject” to the context of Greater East Asia, Shōji portrays a Taiwanese man’s gradual transformation from an object of colonialism, the colonized, to a subject, a colonizer. In light of its pro-colonial message, it is fitting that the novel won the first Greater East Asia Literary Award. As a result of this recognition, Shōji and his work participated in a movement spearheaded by Japanese officials to promote a broader tradition of East Asian literature that bridges nations in support of the Co-Prosperity Sphere. Many Japanese writers reconfigured the relationship between the colonies and the metropole. In chapter 5, I examine the essays of several Japanese literary critics in Manchuria, who depicted the colonies and “colonial literature” as utopian opportunities—chances to witness and participate in the “birth” of a new community, and a new literary tradition bringing together Japanese and colonized subjects. In formulating colonial literature and the colonies as independent bodies, these critics eschewed images of family and lineage that emphasized ties with Japan and instead promoted a “literary frontier” seemingly free of the limitations of the Japanese literary tradition. These debates on colonial literature discussed the unique purposes and responsibilities of a literature born in the colonies; they also addressed the nature of the colonial project, including its relationship, however fraught or attenuated, to Japan itself. While this study examines writings by both Japanese and colonized subjects, its primary focus is Japanese-language writings by



I n t r oduc t ion


Japanese. Relying primarily on the views of Japanese writers risks reenacting the power hierarchies of colonialism by privileging the voices of colonizing Japanese. However, this study does not aim to provide a comprehensive portrait of Japanese colonialism. Rather, it purposes to create a nuanced study of the varied perspectives specifically among Japanese in the colonies. Such a depiction reveals alternatives to official representations of colonialism and consequently challenges the notion of a homogeneous, unified colonizer perspective. By presenting the official version of colonialism as one of several narratives, this study also shows how Japanese in the colonies interpreted that narrative as well as articulated their own visions of empire. These multiple narratives of empire facilitate better understanding of the foundations of Japanese colonialism and provide insight into the reasons that Japanese participated in the colonial project. Exploring such literary renderings of romance, marriage, and family in the colonial context reveals how colonialism was made “attractive” through its transformation from a state-led policy to a romanticized and familial endeavor. This study shows how writers used powerful narratives of romantic and familial love in order to traverse the dangerous currents of empire. All of these writers participated in the Japanese colonial project through their presence in the colonies as well as through their literary activity. Despite their critical views of Japanese imperialism, these writers succumbed to empire. This study reveals the limits of their critiques and underscores the influence of narratives of family, nation, and empire. By dissecting the factors restricting these writers, this study touches on issues relevant to contemporary discussions of nationalism, militarism, and wartime responsibility. In this light, the works provide an opportunity for deconstructing official discourse and challenging contemporary narratives of nation, citizenship, and cultural identity.



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P e r for m i ng Et h n ic i t y, Ge n de r a n d Mode r n L ov e i n C ol on i a l M a nc h u r i a

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uring the late 1930s and early 1940s, the colonial romance, a love affair between Japanese and colonized subjects, emerged in the Japanese popular imagination as an important trope associated with the “puppet state” of Manchukuo.1 Most notable for the proliferation of these images of interethnic romance are a series of films, referred to as the “continental trilogy” (tairiku sanbusaku), produced by the Japanese-administered Manchurian Motion Picture Company, Mansh ū eiga ky ōkai (or Man’ei).2 The plots of such films usually consist of a Chinese woman overcoming anti-Japanese sentiments and escaping rebel Chinese or military conflict to recognize her love for a Japanese man. These cinematic images indelibly linked Manchuria and the “continent” with passion and intrigue in the minds of Japanese spectators, and implicitly likened the relationship between Japan and the continent to a love affair.3 Such portrayals functioned to “romanticize” (both to render as an amorous interlude and to figuratively idealize) and ultimately promote the colonialist agenda embodied in such popular slogans as gozoku ky ōwa (ethnic harmony among the five ethnic groups populating Manchuria: Han Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, ethnic Manchu, and Mongols). Sentimentalized visions of the colonial relationship were not limited to cinema. Images of romances between Japanese and Chinese subjects also appeared in literary production in or about colonial Manchuria. For example, one of the aforementioned films, Byakuran no uta (Song of the White Orchid), was based on a novel by Kume Masao, and serialized in the Tokyo nichi nichi shimbun in 1939.4 Yet, unlike their cinematic counterparts, some literary portrayals of such relations implicitly (or explicitly) countered romanticized images of the colonies by depicting the complex and oftentimes conflicted



1


realities of the colonial context. More specifically, these literary narratives revealed an alternative perspective on the romanticized depictions of colonial relations in Manchuria. This chapter will explore the intertwined discourses of romantic love and colonialism through an examination of one literary representation of an unrequited love affair between a Japanese woman and a Manchu man. “Koibumi” (Love Letter, 1942), a short story by Yokota Fumiko (1909–1985),5 evokes the romantic discourse of its cinematic contemporaries, but instead foregrounds the complex challenges confronting both colonized and colonizing subjects in such an endeavor. This story reveals the contradictions embedded in intersecting discourses of ethnic difference, gender, and romantic love underlying the colonial romance narrative. Foregrounding the paradoxical implications of these intertwining discourses challenges the validity of these very discourses and the colonial hierarchies that they support, and thus questions the possibility of harmonious colonial union promoted by the Japanese colonial government. In the Japanese colonial context, romantic narratives often contributed to the promotion of the colonial project. The evocation of colonial romance is not limited to the case of Japanese empire as seen in postcolonial studies focusing on Latin American and German literature. Described variously as “encounter fictions” or “conquest fantasies,” these romantic narratives paired European male explorers with “native” women, whose “voluntary surrender” cloaks the violence of colonial conquest by reformulating empire as a desirable enterprise.6 As will be seen in chapter 2, similar treatment of relations between Japanese men and Aboriginal Taiwanese women, particularly a preoccupation with what Susanne Zantop has called an “erotics of conquest,” appears in colonial fiction produced in Taiwan. In film, romances between Japanese and Chinese subjects also followed a similar pattern, with Chinese women eventually surrendering to Japanese men. In the first film of the aforementioned “continental trilogy,” Song of the White Orchid, a Chinese woman, Xuelan, becomes romantically involved with a Japanese man, Matsumura, an engineer for the Southern Manchurian Railway (also known as Mantetsu), while she is taking voice lessons in Mukden. When she is called back to her hometown in Jehol, they promise to maintain their relationship by writing to each other. Yet, following her return home, she does not receive any letters from him. In fact, her relatives intercept these letters and hide them, causing Xuelan to believe that Matsumura has betrayed her. Her heartbreak transforms into bitterness and rage, which eventually leads to her joining the



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Eighth Route Army (or balujun in Chinese or hachirogun in Japanese), a Communist unit of the National Revolutionary Army that fought against the Japanese military on the continent. One day Xuelan’s unit captures a group of engineers, including Matsumura, reuniting the couple, albeit under different circumstances. Matsumura eventually convinces Xuelan of his faithfulness, and she deceives her cohort to help him escape. Although the film concludes with the couple dying under the bullets of Xuelan’s former cohort, their lives are not taken in vain, as the construction of the railway is completed because of their sacrifice.7 Despite the mediation by the heroine’s relatives and the intervention of Chinese nationalist (anti-Japanese) ideology, fate and the goodwill of the Japanese hero inevitably bring the couple back together. The union of Xuelan and Matsumura leads to the completion of tracks for the South Manchurian Railway, a symbol of modern technology and Japanese colonialism.8 The message is clear; a feminized Asia must learn to trust the altruistic efforts of masculinized Japan, and unite to live in (or die for) modern “co-prosperity.” 9 The use of these films to promote the colonial project becomes increasingly apparent in their circulation throughout East and Southeast Asia in different forms. As Donald Richie and Joseph Anderson note, censors intervened in the messages portrayed in the second film of the “continental trilogy,” Shina no yoru (China Nights), by assigning “appropriate” conclusions to different audiences. While viewers in China and Southeast Asia saw the couple marry and live happily ever after, spectators in Japan witnessed a vastly different ending. The couple is torn apart by the hero’s death in battle, whereupon the Chinese heroine commits suicide to be with her beloved.10 Viewers of the Chinese and Southeast Asian version saw a film that advocated the “official” unification of Japan and other Asian nations, as the marriage symbolizes the union of Japan and China. In contrast, the double-suicide ending for spectators in Japan fulfilled romantic conventions by recognizing the couple’s mutual attraction, and minimized the threat of transgressing boundaries between colonizers and colonized by ending the love affair. The differences between each version supported alternate versions of the colonial project in acceptable forms for the diverse audiences imagined by the censors. This fact reiterates the propagandistic aims underlying these films and highlights the complicated process of mediation in cultural production in the colonial context. Yokota’s short story “Love Letter” appeared in 1942 following these cinematic representations of colonial romance. Similar to the



P e r f or m i ng E t h n ic i t y


“continental trilogy,” Yokota’s story also evokes the mediation of colonial relations through the depiction of a brief correspondence between a Manchu man and a Japanese woman. As we shall see, while clearly referencing the trope of colonial romance, Yokota’s story questions, rather than advocates, the possibility of colonial union by revealing the inherent contradictions within colonial discourse on ethnic difference, modernity, and romance. Mediation, in particular, plays an important role in the ways in which colonial subjects negotiate their position in the colonial context. By mediation, I am referring to the process by which an outside entity—whether a nation-state or discourse or third party— intervenes in the communication between two individuals. In his study of structures of desire in the novel, René Girard identifies a triangulated formation of romance, with a third party mediating desire between two other subjects. Girard discusses mediation as a way to “bring together two spheres of possibilities.”11 My examination, drawing on Girard, will focus on a triangulated formation of romance, but will explore the ways in which mediation separates, rather than unites, two subjects. Girard’s study of mediation identifies the mediator of desire as an individual subject. Although instances of mediation by an individual subject occur in Yokota’s “Love Letter” (e.g., the narrator’s mediation of Wang’s letters; the husband’s mediation between Wang and the narrator), my examination of mediation will focus on the ways colonial discourses of ethnic difference, romance, and gender intervened in the interactions between colonizing and colonized subjects. My use of the term discourse follows Michel Foucault in focusing on how discourse shapes the ways in which subjects relate to each other and to themselves. Foucault writes, “(discursive relations) are, in a sense, at the limit of discourse; they offer it objects of which it can speak, or rather (for this image of offering presupposes that objects are formed independently of discourse), they determine the group of relations that discourse must establish in order to speak of this or that object, in order to deal with them, name them, analyse them, classify them, explain them, etc.”12 While the mediation of characters themselves is visibly apparent in “Love Letter,” we must also acknowledge how their behavior is shaped and even limited by colonial discourses, in this case, of ethnicity, gender, and romance. In other words, such discourses strongly influenced the ways that subjects viewed themselves and others, and the ways that they spoke and were spoken (or not spoken) about.



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During her stay in Manchuria between 1938 and 1946, Yokota published essays and short stories in journals based in both Japan and Manchuria.13 Undoubtedly, Yokota observed firsthand the realities of the Japanese colonization of Manchuria while living in Kuanchengzi, a suburb on the outskirts of Shinkyō (Xinjing), with her husband, the poet Sakai Tsuyashi. Such experience further complicated her awareness of gender and class inequality, issues to which she had been exposed through her previous involvement with NAPF (Nippona Artista Proleta Federacio), the Japanese Proletarian Writers League, and the early Shōwa period Japanese women’s literary arts journals, Nyonin geijutsu (Women and the Arts), Kagayaku (To Shine), and Fujin bungei (Ladies’ Literary Arts).14 “Love Letter” tells the story of a Manchu15 man’s unrequited feelings for a married Japanese woman. The story is constructed with an opening preface followed by the reproduction of two letters. The prefatory section begins with a first-person female narrator discussing her yearning for mail, which has recently been satisfied by two letters she had received from a young Manchu man, Wang. The female narrator explains that she became acquainted with Wang at a mutual friend’s party, and that he occasionally paid her visits where they would discuss literature and world events. Following an explanation of their acquaintance, she recounts her last meeting with him, on a snowy evening when he divulged his romantic predicament. Wang told her that he was infatuated with a married Japanese woman but, tormented by the ethnic and marital barriers, was unable to confess his feelings. Upon hearing Wang’s dilemma, the narrator declared that love should transcend national boundaries, but then noted to herself, “As soon as I said it, I felt somewhat ashamed at my simplistic feelings. . . .”16 Wang ignored her comments and said he had written a love letter but has decided to destroy it in order to hide his shame. He eventually returned home, never to be seen again by the narrator. The love letter, however, does materialize, as Wang has forwarded it along with another explanatory letter to the narrator; these are the two letters to which she refers at the beginning of the story. At this point, by way of introduction to the two letters, the female narrator emphasizes how, despite “ethnic” differences (minzokutekina s ōi), she understands Wang’s sadness and can empathize with him.17 Likewise, she acknowledges Wang’s impressive language skills, but edited the letters in certain places to make them “easier to read as Japanese” (nihonbun toshite yomiyasuiy ōni).18 The narrator reproduces Wang’s letters following her prefatory comments. The first letter is directed to this narrator, explaining Wang’s reasons for sending the





second piece of correspondence, a love letter, to her, and for returning to his rural hometown. The second letter is addressed to the object of Wang’s affections, who remains nameless in the letter. From the start, we see that communication is accomplished through a complex set of mediations. In this case, the mediation of individuals is particularly apparent, but, as we will see later, specific discourses of ethnic difference, romance, and gender also intervene in the relationships between characters by contributing to these initial acts of mediation. In the love letter, Wang describes his first encounter with this unnamed woman at an official dinner, where he viewed her garbed in a beautiful kimono, and was “paralyzed by her mysterious beauty.”19 The next day, he glimpses her on the local bus, and later has an opportunity to talk with her. Eventually, invited by her husband, who is Wang’s co-worker, Wang visits their home several times, and although they seldom speak, his silent longing grows stronger with each meeting. At the conclusion of the love letter, Wang discusses the final meeting with his beloved. He visits her home under the pretext of delivering a message to her husband, and stays a while to chat with her. After the usual polite exchanges, the topic of conversation shifts to traditional Chinese drama. Wang claims to enjoy watching plays but is not skilled in performance. The woman seizes this cue to beg him for a dramatic display. Despite his protestations, she, according to Wang’s letter, bullies him into fulfilling her request. Wang decides to act out a confession of love. He grips the edge of the table, bows his head, and in a slurred whisper says, “Madam, please save me.” She is surprised, but quickly recovers by laughing and complimenting him on his acting. Following this exchange, Wang rushes home in the dreary cold with tears streaming down his face. He closes the love letter with the following words: With this, the stupid act is over. I have decided in my heart to never see you again. To be honest, I felt humiliated by you. People say that humiliation goes hand in hand with romantic love and can be felt quite strongly. However, for me, it doesn’t matter. I will not apologize for being so pathetic. And yet, no matter how much humiliation I experienced, I cannot forget that “beauty” I sensed in you from the beginning. No matter if you or someone else laughs, I cannot forget.20

Letters and Language “Love Letter” ends with Wang’s severing the relationship, and leaves the effect of his decision to the imagination of the reader. This open-ended finale leads readers to consider the unusual circumstances



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of the narrative, including the mysterious identity of Wang’s beloved, and the relationship between the female narrator and Wang. My interpretation of the story follows cultural critic Kawamura Minato in assuming that the female narrator is the intended reader of both letters.21 Although the text does not explicitly identify her as the object of Wang’s affection, the vague resemblance of the friendship between Wang and the narrator, as described in the preface, and the interactions between Wang and his beloved in the love letter suggest this fact.22 However, unlike Kawamura, I believe that the female narrator reciprocates rather than plays with Wang’s feelings, as indicated by her excited response upon receiving his letter, and her quick defense of interethnic romance. At the beginning of the story, for example, upon picking up her mail and realizing she has received a letter from Wang, her heart stops and she thinks, “He’s done it” (yattana). Her reaction of surprise and delight indicates her affection toward Wang. Later in the preface, when Wang laments his feelings for a married Japanese woman, the narrator protests that love should transcend ethnic, marital, and social barriers. Her comments here indicate that social mores are secondary to affairs of the heart. And finally, before disclosing Wang’s letters, the narrator confesses that she understands Wang’s feelings, despite ethnic differences, and “knows his sadness” (Wang no kanashimi o watashi ga shiri).23 These three moments intimate that she has more than platonic feelings for Wang. Despite the mutual affection between Wang and the female narrator, several intervening factors, specifically discourses of colonial modernity and ethnic difference, ultimately engender miscommunication and inhibit their relationship. Yokota foregrounds the mediated nature of the exchanges between the narrator and Wang by integrating the epistolary form into the structure of the narrative. Literary correspondence, according to Janet Gurkin Altman, highlights the physical, temporal, and emotional expanses between letter writers and their addressees and fulfills a mediatory function through its bridging of such distances.24 In the case of “Love Letter,” Wang’s missives underscore gaps between Wang and the reader(s) of his letters and represent an attempt to mend the relationship between these characters. The epistolary form also emphasizes the mediated nature of the relationship between Wang and the narrator through the foregrounding of the dynamic roles of writers and readers in the production of textual meaning. Because letters represent, as Altman notes, a “halfway point” between presence and absence, and total and zero communication, they are dangerously flexible.25 While a writer





may strategically construct his or her text for a certain purpose, other factors, including the reader’s own disposition, can intervene in the intended meaning.26 Readers, both intended and unintended, create new significance for literary correspondence by their own interpretations and, consequently, participate in the reproduction of the text. In “Love Letter,” Yokota emphasizes the reader’s role in textual reproduction through her portrayal of the first reader, the female narrator, who transforms the significance of Wang’s letters by publicly exposing them to a broader audience. The existence of the text “Love Letter” itself is a “result” of the narrator’s revealing the letters in public. This disclosure influences the meaning of the letters by the mere act of placing them within a different context from that which was intended by their author Wang. More specifically, while the letters may have been originally created for the private consumption of a specific reader, their relocation into a public arena situates them under a broader and more obviously politicized gaze. Thus, by subjecting Wang’s letters to the eyes of unintended readers, the narrator also creates the possibility of further intervention and transformation by these additional readers. In fact, as a result of the transformation of these private missives into public documents, the relationship between Wang and the female narrator is explicitly placed under the politicized scrutiny of a colonial and Japanese gaze. Their respective identities as writer and recipient of a set of letters take on additional significance once their ethnicities, and consequently their different stakes in the Japanese colonial project, are revealed. Although the influence of colonial discourses of ethnicity and gender shape the significance of the letters, whether in the private or public sphere, the display of the text to a wider public audience in Manchuria (and later, Japan) further emphasizes colonial influence by taking the relationship from a private fantasy, seemingly immune to colonial hierarchies of power, to a public display, necessarily steeped in such discourse. Thus, by transforming the letters from a private correspondence into public documents, Yokota calls attention to the colonial context in which the texts were produced (and reproduced), and emphasizes the ways that discourses of ethnicity and gender mediate the interpretation of the text (and by extension the relationship between Wang and the female narrator). In light of the (re)location of this epistolary interaction into the colonial context, the narrator’s textual reproduction may be viewed as a reflection of colonial hierarchies. Because of her identity as a Japanese woman in colonial Manchuria, her public display of the letters may be interpreted as her accessing Japanese colonizer privilege



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to voice the concerns and feelings of a disempowered subject like Wang. Using her authority as a colonizer, she places the letters in this short story, a public venue that Wang, as a Manchu, could not have occupied. Alternatively, her recontextualizing the letter disrupts the narrative control that Wang attempts to wield, by appropriating, in effect, his narrative privilege. By sending the letters to her without a return address, Wang thwarted the possibility of a dialogue between the two and thereby ensured that he had the “final word” in the relationship. The narrator’s re-presentation of the letters in a public arena counters Wang’s authorial privilege by continuing the dialogue and usurping narrative control of the “conversation.” Either way, it is clear that her mediation of his letters is made possible by her status as a colonizing Japanese and her access to colonizer privilege. The narrator further undermines Wang’s narrative control by attaching a preface that influences future readers’ approach to these letters. The preface describes the relationship between Wang and the narrator, and the circumstances under which the letters were sent. By providing such information, she makes the text accessible to the public audience, something that Wang had not anticipated and thus had not attended to in his letters. However, because this background is written from the narrator’s perspective, it is inevitably biased and shaped to cast her in an advantageous light. For example, near the end of her narrative, she empathizes with Wang, declaring that she “knows his sadness” and that she believes he would not be angered by her public release of the letters.27 Her self-portrayal as sensitive to his dilemma and sympathetic to his feelings seemingly justifies her interventions in the text, and may also be interpreted as an attempt to gain the trust of the reader. Here, we see a distinct resemblance to the Japanese characters appearing in cinematic colonial romances—benevolent, well-meaning Japanese initially misunderstood by their Chinese counterparts. Yet, rather than following the example of the films and eventually lauding the narrator’s generous efforts, Yokota subtly undermines the trope of the benevolent Japanese as embodied in the narrator’s self-characterization as sensitive and reliable. The motives behind the narrator’s compassionate behavior toward Wang become questionable when she reveals her intervention in Wang’s narrative and confesses: I want to point out that he is skilled at Japanese and was able to write Japanese sentences. Furthermore, in order to make the Japanese easier to read, I fixed it here and there.28





Although she acknowledges Wang’s linguistic talents, she takes the liberty of fixing the Japanese used in his letters in order to make them “easier to read.” At first glance, the narrator seems considerate in her attempts to make Wang’s letter understandable to Japanese readers. Yet, if she herself can read and understand his writing, and believes he is “skilled at Japanese,” how much revision is actually necessary? Again, we must return to the specifics of the colonial context to consider the relationship between a Japanese reader and a Manchu writer. As already noted, the narrator’s behavior resembles that of “benevolent” Japanese who defended colonial intervention by claiming to help colonized subjects on the path toward modernity. She rationalizes her epistolary intervention by claiming to help make his letters readable as Japanese. Her statement also reflects the conceit of a colonizer who assumes that she can “translate” his letters into a format for readers unacquainted with the psyche of colonized subjects such as Wang. Like colonizers who intervene on the presumption that they understand what is good for colonized subjects, the narrator makes a similar assumption that she understands his intended meaning, and can thus accurately “translate” or “fix” his letters. To further understand the significance of the narrator’s revisions in “Love Letter,” it is necessary to reflect on the integral role language played in the Japanese colonial context. Through Japaneselanguage education in the gaichi (the colonies, literally outer territories), the colonial government attempted to undermine colonized subjects’ ties to their own ethnic and cultural heritage, and indoctrinate them into Japanese imperial ideology. Despite the lack of official assimilation policies in Manchuria, Japanese officials aimed at “acculturation,” familiarizing Chinese with Japanese language and cultural practices.29 Consequently, as Chinese students progressed through the Japanese-administered educational system in Manchuria, the number of classroom hours in Japanese gradually increased from 42 percent in the elementary years to 50 percent in higher preparatory schools.30 Textbooks in both Japanese- and Chinese-language classes contained chapters on such topics as the Japanese emperor, and modern lifestyles in Japan.31 Furthermore, although Chinese, Japanese, and Mongolian were designated as the three official languages of Manchuria, Japanese language received the most support from the Japanese-run administration and became the “common language” shared among the different ethnic groups in Manchuria.32 Such governmental support gave colonized subjects, particularly those who wanted to actively participate in the building of Manchukuo, strong incentive for learning Japanese. Yet, for Wang, learning Japanese was not a benign act of vocational training. 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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As Frantz Fanon has discussed in Black Skin, White Masks, language serves as a marker for a subject’s cultural affiliation. “To speak a language is to take on a world, a culture.”33 Wang’s attending a Japanese school and learning the Japanese language of his own volition ostensibly signifies he is a complicit colonized subject, on the path to becoming an exemplary “imperial subject.” By speaking Japanese, Wang positions himself closer in proximity to Japanese than Manchu or Chinese culture. In fact, not only has Wang studied Japanese, but he also works for the municipal government as an assistant to a Japanese official. Through his occupation, Wang literally supports the Japanese administration and directly participates in Japanese colonial efforts in Manchuria. Moreover, through his use of the Japanese language and his fraternizing with Japanese in his public life, Wang may be expressing a desire to be modern, and, perhaps by extension, to be Japanese. Wang’s situation is similar to that of the colonized subject described by Fanon, who wants to be like the colonizer as he “gains greater mastery of the cultural tool that language is.”34 However, for Wang, the achievement of cultural and linguistic fluency does not result in his recognitions as a modern subject. Instead, the narrator corrects his language, indirectly identifying him as a performer of Japanese culture, rather than a completely assimilated, and, thus, authentic and modern, subject. Fanon claims that “mastery of language affords remarkable power,” but notes that such power may be limited by the (colonizing) audience’s narrow conception of the (colonized) subject.35 In the case of Yokota’s story, the narrator’s preconceived notions of Wang’s Manchu identity diminish her perception of his linguistic abilities and prevent his achievement of equal status with her. Specifically, her contradictory behavior of praising and then revising his Japanese reflects certain assumptions about the abilities (or lack thereof) of certain ethnic groups: in this case, that only members of a specific ethnic group can speak the language fluently or naturally. Therefore, because of his ethnic identity as Manchu, no matter how “fluent” Wang’s Japanese may be, it will never be “natural” or assimilated enough. Linguistic fluency is portrayed as a natural talent rather than a culturally acquired skill. As a result, in the eyes of the narrator, Wang requires a native Japanese speaker, such as herself, to make his Japanese “perfect.” The narrator’s act of revision highlights the contradiction embedded within colonial discourses of modernity and ethnic difference, which colonized subjects faced daily. Colonial officials urged colonized subjects to assume Japanese practices and learn to speak Japanese as part of the modernization process. However, the explicit connection between modern status and Japanese culture inevitably 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono




excluded non-Japanese from achieving complete recognition as modern subjects equal to their Japanese counterparts. Despite intimations of harmony and collaboration, Japanese discussions of “ethnic harmony” (gozoku ky ōwa) nevertheless emphasized the “superiority of the Japanese race” and the responsibility of Japanese in Manchuria to guide the other races of Manchukuo.36 Equality was never a possibility because the transcendence of ethnic difference, defined as a “natural” and unchangeable category, could never be achieved. As a result, even if Wang is fluent in both the Japanese language and Japanese cultural practices, he can never become ethnically Japanese, and, as a result, his achievement of modern status is not, and can never be, complete. In fact, Wang’s fluency remains irrelevant to his position in colonial society, because no matter what level of Japanese he speaks, ethnic Japanese subjects, like the narrator, can choose to not understand him. Since Wang is not ethnically Japanese, his fluency in the Japanese language will never be “natural” or equal to that spoken by a native speaker. The narrator’s status as a colonizing Japanese gives her cultural authenticity and linguistic authority, which in turn allow her the privilege of miscomprehension. She can judge the intelligibility of his Japanese and choose to understand or misunderstand him. Moreover, her status as a native speaker grants her the authority to revise his words. After realizing Wang’s tenuous connection to the Japanese language and culture in the eyes of the narrator, one wonders not only what portion of the letters is actually written by Wang, but also how he identifies himself in relation to the Japanese language. In a discussion of African writers’ relationship to English, the language of former colonizers, Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe questions the ethical ramifications of the colonized using the colonizer’s language, but also suggests further possibilities for appropriation and co-optation of the culture of the colonizer.37 Specifically, Achebe suggests that African writers can use the language of the colonizer, molding it to their own needs, without submitting to colonial hierarchy. Yet, while Achebe’s comment identifies avenues of critique and resistance through language, it is important to note that he is addressing the situation of postcolonial writers. In the period following decolonization, the formerly colonized was and is able to freely choose a mode of communication without suffering the potentially violent repercussions involved in resisting the status quo during the years of colonialism. In a colonial context, however, if language represents the ideologies of the colonizing culture, can a colonized subject use the language of the



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Being “Japanese” and Making Modern Love in Manchuria When was it? I recall a particularly chilly evening in early autumn when I encountered your husband on the bus. It had been about ten days since we’d last seen each other. When I accompanied him home, you and I had just five minutes alone together. You said, “Wang, you are just like a Japanese. Please excuse me for saying so, but one wouldn’t think you were Manchu.” “Well, I don’t know whether that’s good or bad, but I acknowledge that I have feelings like a Japanese.” “Well, then. What do you think about things such as love? It seems that many Japanese and Manchu are marrying. What do you think of that?”38

The conversation above between Wang and his beloved calls into question the construction of ethnic difference in the Japanese colonial context. What makes one a Japanese or a Manchu? Is this identity related to biology or nationality? Is it related to fluency in a language or a subject’s conformity with expectations of “modernity?” During the late 1930s and early 1940s, popular media in the colonies emphasized a form of modernity ethnicized as particularly Japanese. The “continental trilogy” films, for example, portrayed the Japanese hero as the arbiter of modern cultural practices through his participation in the modernization of both Manchuria and its inhabitants. While the hero of “Song of the White Orchid” plays a direct role in modern nation-building through his occupation as an engineer for the South Manchurian Railway, a central pipeline for Japanese colonialism in Manchuria, his counterpart in “China Nights” attempts to help a Chinese woman overcome her hostility toward Japanese by familiarizing her with modern Japanese culture. Elsewhere, assimilationist discourse in Taiwan and Korea exhorted colonized subjects to assume Japanese practices in order to attain status equal to that of “modern” Japanese.39 The equation of the terms modern and Japanese justified colonial activity and helped maintain Japanese hegemony over colonized subjects. On the national and



colonizer to express rage, resistance, or even remorse? As a colonized subject, can Wang transcend the constraints of the colonizing language to transform that very language into his own? In order to adequately answer these questions, we must further explore the mediation of discourse of ethnicity through the trope of romance.


colonial levels, the condition of modernity was associated with the efforts of the Japanese colonial administration: industrialization, new technologies (i.e., South Manchurian Railway), urbanization (development of cities such as Shinkyō), and centralized government. For individuals, and for colonized subjects in particular, modern status required “modern” behaviors (defined by Japanese colonizers as the assumption of Japanese cultural practices), the successful performance of which would lead to equal treatment as Japanese. Although Yokota’s story does not explicitly connect modern status and Japanese culture, the narrator’s comment that Wang “seems Japanese” is informed by colonial discourses of modernity and ethnicity. On the one hand, her exclamation may be intended as a compliment to emphasize the level of comfort she feels with Wang. However, such familiarity is made possible by the fact that Wang has taken on Japanese language and culture on the path toward modernization. Consequently, we can read the woman’s comment as implicitly linking modern behavior with “Japaneseness.” Wang’s attempts at being modern are, in her eyes, attempts at “being Japanese.” Yet, while Wang’s behavior may “seem Japanese” to this Japanese woman, we may also question the definition of these labels. What does it mean to be “Japanese”? What does it mean to be “modern”? Are “modern” and “Japanese” necessarily the same thing? Although Wang may be striving to achieve “modern” status through working for the colonial government, socializing with Japanese, and achieving fluency in the Japanese language, the limitations of colonial discourse prevent the possibility of his being acknowledged as both “modern” and Manchu. Colonial discourses of ethnicity emphasized distinctions between Japanese and Manchu/Chinese through the categories of modern and unmodern. Such distinctions maintained colonial hierarchy by implicitly constructing these identities as mutually exclusive, with modern being inextricably Japanese and unmodern being nonJapanese, or, in Wang’s case, Manchu. Of course, the realities of colonial life differed from the strict distinctions of discourse and revealed an ambivalent division between these categories. However, despite realities contradicting the strict binary constructions of colonial identity, the limitations of colonial discourses of ethnicity and modernity prevented colonial subjects from articulating certain identities. As a result, when the woman attempts to commend Wang for his “modern” behavior, she can only compare him to a Japanese and acknowledge the incongruence of his actions with his Manchu background. This particular scene also suggests that the contradiction between colonial constructions of ethnic difference and modernity created a



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dilemma for both colonized and colonizing subjects. By immersing himself in the Japanese language and participating in the colonial administration, Wang clearly strives for a status equal to modern, and thus Japanese, subjects. Yet the dilemma is clear in his ambivalent response to her comment that one wouldn’t think he was Manchu, by saying he is not sure whether “seeming Japanese” is good or bad. Although Wang may be taking on Japanese language and culture, he is perhaps only expressing a desire for equal status, and not a desire to become Japanese. However, because of the frequent conflation of modern and Japanese within colonial discourse, Wang’s beloved and other colonial subjects, who are immersed in the limitations of those discourses, can only interpret Wang’s behavior as an attempt to become Japanese. Wang may desire the privileges of a “modern” Japanese man, including access to a Japanese woman such as his beloved, but he also questions the abandoning of his identity as Manchu, which complete assimilation would entail. The female narrator as well is caught in the contradictions of colonial discourse. While she attempts to recognize Wang’s “modern” qualities, she is at a loss for the precise words to describe him. On the one hand, Wang “seem(s) Japanese,” and yet both she and Wang know that he can never become ethnically Japanese. On the other hand, colonial ideology prohibits the possibility of a “modern Manchu” and, consequently, his beloved is forced to rely on ambiguous and imperfect phrasing to articulate her assessment of Wang. As previously discussed, language is a reflection of culture, in this case that of Japanese colonialism, and, as a result, the contradictions of colonial discourse are manifest in the insufficiencies of the Japanese language. In other words, because colonial discourse does not allow for the possibility of a modern Manchu, she is unable to describe Wang’s modern qualities without associating him with a “Japanese” identity. In general, the terms “modern” and “Japanese” were employed in colonial discourse to describe cultural practices, but, as Yokota shows, these terms were also applied to personal emotions. Wang’s declaration that he has “Japanese” feelings suggests his ability to feel “modern” emotions, namely, romantic love. Since the Meiji period, romantic desire served as a basis for modern relationships in Japanese literature, in contrast with feelings of filiality and duty supporting traditional ties, such as arranged marriages. While romantic love was based on the desires of the modern individual subject, filial “love” and duty followed the needs of the family or the larger community.40 In the colonial context, the ethnicization of tradition and modernity





transformed this binary division and recast filial love as a traditional—and in the case of Yokota’s story, Chinese—feeling and romantic love as a modern Japanese emotion.41 In light of these connections, Wang’s “Japanese feelings” refer to modern feelings of romantic love, presumably for the female narrator. Because language is inextricably linked to cultural context, even when it is used to express individual emotion, the articulation of the emotion becomes infused with ideological significance. Wang initially attempts to express his feelings of romantic love for his beloved in Japanese. However, because of the identification of romantic love as modern, and all things modern as Japanese, the emotion of romantic love inevitably becomes associated with Japanese status as well. Thus, the expression of his individual feelings is mediated through colonial discourse that links the “modern” with a Japanese identity. Furthermore, the fact that his individual feelings must be described as “Japanese” suggests the impossibility, at least in this discourse, of Wang as a Manchu possessing such passion. As a result, even his emotions are negated by colonial discourses of modernity and ethnic difference. Yokota’s identification of romantic love as modern accorded similar portrayals in film and literature. For example, the Man’ei-produced “continental trilogy” combined romance with Japanese colonialism by depicting romantic relations between Japanese men and Chinese women who transcended ethnic barriers to fulfill their “modern” feelings of love. Such representations disguised unequal relationships of power by glorifying romantic love, in the form of individual sentimentality and also colonial benevolence, as the ultimate fulfillment of individual, national, and colonial desires. The cinematic series implied that the harmonious unification of Asia and Japan would enable the colonies and colonial subjects to achieve the standard trappings of modernity: industrialization, centralized government, and romantic love.42 While the films portray romantic love as a privilege of modernity, Yokota’s story suggests that access to this privilege is not extended to all subjects of the Empire. Following Wang’s confession to “having feelings like a Japanese,” his beloved asks Wang his opinions about love and, in particular, about marriage between Japanese and Chinese. Before Wang can answer, the woman’s husband reenters the room and interrupts their conversation, saying that Wang should not be thinking about love, as he, as a Manchu youth, is responsible for the future of Manchuria.43 On the surface, this comment seems to represent a prioritizing of “serious” political matters over the frivolity of



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romance. However, by identifying Wang as a “promising youth with the future of Manchuria on his shoulders,” the husband also separates and privileges the needs of the larger national community over that of the individual subject.44 This scene emphasizes what Barbara Brooks calls the “rhetoric of inclusion,” the discourse that provisionally incorporated colonized subjects into the Japanese empire.45 According to this schema, colonized subjects gained access to certain “modern” privileges, but only when the outcome of such privileges was convenient or beneficial to the larger colonial project. In the case of “Love Letter,” although Wang may gain recognition for his contribution to the colonial government and the building of Manchuria, his access to “modern” privileges does not extend to the pursuit of his individual desires in the form of romantic love. While implicitly identifying romantic love as a modern privilege, the husband’s prohibition also reinforces the positions of both Wang and the husband in the colonial context. The husband assumes a “parental” role and infantilizes Wang by referring to him as a “youth” and advising him on his behavior. Such infantilization clearly evokes the tropes of the benevolent colonizer and the unenlightened colonized that are used to justify the colonial project in the aforementioned cinematic “continental trilogy.” Even though Wang may be on the path of modernization, he has not reached full maturation and thus needs the guidance of a fully modern Japanese, in this case the narrator’s husband. Of course, the husband’s asserting his privilege as a modern Japanese male may reflect his own insecurities about his identity, and is probably a jealous response to discovering his wife in an intimate silence with Wang. However, Wang’s immersion in colonial categories of identity prevents Wang from recognizing that he can pose a threat to his beloved’s spouse. As a result, this possibility is not made available to readers because the incident is depicted through Wang’s perspective in his love letter. Instead, the husband’s comment puts Wang “in his place,” emphasizing the incompleteness of Wang’s modernization and his inferiority to Japanese. Furthermore, by prioritizing Wang’s responsibilities to the developing nation of Manchuria over his own desires, the husband thus implies that romantic love is not a right for all, but rather is a luxury reserved for fully modern, in other words, Japanese, subjects. Love, however, comes in many forms, only some of which, as Yokota shows, are considered modern. While romantic love may be reserved for modern Japanese subjects, other “traditional” forms of love were attributed to colonized subjects. As described in Wang’s love letter, during his final meeting with his beloved, Wang performed,





at her behest, a scene of traditional Chinese drama. Announcing that he would enact a confession of love, he prostrated himself before her and whispered, “Madame, save me.”46 After her initial shock, she laughed and said, “So, that’s how a gesture of love is performed in Chinese drama. It’s as if you’re begging (for something). Wang, if you became an actor in tragedies, you would probably succeed.”47 This particular scene also calls to mind a trope of performance in classical Japanese literature, whereby the performer, usually female, recites a poem or sings for a male audience. Oftentimes the woman expresses her “true feelings” through her performance. The gender reversal in Yokota’s work incorporates ethnicity, and transforms this trope, resulting in the feminized (but male) colonial Other, Wang, performing for a Japanese (female) colonizer audience. In his letter, Wang says that he felt humiliated after his act and took his final farewell. His dramatic presentation is particularly ironic in that while the narrator says he should be a tragic actor, in fact, he has been in the midst of staging a romantic tragedy through all of his interactions with her. As a result of her response, Wang realizes how she perceives him and how he has been perpetrating a type of performance through his “modern” behavior.48 While she had previously noted that he was “just like a Japanese,” in fact, she views him as essentially Chinese, or as cultural Other, who can perform a Japanese identity yet never be Japanese, and who can enact romantic love but can never truly love. She forces him into the role of cultural performer, who does not (and cannot) assume a Japanese identity, rather than an assimilated modern (and ultimately Japanese) subject. The narrator’s interpretation of Wang’s performance is mediated by the binary divisions of colonial discourse. In light of colonial pairings of traditional and modern, and Chinese and Japanese, Wang’s plea for help represents, in the eyes of his beloved, a traditional Chinese gesture of love. On the other hand, modern Japanese love appears as the benevolent love expressed by Japanese colonizers, such as her revisions of Wang’s linguistic errors. The complementary construction of Chinese and Japanese forms of love conveniently fits the schematic of colonizer-colonized relations, and, consequently, seemingly innocent sentiments of love become imbued with political significance.49 Colonized and colonizing subjects were often trapped in the categories of identity constructed by colonial discourse, and, consequently, certain behaviors represented specific reflections of a subject’s ethnic identity. While Wang may be taking advantage of an opportunity to confess his feelings and asking her to save him from his unrequited feelings of love, the female narrator merely views his



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dramatic performance as another articulation of his Manchu/Chinese identity. Furthermore, because of the impossibility of being a modern Manchu, she perceived his everyday “modern” behavior and his interactions with her as a performance.50 Clearly, the limitations of colonial discourse mediate the interactions between this woman and Wang, transforming them into performances rather than unmediated “authentic” interactions of love. Yokota’s use of performance is hardly unique. The trope of performance frequently appears in colonial literature as an indication of the contradictions of colonial discourses on ethnicity and assimilation policy. Colonial writers such as Imamura Eiji (Manchuria) and Yuzurihara Masako (Karafuto) revealed the performativity of ethnicity, and thus indicate the fissures in ethnic discourse of the time.51 Imamura’s short story “Dōkōsha” (Companions, 1939), on the other hand, depicts a Korean man posing as a Chinese, and a Japanese man posing as a Korean. Yuzurihara’s short story “Chōsen yaki” (Korean yaki, 1949) portrays a Korean man posing as Japanese in order to conceal his work as a spy for the anti-Japanese resistance movement. In each story, similar to the “white masks” worn by colonized subjects in Frantz Fanon’s work, ethnicity becomes a role to be performed, rather than an inherent characteristic. By portraying ethnic identity as a guise, a series of disposable costumes, colonial writers defamiliarized notions of ethnicity as fixed and biologically defined. Many colonial writers, Japanese and colonized alike, used the performance of ethnicity to highlight the possibility of resistance by colonized peoples “passing” as Japanese.52 By “passing” here, I am referring to the fact that many colonized subjects attained a level of “Japaneseness” through language proficiency and “modern” Japanese clothing. Masquerading as Japanese facilitated access to privileges and resources reserved for the colonizing Japanese and transformed interpersonal relations. Being viewed as Japanese, colonized subjects could interact with Japanese on equal footing and avoid the potential discrimination faced by non-Japanese. Such a façade, in fact, was a concern of some Japanese colonial officials, who protested the segment of assimilation policy that required colonized subjects to assume Japanese names. These officials complained that such a practice would make it difficult to distinguish between “real Japanese” and colonized subjects.53 Nevertheless, despite the increased access to colonizing privileges, colonized subjects did not always succeed, and frequently experienced identity crises. In the previous discussion, we addressed how both writers and readers participate in the production of a text. While





writers may have crafted their work to convey a specific meaning, readers ultimately have the power to create their own, oftentimes different, interpretations. Similarly, in the case of “passing,” subjects perform a specific identity, the success of which hinges not on the skill of an actor but, rather, on the audience. Such viewers participated in the process of making meaning, rather than just blithely accepting the intended performance of the performer. Wang, for example, does not pass as Japanese, because his audience, both his beloved and her husband, know his ethnic background and subscribe to conventional assumptions about that identity. Instead, they interpret his “modern” behavior as a performance of a desired Japanese identity. Although Wang may have intended his confession to reflect his feelings of love, in fact the object of his affections views his performance differently and transforms the significance of the act. This woman does not (and perhaps cannot) ignore Wang’s ethnic and cultural identity as non-Japanese, which according to colonial discourse cut off Wang’s access to modern status and privileges, including modern romance with a Japanese woman. She reads Wang’s performance not as that of a man genuinely confessing his love to a woman, but rather as that of a Manchu man performing a gesture of love.54 As a result, Wang’s attempts to communicate his feelings are dashed by colonial discourses on ethnicity. Thus, the interactions between this Japanese woman and Wang underscore the ways in which constructions of ethnicity mediated and limited the possibilities of colonial relations.

The Limitations of Gender in Colonial Manchuria While much colonial scholarship focuses on the prevalence of discourses of ethnicity in mediating the interactions of colonized and colonizing subjects, categories of gender further complicate colonial interaction. Through the reversal of the romantic paradigm of a male colonizer and female colonized subject, Yokota draws readers’ attention to the intersections of ethnicity, gender, and power in the colonial context. Despite the female narrator’s status as a woman, because she is Japanese she receives colonizer privileges (i.e., the opportunity to revise and publish Wang’s letters). In many instances throughout the colonies, Japanese women benefited from their status as colonizers. Several modern Japanese women writers, including Hayashi Fumiko, Yoshiya Nobuko, and Amino Kiku depicted Manchuria and other colonial territories as sites outside of the moral and social restrictions



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of the Japanese archipelago, identifying the gaichi as a place of liberation for Japanese women and an escape from the responsibilities of daily life in Japan.55 Yet, despite certain privileges as Japanese colonizers, the behavior of many Japanese women was restricted by discourses of femininity. The reality of patriarchal colonial governments and male-dominated communities in the colonies perpetuated unequal gender hierarchies, rendering these utopic visions a mere fantasy. Consequently, as a colonizing woman, the narrator’s privileges are limited in comparison to those of her male counterparts, on both a discursive and a material level. Constructs of gender also limited the ways that women participated in the colonial project and interacted in the public sphere. For example, married Japanese women in the colonies, such as Wang’s love interest, were subject to close scrutiny as the potential reproducers and caretakers of future national subjects.56 Conventional expectations of her role as Japanese and as a Japanese woman limited her behavior, and inhibited the expression of her feelings for Wang. As a bourgeois Japanese woman, the narrator was expected to keep her interactions within socially acceptable circles, and in some respects her meetings with Wang did follow social etiquette. Since he worked for the colonial government along with her husband, Wang’s meetings with his beloved were justifiable. Yet, through subtle suggestions in the preface, it is clear that her feelings for Wang amount to a social transgression. In spite of her affection, the narrator must not reveal her feelings for Wang so as to maintain her status in colonial society. She has access to certain privileges through her status as the wife of an employee of the colonial administration. If she were to separate from her husband, those privileges would be nullified and her status in colonial Manchuria, as well as in Japan, would disappear. Similarly, if Wang, or, on a larger allegorical level, Manchuria or any other colonial territory, were to separate from Japan, he (or they) would lose access to certain modern privileges. Without his performance of Japanese loyalty through “assimilated” behavior, Wang cannot have access to a Japanese woman and the other privileges he gains through such behavior. In this way, both Wang and the narrator, despite their positions as colonized and colonizer, are in fact both located in positions of interdependence in the colonial hierarchy, one based on ethnicity and the other based on gender. By identifying both female colonizers and colonized subjects as dependent on different forms of colonial hegemony, I am not equating their positions in the colonial hierarchy. I am here suggesting that





constructions of gender and ethnicity complicate the dualism of colonizer and colonized. Accordingly, it is imperative to acknowledge the ways in which many Japanese women participated in, and oftentimes vigorously supported, the colonial project as wives, educators, feminist activists, and so on. 57 Japanese had privilege and power through their colonizer status, and many reveled in that status. For Japanese women, however, these privileges were limited to specific spheres, such as the home, and were oftentimes earned through subscription to conventional notions of women’s roles as wives and mothers.

Scattered Colonial Hegemonies Yokota’s depiction of Wang and his beloved shows that different hegemonies shifted subjects’ access to power and complicated the categories of colonizer and colonized that some scholarship on colonialism has assumed. Relying on a binarism of colonizer and colonized to explain power dynamics in a colonial context does not take into consideration shifting centers of power, referred to by Inderpal Grewal and Caren Kaplan as “scattered hegemonies,” and results in an overly simplistic mapping of colonial interaction.58 Complicating the categories of colonizer and colonized enables the recognition of the agency and subjectivity of all individuals immersed in the colonial project. In acknowledging this agency, we are able to see the ways in which subjects, colonizer and colonized alike, simultaneously resisted and advanced the colonial project. In a colonial context, Japanese women, like the narrator, hold authority as colonizers in relation to colonized subjects, but, as women, they are deemed unequal to their male counterparts. The female narrator can reveal Wang’s “inappropriate” feelings but cannot voice her own reaction to those feelings, which might endanger her status in colonial society. She utilizes her privilege as a Japanese colonizer to present Wang’s letters in a public forum. Yet, she must work to conceal her own emotions to fulfill her role as a wife in colonizing Japanese circles. Thus, while the narrator’s authority as a Japanese colonizing subject may be exercised in relation to colonized subjects, her inferior status as a woman in patriarchal colonial society ultimately limits the extent of her colonial privilege. The notion of “scattered hegemonies” also complicates Wang’s access to certain privileges as well. Although many colonized subjects did not have formal access to political and social influence in the colonies, some did have informal leverage in certain contexts. For example, colonized men may have been subjugated to colonial authority,



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but they may still have assumed male privilege in interactions with women, both colonizing and colonized. Wang, for example, creates a fantasy in which he holds the reins of what might be assessed as a masculine form of privilege and power. In his love letter, Wang recounts several times when he gazed at his beloved from afar. His descriptions construct a specific image of a silent, cold, unattainable beauty.59 The first time I met you, I was very surprised, because the center of my heart was wide open. Why was I surprised? It was because I had unexpectedly discovered something so beautiful. Of course, your clothing was beautiful, and your appearance was much more attractive than anyone else at the party. Yet, it wasn’t just those elements. Your mysterious beauty was hidden somewhere.60

Using the power of the male gaze, Wang objectifies his beloved, and exercises his agency and masculine privilege within the limits of his fantasy. Enacting this objectification through his personal fantasy, Wang is able to avoid barriers that might otherwise prevent his accessing a position of power. Within his fantasy, his Manchu origins become inconsequential, while his masculinity enables him to assume a position of power—however fantastical—over this Japanese woman. Wang’s assumption of masculine privileges reiterates the way in which subjects’ relations to power shift in specific contexts. Although power in a fantasy realm does not have a direct impact on access to power in the “real” world, it allows for the recognition, if not enactment, of impulses that would be otherwise impossible. Within the limits of his fantasy, Wang can imagine asserting his masculinity in ways that he could not in “reality.” Through the realization of otherwise prohibited emotions and actions, he can taste the privileges of power and imagine and experience, in a limited sense, an alternative to the colonial hegemonies that render him powerless. As a space for constructing alternatives to reality, fantasies allow for the “safe” development of alternatives to the status quo. Within the personal fantasy expressed in his narrative, Wang can articulate his power without the potentially negative repercussions that he might experience in the public sphere. Wang is a narrator who is distinctly aware of both his audience, a Japanese woman, and the image he is presenting to her. He possesses specific goals in conveying to his beloved his feelings and his perspective on their interactions. By allowing the female narrator to view the act of his gaze, he asserts and makes her aware of his masculine





privilege. Although she may not have acknowledged him as a man in their interactions in the past, he makes sure to clearly articulate this declaration of his masculinity. Yet, he is also very aware of the limits of his desire. In the opening of his letter, he mentions that he felt intimacy when gazing at her “with his eyes and his heart,” but felt sad and estranged when they were in close proximity. He can fantasize about this Japanese woman, but, in reality, or when face-to-face, such intimacy is impossible. While cinematic fantasies of the “continental trilogy” portrayed colonial interactions as romantic adventures, actual relations often reflected power imbalance and alienation. Similarly, the reality behind Wang’s fantasies of romance had the same results: rejection and humiliation. Instead of reading Wang’s letters transparently, we can view his self-characterization as a deliberate performance. On the one hand, Wang’s assuming the role of dejected and tragic suitor may be interpreted as an attempt to receive the attention and praise of his beloved once again. However, we may also ask whether his self-portrayal as a tragic figure is a mere act. The deliberate mediation of the love letter by his prefatory direct letter and the pretense of an anonymous love object suggest that his love letter is not a transparent confession of his feelings for the narrator. Following his performance of a confession of love, his beloved compliments him, saying that he should become a tragic actor. He takes her suggestion one step further by not only embracing this role of the tragic male but also by exploiting it to present his side of the story. In his letter, Wang deliberately portrays himself as a lovelorn victim of a cold, insensitive Japanese beauty who does not acknowledge his feelings. In doing so, he embraces a Chinese identity that is only viable through the path of victimhood, and exploits colonial discourse by relying on the conventional depiction of Chinese and Manchu. He describes how he trudged home in the snow and how he has decided to leave Kuanchengzi and return to his family in the countryside. The trope of the tragic Manchu or Chinese returning to his hometown, dejected and tired of trying to survive in the modern city, appears throughout colonial literature in such works as Imamura’s aforementioned “Companions.”61 Just as Wang initially “takes on” Japanese culture, he also “takes on” the role of a tragic Manchu, and in doing so he reemphasizes the performativity of ethnicity. In other words, he accentuates the constructed nature of ethnicity by enacting a Chinese identity as defined by Japanese colonizers. Colonial officials may have been concerned about the “passing” of colonized subjects as Japanese, but perhaps a more pressing concern may have been the performances of Otherness



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clouded by narrow colonial concepts of ethnicity. Many colonized subjects may have worked with certain stereotypes of colonial subjects for their own personal gain. In performing a Chinese identity, Wang exhibits true fluency in Japanese. Fluency in a language does not only entail the acquisition of grammar and vocabulary, but rather necessitates adeptness with the culture and the ideologies embedded in the language. Instead of attempting to “translate” his feelings with the dramatic performance, Wang realizes that he must work within the ideological constructs of colonial language and culture. His initial attempt at communicating with his beloved through his dramatic performance fails because she identifies it as a performance. However, this moment reveals to him the harsh fact that she will always see him as a Chinese subject. Thus, in order to communicate with this Japanese woman, he must view the situation and himself from the eyes of a colonizer: as a colonized Manchu/Chinese subject. He appropriates the image of the “tragic Chinese” and consequently enables the expression of his frustration with his beloved and, indirectly, the colonial enterprise. In other words, by actively choosing this position of “tragic Chinese,” Wang reappropriates this role and indirectly rejects both this woman and the colonial enterprise by retreating away from the colonial center to the marginal location of his hometown. Although Yokota’s narrative does not challenge the entire colonial project (which after all she participates in and benefits from), “Love Letter” does examine the construction and mediation of identities in the colonial space. Specifically, the text shows how colonial discourses on ethnicity and gender mediate and limit the ways in which both Wang and the narrator perceive themselves and each other, despite attempts to use their fluency in colonial ideologies to their own advantage. Wang attempts to create a fantasy where he can articulate his desires and assert his agency without the intervention of colonial discourses of ethnicity. However, the problem with fantasy is that it is not always feasible outside of its own realm, despite the fact that it enables Wang to imagine possibilities “outside of the box,” engendering resistance, change, and, sometimes, revolution.

Conclusion Unlike the films of the continental trilogy that end in the union (whether in life or death) of Japanese and colonized subjects, “Love Letter” leaves readers with a strong sense of alienation and dislocation. As mentioned earlier, each of the films concludes with the





overcoming of anti-Japanese sentiment, and the Chinese heroine’s grateful acknowledgement of Japanese goodwill. In contrast, the finale of “Love Letter” leaves Yokota’s unrequited lovers physically and emotionally distanced from each other and disillusioned with the empty promises of empire. Yokota’s narrative does not bode well for the “ethnic harmony” of colonial union. Yokota underscores the limitations of colonial discourse and the challenges facing subjects attempting to transcend such limitations. In “Love Letter,” Wang corresponds with the female narrator in Japanese. Despite potential mediation on the part of this woman, ultimately readers come to understand the remorse that Wang feels in attempting to “take on” Japanese culture. Using the constructs embedded in colonial ideology, Wang is able to show his fluency in Japanese and reveal the contradictions of discourses of ethnicity and modernity. Yet, he also realizes that in gaining “true” fluency he is forever limited to the possibilities doled out by such discourses. Wang can use the language for his own purposes, but without the recognition of others like his beloved, his words are rendered meaningless. Despite the limitations of colonial discourse, Wang expresses his resistance and makes an implicit critique of colonial propaganda through his return to his rural hometown. While Wang’s move away from the modern urban center could be viewed as an inability to survive in modern colonial society, it is important to acknowledge that Wang actively chooses to relocate. Instead of submitting to the restrictions of colonial discourse, Wang elects to write his own ending through his departure; this final act also emphasizes the failure of colonial efforts at “ethnic harmony,” suggesting that, despite claims of inclusion and harmonious relations, not all subjects were treated equally in the colonial context. Rather than pointing out Wang’s failure as an individual subject, Yokota’s narrative reveals the colonial project’s failure to meet the needs of its subjects. Wang’s response does not remedy such failings, but it does represent one approach to circumventing the limitations of the colonial context—complete withdrawal. Through “Love Letter,” Yokota has drawn readers’ attention to the contradictions and limitations of discourses of ethnicity, gender, and modernity in the colonial context. The conclusion of a narrative of Japanese colonialism, she suggests, lies not with the “happy ending” of the cinematic colonial romances, but rather through struggle and negotiation, through dialogue between readers and writers, colonizing and colonized subjects alike. By not specifying a future course of



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action, Yokota thus provokes readers to contemplate their own implication within the production of a narrative of colonial relations. In other words, Yokota calls for readers to produce their own response to the “love letters,” to struggle to write a conclusion to the narrative of Japanese colonialism, and to contemplate the very possibility of harmonious colonial union.





( R e)w r i t i ng C ol on i a l L i n e age i n S a k aguc h i R e i ko’s “Pa ssion f l ow e r”

W

hat are the possibilities and limitations of literary expression in the colonial context? Recent discussions of Japanese colonial literary production focus on the linguistic and political constraints of literary expression for colonized writers.1 Addressing the challenges of censorship and writing in Japanese, scholars in Japan and the United States have explored the different ways that colonized writers negotiated their way through the various political and literary lineages of Japanese empire. While such research is vital to the conceptualization of colonial subjectivity, it is also important to consider the ways in which the restriction of colonial discourse affected colonizing Japanese writers. The fact that ethnically Japanese subjects received numerous privileges from their colonizer status does not mean that they were unaffected by the limitations of colonial discourse. Thus, in exploring colonial literary production, we must consider the following questions about the effects of the forces of empire on the development and expression of colonial identity. Is it possible for a colonizing subject to effectively critique the colonial enterprise that facilitates her writing? How efficacious would such a critique be in light of the writer’s environment? Can a subject, colonized or colonizing, escape the constraints of the colonial context? Focusing on Japanese colonialism in Taiwan, I address these questions through an examination of “Tokeisō” (Passionflower), a novella written in Taiwan in 1943 by Japanese writer Sakaguchi Reiko.2 In 1942, Taiwanese writer Yang Kui praised Sakaguchi for departing from the exotifying tendencies of her Japanese contemporaries, and depicting the lives of colonial residents with vivid “realism.”3 Such an evaluation does not merely represent an assessment of Sakaguchi’s artistry, but also reflects her literary affiliations in colonial Taiwan. Unlike many of her Japanese cohorts, Sakaguchi worked



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mainly with Han Chinese4 writers and intellectuals for the Japaneselanguage literary journal Taiwan bungaku (Taiwanese Literature) while living in Taiwan between 1938 and 1946.5 The organizers of Taiwan bungaku, Zhang Wenhuan, Lü Heruo, and Nakayama Susumu, vigorously supported the development of a Taiwanese literary tradition that accurately rendered the realities of life in colonial Taiwan.6 Another core member, Huang Deshi, explained that the journal was established in order to “improve Taiwanese culture in general and support new writers,” in contrast with the predominantly Japanese-supported literary journal Bungei Taiwan, which was created as a “pastime” for the writers involved.7 Sakaguchi’s association with this “nationalist” literary coterie emphasizes her unique position in the colonial Taiwanese literary milieu, while it complicates her critique of Japanese colonialism in Taiwan.8 Sakaguchi’s wartime writings portray the ideological and emotional challenges facing a diverse array of subjects in colonial Taiwan. For example, her short story, “Shunjū” (Spring and Autumn, 1941), describes the ways in which a Japanese settler family in Taiwan negotiated their relationships to Japan and their colonial residence.9 In addition to writing on Japanese settler life, Sakaguchi also addressed the challenges experienced by colonized subjects. In her short story “Tei ikka” (The Zheng Family, 1941), she depicts multiple generations of a Taiwanese family and their conflicting attitudes of critique and support for Japanese assimilationist policy.10 Similar to these works, Sakaguchi’s novella “Passionflower,” the focus of this chapter, centers on the identity struggles of a colonial subject, a young man of Japanese and Aborigine descent.11 In addition to the unique exploration of biracial identity in the colonial context, this work further stands out in Sakaguchi’s oeuvre for its controversial history. Notably, it was the first text by a Japanese writer in Taiwan to refer to the Musha jiken (Musha, or Wushe in Chinese, Incident), an Aborigine uprising of 1930 where 134 Japanese and two Han Chinese were killed by members of the Atayal tribe.12 Perhaps more important, however, “Passionflower” was first published in the February 1942 issue of Taiwan bungaku with forty-six pages excised; only the first and final pages made it past the government censors. Although the reasons for censorship have not been disclosed, Sakaguchi’s novella presumably trod on controversial ground, particularly in its commentary on the Musha Incident and the colonial assimilation policies imposed on Aborigines.13 Another version, totaling seventy-one pages, was published under the same title in Sakaguchi’s short story collection Tei ikka (The Zheng



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Family) in September 1943.14 Despite supposedly passing the strict gaze of censors (Sakaguchi reported that following the censored first version of “Passionflower,” she had been identified as a “war resister,” and scrutiny of her work was strict),15 the 1943 version critiques numerous aspects of the colonial project in Taiwan, from individual discrimination against the Aborigines to tourism and cultural commodification, and provides an innovative view of colonial subjectivities. Japanese literary scholar Tarumi Chie has attempted to reconstruct the original version of “Passionflower” through interviews with the author, and by examining the two extant texts, and a third story, “Musha” published in Shinch ō in 1953.16 My investigation focuses solely on the 1943 version and does not consider the issue of censorship in depth.17 Instead, I demonstrate how Sakaguchi articulates new lineages through the reformulation of popular tropes utilized in colonial literature, including nature, culture, family, and marriage. This chapter’s focus on lineage takes its cue from the JapaneseAborigine protagonist’s negotiation with his familial origins. The protagonist Jun is forced to choose between his Japanese and Aborigine heritages—a choice manifest in his decision whether to marry a Japanese woman, Kinko. While his biracial heritage leaves him in a position of ambivalence (in both senses of the word), his arranged marriage provides an opportunity for him to proactively choose one of his lineages and assert a place for himself within the Japanese empire. Besides the personal significance of his choice, Jun’s dilemma also possesses political ramifications. Marrying Kinko literally represents a sustained affiliation with a Japanese lineage as well as symbolically embodies the continuation of colonial union and the production of what might be identified as a uniquely colonial lineage. By exploring Jun’s negotiation with his “native,” “Japanese,” and colonial lineages, this chapter discusses the ways Sakaguchi attempts to articulate multiple colonial subjectivities within the confines of the colonial context. In addition to this usage of the term lineage in the context of familial and political affiliation, this chapter also employs the notion of lineage in the context of literary affiliation. Through the use of particular literary strategies, Sakaguchi locates her own writing within the Taiwan bungaku literary lineage. By reconfiguring popular colonial literary tropes, Sakaguchi contends with the legacy of her predecessors—in this case, other Japanese writing about Taiwan. These intertextual gestures simultaneously acknowledge the presence of such writers as well as implicitly affiliate Sakaguchi with another literary lineage populated by Taiwanese writers and critics. Similar to



( R e)w r i t i ng C ol on i a l L i n e ag e


the political resonance of Jun’s negotiation of familial lineage, Sakaguchi’s chosen literary lineage also suggests a specific political stance on Japanese colonialism in Taiwan. With these notions of lineage in mind, this chapter first explores the possibilities and limitations of expressing colonial subjectivity in colonial Taiwan. The next section provides historical background on the indigenous peoples of Taiwan and their relations with Japanese during the colonial period. Discussion of the political and cultural resonance of the Musha Incident and the colonial policies imposed on Aborigines will contextualize a reading of “Passionflower,” in light of Sakaguchi’s references to these two historical centerpieces of JapaneseAborigine relations during the first half of the twentieth century.

Managing the Natives During the colonial period, Japanese anthropologists variously referred to the indigenous peoples of Taiwan as the “high mountain tribes” (Kōzan-zoku), the Takasago tribe (Takasago-zoku), or savages (banjin).18 Numerous scholars from Japan, Taiwan, and the United States have identified, at varying times, between seven and eighteen different tribes, each with a distinct language and custom.19 According to such scholars, Aborigines were distinguished from Han Chinese, who began moving to Taiwan in the seventeenth century, by ethnicity, cultural practices (religion, facial and body tattooing and piercing), language, and subsistence activities such as hunting and fishing. Friction between these two groups arose after initial Han Chinese attempts to subdue the indigenous peoples during the seventeenth century. While some Aborigines eventually assimilated Chinese cultural practices, others resisted. Han Chinese referred to the assimilated indigenous peoples as “ripened” or civilized Aborigines (shu fan) and the “primitive” as “raw” or uncivilized Aborigines (sheng fan). These divisions and terms were later translated and used by Japanese anthropologists, respectively, “ripened” or civilized Aborigines (jukuban) and “raw” or uncivilized Aborigines (seiban), in the early years of Japanese colonial rule.20 Although Taiwan was ceded to Japan in 1895 after the SinoJapanese war, Japan did not address relations between Japanese and Aborigines until several years later. In 1903, colonial officials first organized special police forces to protect Han Chinese and settler Japanese from “hostile” tribes.21 Seven years later, in 1910, GovernorGeneral Sakuma Samata (1906–1915) established the riban jigy ō, literally, a project for management or control of “savages,” a five-year



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plan to confine and control the agricultural and economic activities of Aborigines. Under this plan, also referred to as the riban seisaku, indigenous peoples were forcibly relocated to “protected areas” (ch ūzaijo) in the mountains.22 Such policies addressed the areas of education, agriculture, commerce, and development. 23 Japanese police (junsa) were assigned to such areas to enforce these policies through multiple roles as guards, educators, administrators, and even providers of health care.24 Despite the fact that colonial officials heralded the success of the riban policies, Aborigine resistance continued throughout the 1910s and 1920s.25 The Musha Incident, one of the main reference points for Sakaguchi’s “Passionflower,” served as a crucial turning point in the Japanese perception of Aborigines, and vice versa. On October 27, 1930, at an elementary school sports day in the Musha area of Taichung, over three hundred members of the Atayal tribe, led by Maebo village chief Mona Rudao, attacked and killed 134 Japanese and two Han Chinese.26 Although there had been numerous other Aborigine uprisings, including the Saramao uprising of 1920, which resulted in the deaths of seven Japanese, none reached the magnitude of the Musha Incident. In fact, the controversial nature of this event was exacerbated by the fact that the Musha area residents’ assimilated living conditions and high rates of literacy had been touted by the colonial administration as the successful results of the policies for “managing the natives.” Furthermore, two Aborigine men, Dakkis Nobin (Japanese name Hanaoka Ichirō) and Dakkis Nawi (Hanaoka Jirō), who had been primed as examples of successful assimilation in their roles as colonial police, participated in the uprising.27 The violence of the Atayal in Musha flouted assumptions about cultural integration and civilization and suggested the failure of colonial policies and programs. The uprising also indicated that colonial forces had not sufficiently “managed the natives” and consequently questioned the control that Japanese forces allegedly exerted over the Aborigines. Thus, not only did the uprising invalidate Japanese perceptions of the tribes as completely assimilated, it also challenged the civilizing techniques the Japanese had deployed. Japanese officials had viewed their five-year plan of “managing of the natives” as a complete success, but, in fact, anti-Japanese resistance had persisted throughout the period, specifically in response to enforced labor in the construction of colonial facilities (dormitories, schools), poor working conditions, and other abuses of the Aborigines, particularly women, by Japanese colonizers.28 In light of such resistance, the notion of Japanese control was revealed to be a figment of the Japanese colonial imagination.





In the days following the uprising, the colonial government mobilized over 4000 troops against the “rebel” Aborigines.29 Using modern weapons—airplanes, incendiary bombs, and poison gas—troops pursued the “rebels” and their families over a two-month period. As a result of the violent Japanese response to the uprising, approximately 650 Aborigines died; some, like the aforementioned Dakkis Nobin and Dakkis Nawi, committed suicide, while others were killed by the incendiary bombs and poisonous gas of the Japanese military forces. The colonial government’s response to the uprising reasserted Japanese authority at a high price to Aborigines. The Atayal tribe suffered the loss of their compatriots, while tribes in the uplands once again faced the imposition of a revised set of policies created in the wake of the Musha Incident.30 Following the Musha Incident, the “policies for managing the Aborigines” were deemed an “utter failure.” Harsh criticism was also directed at the police forces responsible for the enforcement of such policies.31 In response to these critiques, and in order to maintain the colonial hierarchy, prevent future uprisings, and recuperate the colonial project, officials shifted their attitude toward the Aborigines from military maintenance to education and assimilation.32 Consequently, after the Musha Incident, Aborigines, along with Taiwanese, were pressured to participate in the k ōminka (becoming Japanese imperial subjects) movement. Kōminka, introduced in Taiwan by Governor-General Kobayashi Seizō (1936–1940) in 1936, entailed mandatory Japanese-language education, the promotion of “voluntary” military conscription, Shinto religious practice, and the acquisition of a Japanese name.33 In 1937, Japanese officials adopted the term Takasago-zoku in reference to the Aborigines, further emphasizing the shift in the perception of the Aborigines as an independent people rather than a loosely bound tribe of savages.34 Despite many changes in Aborigine communities, however, the Musha Incident remained a touchstone in discussions about relations between Japanese and Aborigines.

Naturalizing the Natives Following literary precedent, the representations of Aborigines in Sakaguchi Reiko’s “Passionflower” intertwine references to the Musha Incident with conventional descriptions of natives immersed in natural surroundings. Images of nature pervade “Passionflower,” from the mists of the Musha region in Taiwan to the transplanted passionflower of the title. Such imagery is hardly surprising, as popular



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discourse in Taiwan frequently associated Aborigines with nature.35 For example, the character used to reference Aborigines, ban 蕃, means to grow luxuriously, and implicitly likens them to a wild form of nature.36 The character is sometimes interchanged with a homophonous character ban 蛮, which means savage. The overlapping of these two nuances expands the term banjin by evoking both the natural and the savage simultaneously. As Leo Ching notes, the relationship between Aborigines and Japanese was based on a binary formation of “savagery” and “civility.”37 Such categories were deemed mutually exclusive, and, thus, by associating the indigenous peoples with the terms “nature” and “savage,” popular discourse located Japanese colonizers on the opposite end of the spectrum from Aboriginal Taiwanese; the former, of course, served as the arbiters of “culture” and “civilization.” The division between nature and culture differentiated Aborigines from Japanese, and doubled as a justification for their respective positions within the colonial hierarchy. Representations of the Aborigines reinforced this asymmetry. Aborigines were depicted either as part of the natural landscape (that is, as decorative objects rather than as individual subjects) or as subjects in tune with the varied changes of nature. Examples of such treatment appear in early literary works such as Uno K ōji’s “Yurikago no uta no omoide” (Memories of a Lullaby, 1915), which opens with a horde of faceless natives attacking an innocent village of Japanese settlers, and Shōji Sōichi’s Greater East Asia Literary prize-winning novel Chin fujin (Madame Chen, 1940) contains a subplot depicting a romantic relationship between a Taiwanese man and a young Aborigine woman, whom the young man describes as possessing a “bestial wildness.”38 The opening passage of Sakaguchi’s “Passionflower” also connects nature and indigenous peoples, gesturing toward the familiar representations of the natives as exotic and mysterious. On nights of the full moon, the village of M was filled with silent prayers honoring the gods. The mountain peoples once danced on such nights, passionately writhing their bodies, and, looking up at the moon, heaved a great sigh. The sighs of those thousands of people covered the surface of the bright and clear moon, and a milky white mist hung like a veil above the silent M deep in the mountains.39

Sakaguchi creates an exotic image of Aborigines “passionately writhing” their bodies at an indigenous religious ceremony, mysterious and unfamiliar to a Japanese and Han Chinese readership. The





steamy breath of the natives producing the mist also emphasizes the close ties between the natives and nature, as the Aborigine peoples are participants in the creation of a natural phenomenon. In addition, for contemporary readers, the letter M and the imagery of the mist and the mountains intimates the Musha region, evoking the Musha Incident of 1930.40 The combination of references to nature, mysticism, and the violent uprising form a representation of natives not unlike that of other works of colonial literature. The initial appearance of the protagonist Yamakawa Jun reinforces the conventional links between natives and nature. Jun is already tied to the Aborigines through his surname Yamakawa (literally, “mountain river”), which evokes the mountainous regions where many “upland” Aborigines resided.41 Here, Sakaguchi indicates to readers that Jun is included within a familial lineage of nature. In addition, the character for Jun’s given name means “pure” and “natural,” indicative of his “pure” heart and his association with nature and the Aborigines. At the same time, however, his given name belies his mixed-blood ancestry. At this point in the novella, it may already seem that Sakaguchi is following the well-tread path of other colonial literati through her linking of nature and natives. Yet, in fact, the conventional representations of natives in her introduction serve as a strategic counterpoint for the rest of the narrative. By starting with such conventional images of Aborigine subjects and nature, Sakaguchi gives her readers a familiar and stable entry into what becomes an increasingly complex mapping of colonial identity. As the narrative develops, she disrupts conventional notions of colonial identities, both “native” and “Japanese,” and complicates their respective connections with nature and culture, specifically through the “hybrid” presence of the protagonist Jun. As the offspring of a marriage of an Aborigine woman and a Japanese man, Jun transcends conventional categories of identity, and in fact he poses a challenge to the categories of nature and culture, colonized and colonizer, primitive and civilized, and “Japanese” and “native.” On the one hand, it might seem that his hybrid identity possesses a plasticity that enables the production of multiple meanings; at various points in the narrative, he may be identified as Aborigine, Japanese, both, and neither. This mutability enables multiple meanings within the text, which will be discussed at the end of this section. Ultimately, however, rather than opening up numerous opportunities, Jun’s protean identity forces him to choose a single affiliation in order to avoid complete exclusion from all categories. At the time the



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novella appeared, societal recognition of even the possibility of a hybrid identity was improbable; despite the existence of multiple hybrid subjects throughout the colonial period, the persistence of binary categories of identity and the mutual exclusivity of such identities was unlikely to be overcome. Ann Laura Stoler and Frederick Cooper point out the ways in which, in other colonial sites, both colonizing and colonized subjects participated in the construction and maintenance of such binary categories, particularly in the case of establishing specific identities.42 For Jun, as well, identity as an Aborigine subject affords him a stability that is lacking in a hybrid identity. Thus, due to the limitations of the colonial context, Sakaguchi codes Jun as “native” through ties to Aborigines and his relationship to nature. While identifying Jun as Aborigine might seem to be another concession to conventional discourse that maintains the “purity” of Japanese lineage, Sakaguchi’s depiction of Jun actually explores and expands the category of native identity rather than merely taking it for granted. Specifically, the disjuncture between Jun’s identity as native and his “mixed” parentage evokes questions about Aborigine (and Japanese) identity itself. What makes Jun a native subject? How is indigenous identity defined? Who defines it? Sakaguchi presses readers to pursue this very line of questioning through Jun’s journey toward self-discovery. Jun initially resists various elements associated with his native lineage. In the beginning of the novella, he feels “oppressed” by the “unmoving” mountains of the Musha region and resists their “overpowering force with his entire body.”43 The natural imagery of the mountains is associated with the upland tribal origins of Jun, his mother, and his sister. Consequently, Jun’s resistance signifies his struggle to break free of his ties to Aborigine culture. Sakaguchi further emphasizes Jun’s distance from his native lineage through a subsequent scene in which Jun gazes critically at his mother who, despite having lived in a Japanese-style home for thirty years, still exhibits discomfort sitting on the tatami floor. Her awkward posture indicates the difficulty of assimilating Japanese cultural practices for a supposedly uncivilized native. Jun’s shock at his ability to distance himself “from the warmth of his blood ties to his parents and turn a cool gaze” on his mother further emphasizes differences between Jun and his mother.44 Sakaguchi clearly shows Jun’s perception of himself as civilized through his ability to recognize appropriate behavior, but also through his surprising rejection of his mother. Yet, even though Jun identifies himself as enlightened, his rejection as a marriage





partner by two Japanese women because of his Aborigine parentage challenges his self-identification. Each of the above scenes highlights aspects of an Aborigine heritage that Jun rejects: the exotic mysticism of the communing natives and the savage violence of the Musha Incident evoked in the introduction; discomfort with a civilized lifestyle exemplified by his own mother’s difficulty in a Japanese-style house; and exclusion from privileges (such as marriage to a Japanese woman) enjoyed by “civilized” Japanese subjects. In other words, Jun distances himself from Aborigine culture as a result of his subscribing to a specific construct of natives as exotic, violent, and uncivilized. Jun differentiates himself from such conventional constructions of native identity, and instead grapples with his own position within an Aborigine lineage. Thus, through Jun’s dilemma, Sakaguchi reveals the pervasive influence of discursive constructions of native identity. Succumbing to colonial discourse that exotifies and infantilizes the indigenous peoples of Taiwan, Jun is unable to see other possibilities for Aborigine subjects. Yet, although Jun initially subscribes to conventional constructions of native identity, he eventually realizes alternative aspects of Aborigine identity not encompassed within conventional colonial discourse. Sakaguchi utilizes the links between natives and nature in order to contrast the cultural constructions of indigenous subjects with the realities of Jun’s own experience as an Aborigine relating to his natural surroundings. Through the juxtaposition of conventional images with more realistic representations, she also expands the possibilities for Aborigine identity. Although Sakaguchi establishes Jun’s links to the indigenous peoples through his family name, Yamakawa, she further emphasizes the strength of Jun’s ties to Aborigine culture by depicting the power of bloodlines and biological lineage. Jun tries to resist his affiliation with nature and the natives, but he cannot escape the implications of his lineage. For example, immediately before he embarks on his journey to Japan, he “feels” the nature of Musha with his entire body and his entire being.45 Jun’s somatic link to nature serves as a reminder of his biological ties to the Aborigines. While he attempts to physically and culturally distance himself from the stereotyped natives of colonial discourse, his link to Aborigines through bloodline is undeniable and keeps returning him to his Aborigine lineage. Sakaguchi frames the facts of biology and of nature as undeniable “truths” that emphasize Jun’s connections to Aborigines and, consequently, reveals the complexity of the Aborigine lineage.



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Through a renewed appreciation of nature, Jun learns to accept his position within an Aborigine lineage. Ironically, Jun’s attitudes toward nature are transformed while he is in Japan. Walking in the natural setting surrounding his father’s home in Kyushu, Jun prepares to ask his father about his reasons for abandoning the family many years earlier. Faced with such a difficult task, Jun hesitates and instead turns his gaze upward at some beautiful poplar trees glittering in the sunshine. The view stimulates his sharp nerves, and he is suddenly enveloped by his sensations of nature. The sound of the stream reached his ears. Jun thought of the beautiful colors of the mountains and rivers of his homeland. In Taiwan, many of the rivers flowing in the plains were clouded with red soil, but the rivers of M were clear and cool. “What’s wrong? Didn’t you want to say something? Go ahead.” Gentarō, who saw Jun’s silence as hesitation, tried to give his son an opportunity to speak. “Father! Isn’t that a beautiful sound? Please listen. At our home too, the sound of the water running through the mountains is like this. But when you go to the plains, the sounds are all clouded and heavy. I feel the weight of sounds. Listen . . . it’s quite light.” Gentarō tried to listen carefully, but could only hear young Jun’s light accent. What does he want me to hear?46

Jun’s embracing of the natural surroundings of Japan in the passage above contrasts with his previous “resistance” to the mountains of Musha. While in Taiwan, nature seemingly oppresses him; in Japan, however, the natural scenery represents a familiar and safe haven for Jun, a reminder of his home in Taiwan. Although popular discourse linked nature and Aborigine identity in the colonial context, the natural environment takes on alternate significances in Japan proper, and enables Jun to reexamine his assumptions about nature and native identity. In addition, Jun’s encounter with the flora of Japan provides a physical and perhaps emotional distance that further facilitates his eventual appreciation of the natural environment and his Aborigine heritage. Contrasting the nature of Taiwan with that in Japan provides Jun with an alternate perspective that enables him to make a distinction between different forms of nature, such as the rivers of Musha and of the plains. Rather than viewing the natural surroundings of Taiwan and its residents as homogeneous, Jun realizes the subtle differences among these varieties of nature and, by association, numerous native subjects. The contrast between the rivers of the





plains and of the uplands is particularly notable as it evokes a similar distinction between different tribes. In addition to the divisions mentioned previously, Japanese anthropologists differentiated between “upland” Aborigines (k ōzan banjin) and “plains” Aborigines (heichi banjin) to classify the indigenous peoples, not geographically as one might assume, but rather by their level of “acculturation.”47 The immersion of “upland” Aborigines in natural surroundings far from the modern urban lifestyle of the “plains” further emphasized their association with nature, and their distance from the “cultured” lifestyles of civilized subjects. The supposedly higher level of “civility” among “plains” Aborigines was also attributed to the increased intermarriage between such peoples and the “civilized” Han Chinese and Japanese. While the distinction between “upland” and “plains” Aborigines was common among anthropologists, Sakaguchi’s emphasis upon the diversity of Aborigines was unique in the world of literature and very different in its implications. In fact, most literary representations of natives in Japanese colonial literature focused predominantly on the “upland” Aborigines and generally represented the indigenous peoples as ignorant and uncivilized.48 Consequently, many literary treatments of Aborigines reinforced the mutually exclusive categories of natives and Japanese, or savage and civilized. A few works, such as Ōshika Taku’s “Yabanjin” (Savage, 1935), articulate the opposite possibility—the savage nature of a Japanese subject—but the discussion of a civilized native remained quite rare in colonial literature in Taiwan.49 To acknowledge successful civilization of a native would endanger the Japanese colonial presence in Taiwan and would threaten the position of Japanese identity at the apex of the colonial hierarchy. Sakaguchi’s distinction between different forms of nature, however, implies a diversity among native subjects and opens up the possibility of a successful blending of “nature” and “culture,” of Japanese and Aborigine culture, in other words, of a civilized native. Jun realizes the possibilities, and not just the limitations, of being native by returning to nature. Thus, ironically, Jun subscribes to the connection between natives and nature in colonial discourse, but subverts the basis of colonial ideology by privileging nature rather than denigrating it. His innate connection to nature and to the natives enables him to see the disjuncture in his notion of native identity and to realize that Aboriginal blood does not exclude civilized status. Near the end of the novella, Jun’s growing realization of the differences among Aborigines and his position among those distinctions is fully realized in a scene, aptly set, during a hike in Japan. Troubled by



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The mountain was alive. It rumbled fiercely and shook. It gave a frightening roar. Jun shuddered when he heard the sound. The giant pierced the sky with its angry voice. Jun listened carefully with his heart and opened his entire body to that angry voice. He felt as if his body was being pulled apart and scattered here and there. Again the dreadful sound rang out. Jun instinctively covered his ears and turned around. In front of him, the peaceful green hills glistened in the sun. Jun blinked in disbelief and stared at the serene image. The mountain was silent. The still figure covered in green, the line of ridges soared above one by one.50

Jun’s reaction to the rumbling of the volcano confirms his sensitivity to the sounds of nature. However, unlike the light sounds of the streams reminiscent of his homeland, the volcano roars with an angry and invasive resonance. The green hills, evocative of the hills of Musha, represent a sanctuary from a violent form of nature, embodied by the volcano. Again, Jun finds solace in the quiet beauty of nature. This time, however, he is not escaping his father’s legacy of abandonment, but rather the violent legacy of nature and, by implication, of the Aborigines. Tormented by the roars of the volcano, Jun runs down to the plains and passes out on the grass. Overwhelmed by past disappointments, he grieves. Eventually he realizes that he must help his family, the Aborigines, and exclaims, “I’m coming home. I’m coming home. And I’ll become one of you. I won’t hesitate any longer. I acknowledge the Takasago blood coursing throughout my body. At this moment, I realized the importance of my existence. I’m coming home. I’m coming home, mother.”51 The emphasis upon bloodline is significant in that it implies that Jun cannot overcome the determining power of biology, nature, and blood. In other words, bloodline turns Jun away from Japan and returns him to his Aborigine roots. As a result, Jun runs to the plains, the site of civilization, embraces his Aborigine origins, and declares his desire to mediate between Japan and native culture. He realizes the possibility of taming the violent aspects of nature; in other words, the possibility of civilizing the Aborigines, even his tribe of the uplands. Moreover, Jun recognizes that his mediating role as Japanese and native puts him in a unique position to assist in the civilizing process. Sakaguchi hints at Jun’s special abilities in an earlier passage. While Gentarō is unable to appreciate the sounds of nature that Jun recognizes, Jun’s sensitivity to their natural surroundings highlights his



his dilemma as to whether or not to marry Kinko, Jun climbs up Mount Aso, surrounded by volcanic rock and the smell of sulphur.


ties to nature and the Aborigines and also emphasizes the differences between these two men and their relationship to the Aborigines. Jun attempts to create common ground with his father by reminding him of Musha. After all, Gentarō had once lived there with Jun and the rest of his family. However, while Jun perceives the Musha region as “home,” his father does not. Instead, for Jun’s father, the Musha area represents the “failure” of civilizing the indigenous peoples, represented in his own individual civilizing project and the Musha Incident. Clearly, these men have different connections to the Musha region as well as to the civilizing project. Gentarō cannot understand Jun’s appreciation of the natural sounds and can only hear Jun’s accent, a sign of his difference from other Japanese. Gentarō’s inability to understand and appreciate nature reflects his relation to Aborigines as well. While Jun can differentiate between the nature of the plains and the uplands, and between civilized and uncivilized natives, his father cannot. Gentarō’s limited vision of the Musha region does not include the natural beauty that Jun experiences on a daily basis. Rather than following in the footsteps of his father, who is alienated from nature and from the indigenous peoples of Taiwan, Jun possesses an intimate connection to nature, to Musha, and to its Aborigine residents, and, consequently, can distinguish between different forms of nature and native identity. By depicting Jun’s epiphany on Mount Aso, Sakaguchi identifies two kinds of nature: a violent, primitive form of nature, represented by the volcano, and a gentle, beautiful form, represented by the green hills. In turn, through the implicit association of natives with the natural world, Sakaguchi also implies the possibility of diversity among Aborigines. Unlike other Japanese and Taiwanese writers who homogenized the indigenous peoples, Sakaguchi makes distinctions among different groups and allows for the possibility of civilized natives. While she does not devote as much attention to the cultural variations among different tribes, she does challenge the notion of a homogeneous body of Aborigines.

Cultivating Nature, Cultivating Natives Through the depiction of “wild” natural imagery, Sakaguchi speaks to distinctions of nature and of natives, in particular the upland tribes. She also addresses the issue of civilizing natives in the imagery of the passionflower. The characters for passionflower literally mean “grasses of time,” indicating the resemblance of the flower to the face of a clock. The “grasses of time” may also represent the passing of time,



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In the rear garden, the passionflower that Jun had brought on his first visit from M was luxuriant on the trellis his father had made, and the tip of the vigorous vine lifted its head up.53

With the support and maintenance of Jun’s father, the plant had grown luxuriant. The proliferation of these unique and exotic flowering vines in Japan shows how cultivation and diligent care can enable a natural object to survive and eventually adapt to a foreign environment. The Japanese term that Sakaguchi uses for the cultivation of the passionflower, sodatsu, may also be used in the context of bringing up a child, and it clearly evokes the assimilation policy that aimed at education, ikusei, of the natives. Although the implicit commentary on the emphasis upon assimilation in colonial policy in Taiwan is apparent in this metaphor, Sakaguchi insures that readers make the connection between the cultivating of nature and the civilizing of Aborigines. As Jun contemplates the immense responsibility he is assuming by marrying a native woman, he thinks of the “mystery” and “sadness” of the Japanese blood mixed with native blood inside him. Addressing the passionflower in his father’s garden, Jun thinks to himself: Passionflower from another land, take in the richness of this soil, and grow luxuriant. Then try to spread your life throughout the world as much as possible. The drop of blood that fell in the mountains shall also be cultivated amidst the Takasago people.54

Jun sees the flowers as symbolic of planting and cultivating his “civilized” seed in an “uncivilized” setting. Realizing his unique position between Japanese and Aborigine cultures, Jun assumes the role of mediator and strives to help his native family by marrying an Aborigine woman and injecting the drop of Japanese blood in his veins into the native bloodline. Because Sakaguchi has affiliated Jun with nature throughout the narrative, it seems that she creates an alternative narrative of colonization with a native-identified protagonist working for the civilizing project. The notion that colonialism is a benevolent action for the good of the colonized has a self-serving echo when emerging from



and the development of colonialism in Taiwan.52 Previously, Jun had brought passionflowers from Taiwan as a gift to his father’s family in Japan. After declaring to his father that he will return to Taiwan to marry an Aborigine woman, Jun gazes outside.


the mouth of a colonizing subject who benefits from the use of the natural and human resources of a colonial territory. However, by having Jun embrace his Aborigine heritage and embark on the civilizing project for the very same reason, Sakaguchi transforms the dynamics of the colonial relationship. Does the civilizing project become more equitable when the civilizer is another native? Because Jun is part of the “native family,” his intent to “help” the indigenous residents of Musha may seem less invasive or hierarchical. Due to his Aborigine origins, Jun is supposedly “innocent” of colonizing intent, and thus his declaration represents the desires of an “insider” trying to help his community, rather than the questionable intent of a colonizing “outsider,” like Jun’s father Gentarō. Jun’s dual heritage functions as what Mary Louise Pratt calls a “strategy of innocence” in a text of “anti-conquest.”55 In her examination of European travel-writing about South America and Africa written during the eighteenth century, Pratt coins the term “anticonquest” in reference to “the strategies of representation whereby European bourgeois subjects seek to secure their innocence in the same moment as they assert European hegemony.”56 According to Pratt, these “strategies of innocence are constituted in relation to older imperial rhetorics of conquest associated with the absolutist era.”57 For example, in his Travels in the Interior Districts of Africa (1799), Scotsman Mungo Park depicts the protagonist as a “noninterventionist European presence,” who is portrayed as a receiver rather than an initiator of action.58 Park’s passive protagonist contributes to a reconfiguration of the colonial project and its European participants as “innocent” of exploitative motives. Pratt notes that these claims of innocence occurred at a time when European imperialism was facing numerous challenges to imperial authority. Park’s reformulation of European colonialism responded to such challenges and critiques by presenting an alternate vision of the colonizing subject as “innocent” and even “sentimental.” Thus, while Park acknowledges the problems with European imperialism of the past, his reconstitution allows for the recuperation of the various manifestations of European colonialism. Sakaguchi’s “Passionflower” reflects a context similar to that described by Pratt where the colonial administration in Taiwan faced intense criticism for its failed attempts at facilitating AborigineJapanese relations. Sakaguchi portrays the character of Jun as “innocent” of colonizing impulses. However, unlike Park’s protagonist, Jun possesses an “innocence” that arises from his dual affiliations with both the colonizing Japanese and the colonized Aborigines.



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Such hybridity allows for flexibility in interpretation. While it may seem unconventional to have a native-identified subject act as the civilizer, in fact, Jun’s Japanese heritage diminishes the potentially transgressive aspect of this paradigm switch. Because of his plastic identity, Jun may be viewed as a surrogate Japanese character embarking on the civilizing project. His role as civilizer does not threaten the Japanese presence in Taiwan by the very fact that he has Japanese blood in him. Furthermore, even if we ignore Jun’s Japanese parentage, the novella lacks a critical stance in its depiction of Aborigine attitudes regarding Japanese assimilation policy. By having Jun actively advocate the civilizing project, Sakaguchi depicts colonized subjects as willingly submitting and contributing to Japanese colonialism. Although the existence of complicit colonized subjects is certainly not untrue, Sakaguchi’s portrayal of Jun coincides with official discourse that depicts colonized subjects as desiring guidance. Thus, although Jun wholly embraces his Aborigine heritage in the end of the story, he inevitably behaves in the same manner as other colonizers by promoting the civilizing project and expressing the desire to cultivate the natives, like the natural passionflower of the title.

Colonial Marriages Old and New As with her expansion of the colonial trope of nature, Sakaguchi’s introduction of the trope of marriage also distinguishes her work from other literary representations of Aborigine-Japanese relations and suggests an alternative narrative of colonization. Throughout the Japanese empire, marriages between Japanese and colonized subjects, primarily Han Chinese and Koreans, appeared in literary and popular discourse as an allegory for colonial union.59 Colonial intermarriages were legalized by the Japanese government in 1921 and held up by the colonial governments in Korea and Taiwan during the late 1930s and early 1940s as an important step in the assimilation process, bringing colonized peoples closer to Japanese culture, as well as furthering the cause of ethnic harmony.60 However, in the specific case of relations between Japanese and Aborigines, Japanese literary representations of romances, rather than marriages, were more common. Kawahara Isao cites the “not insignificant” number of fictional works on the Aborigines by such Japanese writers as Uno K ōji, Satō Haruo, Ōshika Taku, Nakamura Jihei, Masugi Shizue, Nogami Yaeko, and Yoshiya Nobuko.61 Many of the fictional works, such as Ōshika’s “Savage” and “Banpu” (Native Woman, 1933); Nakamura Jihei’s “Bankai no onna” (Woman of the Native World, 1939) and “Kiri no





bansha” (Native Village in the Mist, 1939), and “Banjin no musume” (Native Girl, 1940) focus on romance and sexual desire, often unrequited, between a Japanese man and an Aborigine woman.62 Nakamura’s “Woman of the Native World” exemplifies a common plot in fictional representations of Aborigine-Japanese romance. The protagonist Yutani Sankichi, jaded by modern life, travels to an Aborigine mountain village. He develops a friendship with “native” woman Shibal Iwal, all the while suppressing his desire for her because she is married. Eventually, the story concludes with Yutani departing for Japan, leaving the relationship unconsummated. Such representations of romance, rather than marriage, may simply reflect the period during which the literary works were produced. Although marriages between Japanese men and Aborigine women were informally supported by the colonial administration during the years of the riban policy, such marriages were prohibited after 1930, because the failed marriages of the past were deemed one of the impetuses for the Musha Incident.63 Consequently, depicting such marriages in literature could lead to censorship, and, in fact, may have contributed to the truncated form in which Sakaguchi’s first version of “Passionflower” appeared in 1942.64 In addition, romance may have represented a desirable alternative to marriage in light of the controversial effects of “racial mixing.” The conclusions of most of these literary depictions, in which men leave for Japan without their lovers, follow romantic convention, but they also provide endings that maintain the boundaries of colonial constructions of race. In order to perpetuate the perfection attained in romantic fantasy, the protagonist must depart, sometimes without even consummating his desires. Conveniently, this convention also serves the purpose of maintaining “purity” of the Japanese bloodline.65 If the Japanese protagonist engages in a romantic tryst with an Aborigine woman, his departure, following convention, allows him to avoid the potential consequences of his actions and instead safely reminisce about their passion from a distanced position in Japan. More specifically, because of his return to Japan, a romantic hero will not have to contend with the birth of a biracial child, such as Jun or his sister Yoko, and the expansion of the family network. Multiethnic and multiracial offsprings presented a challenge to culturally constructed boundaries of bloodline, race, and ethnicity during the colonial period.66 Because the literary romances of writers such as Nakamura and Ōshika avoid this dilemma by not consummating the relationships, the conventional representations of Japanese-Aborigine romantic relations create a fantasy of perpetual desire that does not,



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and in fact does not need to, address the consequences of such consummation. In contrast, Sakaguchi’s focus on marriage seems to signify an unusual perspective on Aborigine-Japanese relations, and it differentiates “Passionflower” from other works written during the same period. Sakaguchi’s positioning of her work against conventional literary romances seems understandable in light of her affiliation with the Taiwan bungaku literary coterie, whose members attempted to write works privileging “realism” rather than the “exotic” romances of the rival literary journal Bungei Taiwan. Sakaguchi follows her literary cohort with a similar critique of colonial romance in a segment of “Passionflower” where Jun discusses the difference between the romanticized images of Aborigines in the popular media and the stark “reality.” While Jun embarks on his trip to Japan to meet his latest fiancée Kinko, he wonders to himself whether his bad luck with marriage will continue. For example, even if there were a woman who knew my secret and still agreed to marry me, when she meets my mother Tewas Rudao in person and sees Musha, which isn’t as lively as it seems in films or plays, wouldn’t she leave just as the first woman did?67

Although the comment above primarily functions to show how disappointment has hardened Jun, his words also suggest that the popular depictions of the Musha area, and by extension its residents, the Aborigine, contrast greatly with the actual site and subjects.68 By critiquing the romanticization of “natives” in conventional representations, Sakaguchi subtly embeds a critique of the exotifying fantasies of Japanese writers, many of whom were affiliated with Bungei Taiwan. Furthermore, such evaluations also imply that her narrative ruptures the “realism” of Taiwan bungaku. Sakaguchi’s treatment of marriage also differentiates her work from conventional narratives through her focus on the aftermath of colonial contact rather than the romance of initial encounter. By addressing the consequences of the marriage of Jun’s parents, the Aborigine woman Tewas Rudao and the Japanese man Gentarō, “Passionflower” differs from works that revel in the adventure and passion of a tryst in the mountains. Depicting the effects of colonial encounter, Sakaguchi reveals the realities and the ramifications neglected by other literary romances. She treats the identity struggles of the protagonist Jun, who is a product, both literal and symbolic, of colonial union, and consequently presents a perspective on colonial





interaction that emphasizes the “results” of colonial union and envisions a more intimate and lasting bond than the ephemeral interludes of literary romances. While Sakaguchi differentiates her treatment of colonial relations from the romanticized images of other Japanese writers, she does not wholly embrace colonial marriage as a desirable alternative to colonial romance. Rather, through her depiction of the broken union of Jun’s parents, she also takes a critical stance on colonial marriages arranged under the auspices of the riban policy between 1910 and 1915. By evoking the problems resulting from such unions, Sakaguchi offers a critique of the colonial project itself. Jun’s parents Gentarō and Tewas Rudao exemplify such colonial unions; they met and married while Gentarō was a colonial police officer in Taiwan during the riban policy. Marriages between Japanese police officers and Aborigine women arranged during this period served both a symbolic and strategic function in support of Japanese colonial activity.69 Colonial officials privately prodded Japanese police to marry Aborigine women, emphasizing how colonial marriage unified Japanese and Aborigines and symbolized the harmony and commitment of the colonial project.70 But an alternate reading of such unions reveals a different strategy of the riban policy. Because Gentarō’s mere presence as a policeman in the “native” village of Musha identified him as a manifestation of Japanese colonial authority, the marriage also represented the infiltration of colonial hegemony into the private sphere of the home and the family.71 Although the marital unions of Japanese and Aborigines were touted by colonial officials as embodiments of the trust and long-term commitment between the two groups, the trust, ironically, was broken from the onset because numerous Japanese officers married the sisters or daughters of tribal leaders as strategic defense rather than as displays of romantic love or commitment to facilitating relations between Japanese and Aborigines. Popular lore also indicates that such marriages were allegedly undertaken in order to gain the support of Aborigine leaders and to acquire inside information in order to stamp out any signs of Aborigine resistance.72 By evoking such couples through the image of Jun’s parents, Sakaguchi highlights the multiple layers of betrayal in Aborigine-Japanese relations, both in the family and the larger colonial political arena. Sakaguchi makes the connections between marriage, colonial policy, and uprising even more explicit by giving Jun’s mother, Tewas Rudao, a name similar to that of the younger sister of the Maebo tribal chief Mona Rudao, who organized the Musha Incident.73 Both



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Jun’s mother and the historical figure married Japanese police officers who eventually abandoned them. In the case of the historical figure, her husband disappeared soon after he was transferred to Kaohsiung, and his reasons for leaving were left unknown.74 Public opinion concluded that, like other officers who abandoned their wives, the man fled to Japan. The occurrence of Japanese police officers abandoning their native wives was significant and controversial enough to be noted by a visiting Satō Haruo in his 1925 travel account, “Musha,”75 and to warrant its citation by Japanese as one of the factors contributing to the Musha Incident. Specifically, numerous Japanese commentaries on the Musha Incident discuss how the humiliation of Aborigine women abandoned by their Japanese husbands incited the anger of male relatives and motivated the violent uprising that ensued. By linking Jun’s mother with this historical figure, Sakaguchi emphasizes the ties between marriage and the Musha Incident and casts a critical gaze upon the marriages formed under the riban policy. Sakaguchi gestures toward the connections between the abandonment of Aborigine women and the uprising in the following scene immediately before Jun embarks on his journey to Japan. While Jun waits for the taxi to take him down the mountain, he chats with a Japanese souvenir shop owner whose parents were killed in the Musha Incident. The shop owner comments: “I’ve heard that your father is a wonderful person. There isn’t a single person among the mountain peoples here who speaks negatively of him.” “He was fond of them.” “Some people say that if your father had stayed in M, the M Incident would not have occurred.” “I don’t think so. No matter who was here, there would have been an uprising.”76

The shopkeeper’s comment can be read as a critique of Japanese husbands’ abandonment of their Aboriginal wives. In other words, if Japanese police had not left and had continued their guidance of the Aborigines, the uprising would not have occurred. Yet, because of the complimentary tone of the previous comments, the shopkeeper’s words may also imply that if a man as caring as Gentarō had remained, he could have prevented the violence. Nevertheless, the overarching significance of the comment lies in the connection between such marriages and the uprising. If the marriages had been





successful, the attack would have been avoided. Linking Jun’s parents to the uprising, Sakaguchi inevitably implicates colonial marriage in the tragic results of the Musha Incident. In addition, Jun’s final comment suggests that even if some Japanese men had stayed with their colonial families, the general lack of commitment to the civilizing project of the riban policy and to Japanese-Aborigine relations may nor have avoided the bloodshed of October 1930. Thus, in the depiction of Jun’s family lineage, Sakaguchi evokes the numerous “failures” resulting from this period: broken marital vows, the collapse of the policy of “managing the natives” as embodied in discarded Aborigine families, and the ultimate example of failure, the Musha Incident. Because Sakaguchi critiques both the unsuccessful colonial marriages of the riban period and the romanticized representations of other colonial writers, one might assume that she presents a more critical depiction of colonial life in Taiwan. In fact, Sakaguchi’s assessment of such marriages functions as another strategy of innocence, whereby her portrayal of the Aborigine characters with realism and respect identifies her work as “innocent” of the romanticized and exotifying tendencies of other writers. While she highlights the failure of colonial marriage, her narrative also locates the reasons for such failure in the ways in which the colonial policies were enacted and maintained rather than in the foundational principles of the colonial project itself. As will become apparent later, by focusing on the flaws in the ways in which the policy was carried out, Sakaguchi creates a narrative that allows for the acceptance of the colonial project, albeit in a different form.

Rewriting Colonial Policy Because the violent events of the Musha Incident clearly indicated the failure of colonial marriage and riban policy to “manage” the Atayal tribe, Sakaguchi’s declaration of the problems in Japan’s colonial enterprise in Taiwan is hardly innovative or revolutionary. Instead, her critique of the policy is distinguished by Gentarō’s discussion of eugenics-influenced notions of lineage in relation to the colonial project. In the following passage, for example, Gentarō describes his intentions in helping the Aborigines by supplementing the official policy on his own. I intended to devote my entire life to the “riban.” With that goal in mind, I married your mother. The “riban” was, in short, ethnic policy.



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There are two kinds of ethnic policies. One is aimed toward subdued ethnic groups that already have a developed culture and history, such as England’s policies toward Egypt. Another kind of ethnic policy is for peoples with an extremely low level of civilization, and who of course have no cultural history whatsoever. That second kind of ethnic policy was our country’s (Japan’s) riban policy . . . People with culture can progress by themselves. Correct guidance is sufficient in enabling such progress. However, such guidance would just deteriorate inside of those who lack a cultural history. What could be done? Wasn’t the only way to mix my blood with theirs? I thought that I could enact ethnic management through my offspring and my grandchildren by cultivating the blood of a cultured person in the mountain peoples.77

Gentarō’s confession takes a curious turn in his discussion of “ethnic management” through mixing bloodlines. The eugenics-based discourse with which Gentarō justifies his actions identifies civilized status as biologically and racially determined and indicates that such status can be transmitted through the introduction of “civilized” blood into an “uncivilized” lineage. Certain eugenics theories also designated Japanese blood as dominant in the mixing of two lineages; accordingly, the infusion of Japanese blood would advance the Aborigines toward enlightenment.78 However, while much official policy was grounded in the notion that Japanese subjects were more civilized than Aborigines, Japanese colonial officials did not officially advocate the intermingling of Japanese and Aborigine bloodlines in the service of colonialism.79 Thus, Gentarō’s attempt to supplement the colonial project through the cultivation of his Japanese (in other words, civilized) bloodline into that of the Aborigines is particularly significant because of its deviation from official policy of the time. Gentarō’s unique enactment of “managing the natives” allows for Sakaguchi’s critique to be aimed at his individual methods rather than the underlying goals of the official policies. Sakaguchi’s references to bloodline and eugenics fulfill two different functions. On the one hand, they reflect her own personal interest in the use of eugenics practices in improving society; she explores the issue of eugenic marriage among Japanese in several of her early stories and initially seems to advocate this practice as a method for societal improvement.80 In addition, the introduction of eugenics emphasizes an integral aspect of the narrative: the concept of lineage. Gentarō’s discussions of “mixing” bloodlines center readers’ attention on the importance of ancestry and the development of diverse familial lineages resulting from colonial marriage. The focus on the potential power of biological and familial connections ultimately





provokes questions about colonial subjects’ differing associations with Japan and with colonial Taiwan. In light of the web of affiliations—familial, national, and colonial—the case of Gentarō exemplifies how certain lineages take precedent over others. In fact, Sakaguchi grounds the failures of the civilizing project in the weak commitment of Japanese colonizing subjects and identifies cultural and national loyalties as the reason. Sakaguchi’s depiction of Gentarō implies that because some Japanese subjects possessed stronger ties to the Japanese nation than to colonial Taiwan, their loyalties to Japan oftentimes took precedence over their participation in the civilizing project and, consequently, curtailed the eventual success of colonial Taiwan. For example, when explaining his reasons for leaving his Taiwanese family, Gentarō informs Jun that he left in order to take care of the family business in Japan after his eldest brother’s death. In addition to filial duty, Gentarō also emphasizes his concern for the one hundred miners who would be unemployed if the business were to close. Torn between national, familial, and individual responsibilities, Gentarō eventually decides to give up his native family, his own “personal” colonial project to civilize the Aborigines, for the larger good of the Japanese nation, represented by his own ties to blood and Japanese miners. His sacrifice reflects the prioritizing of national identity at the expense of his individual identity as a father and husband, and the privileging of a Japanese lineage over his colonial family. Gentarō’s ties to the colonial lineage lack the strength of the biological ties with his Japanese family and the Japanese nation. Linked to the miners by a shared Japanese identity, Gentarō lacks such a connection with Jun, Tewas Rudao, and Yōko. Thus, colonial marriage poses no threat to the stronger responsibilities to the nation and to “blood” family. Furthermore, even though Gentarō possesses biological ties to his “native” children, such connections would be identified in eugenic terms as hybrid, “impure,” and thus weaker in comparison to “pure” Japanese ties. Sakaguchi reveals the blood ties that Gentarō touts as the path to civilizing the “natives” as weak competition for the stronger eugenically purer ties to the nation. On a political level, Gentarō’s choice also represents how the colonial administration privileged the needs of Japan over the needs of the colonies. His commitment to the natives, unlike that of his son, is weak, and, as a result, his attempts to help them end unsuccessfully. In this way, Sakaguchi locates the errors of earlier forms of Japanese colonialism in the lack of sustained commitment to the project rather than in the civilizing project itself. By revealing the breakdown of Gentarō’s lack of success in aiding the Aborigines, Sakaguchi also paves the way for other forms of the 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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colonial project. Gentarō’s insufficient commitment to the civilizing project and his “weak” ties, biological and emotional, to his family ultimately result in failure: a son bitter at his abandonment, a native wife still uncomfortable with the trappings of civilization, and, perhaps, a violent uprising resulting in the deaths of over a hundred Japanese and several hundred Aborigines. However, this critique of the efforts of the riban administration does not result in a call for the withdrawal of the Japanese presence in Taiwan. Rather, Sakaguchi’s critical depiction of the colonial past enables the possibility of a different colonial future.

Rewriting Colonial Lineage Sakaguchi’s portrayal of Jun’s second fiancée Kinko represents an alternative medium for civilizing. In contrast with the nature represented by Jun, Kinko represents an arbiter of culture. Readers first encounter her at a theatre, where she is so moved by the performance of a scene from the Noh play “Funa-benkei” that she wonders if anyone else can share her feelings.81 Her passionate response to the performance suggests her cultured upbringing, which is later confirmed through her relation to a family of Noh performers. Kinko’s name also sheds light on her cultural authority, as the character for kin (which can also be read nishiki) in Kinko refers to Japanese brocade and emphasizes her Japanese identity as well as her position within a lineage of culture. Although Kinko, like Gentarō, represents a potential civilizer of the Aborigine, Sakaguchi creates a binary division of culture, similar to the aforementioned division of nature, in order to differentiate between the two characters. While Gentarō runs a cement factory (which, notably, destroys nature for the purpose of modern architecture and urban development), Kinko practices ikebana (flower arrangement), a cultural activity that molds nature into an artificial form following certain Japanese aesthetic principles. Both Japanese characters, Kinko and Gentarō, clearly represent culture and modernity, but it is also apparent that they represent different forms of culture and modernity as well. Gentarō’s form of civilization takes an interventionist, even invasive, approach, and has been defined by Gentarō himself as a failure. Kinko, on the other hand, represents an alternative form of culture that will cultivate rather than manage nature. Sakaguchi further calls attention to Kinko’s unconventional position through her critique of discriminatory attitudes toward the Aborigine. In contrast to Jun’s previous fiancées, Kinko agrees to marry Jun with full knowledge of his Aborigine background. The 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono




other two women, who were unaware of his native family, abandoned him upon discovering his heritage. In addition, upon hearing comments that Taiwan is dangerous, and the Aborigines are savage and violent, Kinko balks, pointing out the hardships the Aborigines endured through forced labor by the Japanese colonial government. Her behavior identifies her sensitivity to the situation of the Aborigines, despite her association with both Japan and “culture.” However, it also becomes clear that her passionate advocacy for the Aborigines is rooted in an alternate form of the Japanese colonial project, based on a belief in a common human experience that transcends other perceived differences. Near the end of the narrative, Fujiko, one of Jun’s former fiancées, visits Kinko and asks for a second chance with Jun. When chastising Fujiko for her change of heart, Kinko says: The Takasago have always had that beauty, but they just haven’t had a chance to express it. On the battlefront, they gave their lives in the name of His Majesty the Emperor, with the same pure feelings of a Japanese. It would be a mistake to think they were simply overcome by the moment. Rather, they have possessed that spirit from the very beginning.82

Kinko discusses the Aborigine men who were “voluntarily” conscripted into the Japanese military under the policies for “managing the natives.”83 She emphasizes the “pure feelings” shared by both Japanese and Aborigines alike, and reveals her own sensitivity and support of the Aborigines. This consideration of the status of the indigenous peoples differentiates her from Gentarō and other colonizers. While Gentarō views natives as completely different from Japanese, Kinko subscribes to a belief in the commonality of the human experience. It later becomes clear that the differences between Aborigines and Japanese can, according to Kinko, be remedied through education and guidance, because they possess the same “pure feelings.” Kinko’s responses to negative stereotypes of natives reiterate Jun’s critique of the objectification and discrimination against the Aborigines, but her passionate advocacy for the Aborigines is rooted in a universalist humanism, ultimately an alternate form of the Japanese civilizing mission.84 Kinko ignores cultural differences and focuses on the “universal” humanity that the Aborigines share with Japanese. By centering solely on a shared humanity, Kinko does not acknowledge the existence of social inequality resulting from colonial



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hierarchy, and thus creates an artificial space of equality free of the disadvantages experienced by certain subjects, in this case Aborigines. This idealized space of universalist humanism, however, further facilitates the colonial project. While Japanese and Aborigines may share the same human experience, their levels of civilization, according to Japanese standards, differ greatly. And, in fact, the colonial project itself can be justified by this shared humanity, because it becomes Japan’s duty to help the natives reach a “modern” standard of living. As a result, despite a common humanity, the colonizing Japanese and colonized Aborigines are located on an unequal hierarchy of civilized educators and uncivilized students. In addition to advocating a shared humanity between Japanese and Aborigines, Sakaguchi also transforms the colonial project and its literary paradigms through the pairing of a biracial man and a Japanese woman, a colonial union that seemingly poses an alternative to the conventional colonial coupling of a Japanese man and an indigenous woman. The union of a Japanese woman and a biracial man might be interpreted as a more equitable duo, with the elements of ethnicity and gender balancing out any power differentials between the pair. In addition to the aforementioned connection that her name has with culture, the character nishiki also brings to mind the phrase, nishiki o kazaru (also nishiki o kite, furusato ni kaeru): to return to one’s home in glory. This particular phrase appeared frequently in popular discussions about Japanese emigration, depicting the colonies as a land of golden opportunity where one could transcend the limits imposed by Japanese society and find success.85 Through her Japanese identity, Kinko gains access to privileges and power, which would be otherwise inaccessible to her in Japan as a result of her gender. Thus, as suggested by her name, perhaps in the colonies she will be able to escape conventional gender constraints and find success. Yet, this “alternative” pairing does not result in an equitable union, and, in fact, reestablishes the value of the colonial project and continues to subscribe to the conventional gender roles for women of caretaker and educator. Japanese women participated in the colonial project not only as supportive family members but also in their interactions with colonized subjects.86 Although Japanese women were not directly involved in policymaking and government administration (suffrage was not obtained until after the war), many were complicit in the colonial project through their efforts to “educate” the Aborigines. As suggested in “Passionflower,” not only did the policies and the actions of male government officials affect colonial





residents, but Japanese women’s participation in education and cultural exchange also formed an integral part of the entire colonial effort. Numerous Japanese women who traveled to the colonies worked as teachers in colonial schools, teaching both Japanese and colonized youth how to be “good imperial subjects.”87 Furthermore, although this location of the civilizing project in a female subject may seem to signify a shift in colonial discourse, in fact, Sakaguchi follows conventional gender roles. In Japanese national discourse during this time, women were urged to serve the nation as “good wives, wise mothers,” educating and bringing up their children to be “good citizens.”88 In the same way, Kinko will serve her nation and the colonial project by educating the Aborigines to be Japanese imperial subjects. In keeping with this paradigm, the Aborigines are located in the role of the “children” who need education. Sakaguchi’s mapping of the colonial project ends up following the conventional racial and gender hierarchies locating Japanese in the role of parent, educator, and superior. In fact, while her reformulation of colonial union may seem to present an alternative to previous formulations, Sakaguchi’s “new” couple simply reenacts the same race-based power asymmetries imposed by the colonial system. By marrying Jun, who is located outside of the colonial economy of identity, Kinko virtually guarantees her privilege as a Japanese colonizer. Jun’s complex position both inside and outside the racial hierarchy excludes him from full access to Japanese colonial privilege and results in Kinko’s occupying the role of the colonizing and empowered subject within their relationship. Jun’s marginalization is further emphasized through the use of gender, as several instances in the narrative identify his marginality through gendered descriptions of him as “having a slight, feminine body.” As a result, his position outside of the racial hierarchy is manifest in his feminization or disempowerment, and, consequently, the masculinization or empowerment of Kinko. Despite the alternative gender asymmetry placing a woman in the position of power, Sakaguchi’s rewriting of colonial relations maintains the colonial ethnic hierarchy, with a Japanese colonizing subject guiding the non-Japanese subject back on the path toward civilization.

Conclusion The novella ends with the continuation of colonial relations between Japanese and Aborigines despite the failures of the past. After his “natural” epiphany, Jun’s first impulse is to return to Taiwan to marry an Aborigine woman. Later that evening, Jun visits Kinko’s home 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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and takes her for a walk in order to call off their engagement in private. While strolling at dusk, Jun explains that by marrying a native woman he will be able to help the Aborigine people by injecting his Japanese blood into the native bloodline. However, Kinko, everdetermined, declares that it would be better for them to marry each other and educate the Aborigines in Taiwan together. Stunned by her beauty, her fortitude, and, most importantly, her “whip-like” words, Jun decides to follow Kinko’s directives.89 Despite numerous critiques of different facets of the colonial project, “Passionflower” concludes with Jun watching the sunset with Kinko, about to embark on the “civilizing” of Aborigines together. Since Jun is unable to break off his engagement with Kinko, the “results” of the colonial condition are not able to separate themselves from Japan and “return” alone to the Aborigines. Instead, in Sakaguchi’s text, colonial Taiwan and the Aborigines, in the form of Jun, must reunite with Japan and, under the guidance of Kinko, the arbiter of Japanese culture, participate in the assimilation process once more. In the end, Sakaguchi reveals another form of the colonial project: one with a masculine colonizing subject in women’s clothing, Kinko. Sakaguchi’s feminization of colonialism through the relationship between Jun and Kinko represents the relocation of the legacy of colonialism into a new union, and a supposedly new form of colonialism. Jun’s critiques of the riban policy ultimately work to promote the presence of colonial guidance in Taiwan, particularly with the Aborigines, rather than indicate the withdrawal of Japanese subjects from Taiwan. Because such policy was unsuccessful, Japanese subjects must remain in Taiwan and work with Aborigines for the improvement of colonial Taiwan. Through education and Japanese culture—typically female endeavors—Japanese colonialism will continue its civilizing mission along new trajectories, without a strong military or administrative (male) presence. Sakaguchi’s “Passionflower” shows how colonial subjects, including the author herself, negotiated the limitations of colonial discourse and the colonial project itself by discovering ways of acknowledging the problems of the colonial past without endangering the stability of the colonial present. By the latter years of empire, the numerous mistakes of colonial rule had come to light, particularly as a result of the numerous movements resisting Japanese imperial control. It was impossible at this point to avoid addressing the problems of Japanese colonial rule. However, instead of allowing such critiques to point to the need to question the colonial project as a whole, Sakaguchi creates a division between the colonial projects of the past, present, and future. After emphasizing the location of such mistakes in the past, 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono




Sakaguchi indicates alternatives for the present and future and ultimately creates a new narrative of colonial relations and new possibilities for the future of Taiwan. Thus, by creating a division between past and present colonial lineages, Sakaguchi rewrites the narrative of Japanese colonial history and enables a sequel that secures continued Japanese presence in colonial Taiwan. Sakaguchi also emphasizes similar divisions within the colonial literary lineage. While she acknowledges the work of other Japanese writing in and about Taiwan, she separates her own work from these writers by transforming the tropes utilized in their work. She complicates the tropes of nature and culture by expanding the possibilities for these categories. Furthermore, Sakaguchi emphasizes her own affiliation with the writers of Taiwan bungaku, who aimed at creating a body of literature that espoused realism and expressed the “authentic” essence of colonial Taiwan. She considers the consequences of Aboriginal-Japanese relations rather than dwelling on the romantic intrigue depicted by other Japanese. In other words, Sakaguchi attempts to position her work within a literary lineage that writes in, and about, the colonies, rather than with other Japanese who figuratively, and in some cases literally, wrote about Taiwan from a perspective “outside.” By differentiating her writing from the romanticized narratives of other Japanese, she identifies her work as an alternative mode of depicting the colonial condition. In the end, Sakaguchi’s literary and political lineages call for a kinder, gentler colonialism; however, her critiques do not call for decolonization because she does not, and to a certain extent cannot, advocate the expulsion of the Japanese presence from Taiwan. The shadow of official censorship of the initial version of “Passionflower” undoubtedly loomed over Sakaguchi’s second version, and certainly prevented the articulation of the radical idea of Japanese withdrawal from Taiwan. Moreover, Sakaguchi’s own affiliations, literary and colonial, ostensibly play a role in this failure. Her attempts to redefine colonial lineage may be seen as an attempt to create new possibilities for colonial Taiwan and its residents, herself included. She critically portrays past manifestations of the colonial project as a series of wellintended but ultimately misguided attempts. Sakaguchi then proceeds to write colonial lineages, both political and literary, that are seemingly distinguished from their predecessors. Yet, because her modified version of colonial lineage fails to completely divest the colonial project from its own ties to Japan, her revisions create “alternatives” but ultimately maintain Taiwan’s existence as a colonial state under Japanese control. Just as Jun returns to his Aborigine family in the



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arms of his Japanese wife, having been unsuccessful to end their pending union, Sakaguchi’s rendering of the colonial project send colonial Taiwan back into the arms of colonizing Japan. Rather than reading this ending as conveying a sense of relief at having recuperated the colonial relationship, however, we can see, interwoven in the final lines, a sense of despair at the seemingly unavoidable repetition of colonialism. The setting sun of the conclusion, for example, may be read as foreshadowing the twilight of the Japanese empire itself. In addition, the likening of Kinko’s words to a whip renders colonial discourse as an act of violence, and, despite Jun’s masochistic desire to be “hit again,” subtly identifies the “alternative” form of colonialism embodied by Kinko as a mere reiteration of the past. Ultimately, Sakaguchi’s narrative reveals the ways in which subjects, colonizing and colonized alike, are trapped within the cycle of colonial exploitation and oppression if they continue to support the Japanese colonial presence in Taiwan. While the colonial context may allow for partial critique, a challenge to the colonial system would otherwise not be successful unless it called for the end of colonialism itself. As Albert Memmi writes, “For the colonized just as for the colonizer, there is no way out other than a complete end to colonization.” 90 In order to escape the limitations of the colonial context, writers needed to be able to envision the possibility of decolonization. Memmi further suggests that as the colonized must “rise above his colonized being,” so must the colonizer “annihilate the colonizer within himself.” 91 Just as Jun cannot transcend his colonized subjectivity, Sakaguchi grounds her own identity, literary and political, within the colonies and, as a result, does not “annihilate the colonizer” within herself. While she attempts to work inside the system of colonialism by creating alternate visions of the colonial project, ultimately her critiques cannot facilitate change because they remain tied to Japanese colonial hegemony. Thus, although Sakaguchi rewrites Japanese colonialism, she is unable to produce an account of decolonization. Yet, her narrative points to both the problems of colonialism and the need for change. She emphasizes the seemingly unavoidable repetition of the colonial cycle and indicates the insufficiency of superficial modifications. Even while it does not call for decolonization, such a gesture certainly engages in critique and begins the process of considering alternatives to colonialism that can lead to the writing of a truly new lineage—of decolonization.







L ook i ng for L egi t i m ac y : Cu lt u r a l I de n t i t y a n d t h e I n t e r e t h n ic Fa m i ly i n C ol on i a l Kor e a

“It is a fact that intermarriage is most effective in facilitating harmony between Japanese and Koreans, and the recent remarkable trend in these marriages is a truly joyous matter.” —(Chōsen Jijō, December 1920)1 “A real harmonious cooperation between the two masses can only be realized when the seventy million of Japanese and twenty million of Koreans are united into one mutual accord.” —Governor-General Ugaki Kazushige speaking on the future of colonial Korea in 1934.2

D

uring the initial stages of Japan’s colonization of Korea, Japanese historians and anthropologists, often in the employ of the Japanese Ministry of Education, discussed “annexation” as the “reestablishment of the unity of the island race” or as the “return” of a “branch family” (bunke) to the “main family.”3 Framing annexation in familial terms transformed Japan’s colonial ambitions into a reunion of longseparated relatives rather than a political gesture motivated by economic and military concerns. Andre Schmid notes that this revisionist history of a shared lineage between Japan and Korea justified annexation as a way to “excise this sense of separateness that had been allowed—improperly, it was suggested—to develop over the past centuries.”4 Emphasizing this shared identity created a false sense of solidarity and intimacy that was repeatedly referenced by politicians, intellectuals, and literati alike to overcome political and cultural divisions between Japan and Korea. In fact, throughout the colonial period (1910–1945), familial imagery symbolized colonial relations between Japanese and Korean subjects in official and popular discourse.



3


The rendering of colonial relations in familial form was realized at the highest echelons by the betrothal of Korean and Japanese royalty. In July 1916, the Imperial Household Agency announced the engagement of Nashimoto Masako to the Crown Prince of Korea Yi Un. The Taishō Emperor (Yoshihito) approved the union on December 5, 1918 and plans were made for a wedding in January of the following year. The ceremony was postponed until April 28, 1920 due to the death of Yi Un’s father, Emperor Kojong, in January 1919, and the violent events of the March First Movement shortly thereafter. For many Koreans, the death of Kojong symbolized the end of both a dynasty and a sovereign Korean identity associated with the imperial lineage. On March 1, 1919, two days before the funeral ceremony for Kojong, thirty-three Korean activists read aloud a Declaration of Independence based upon U.S. President Woodrow Wilson’s doctrine of self-determination, and proclaimed Korea to be an independent nation.5 In subsequent months, the call for Korean independence further expanded and transformed into a nationwide popular movement with participants from all walks of life. The Japanese colonial police responded to these protests with arrests, imprisonment, and violence, actions censured by the Korean populace and the international community. As a result of the immense outcry against the Japanese colonial government’s violent reaction to the large-scale political demonstrations and their calls for independence, colonial officials were forced to revise their policies and practices in Korea. In a shift from the overt coercion of military rule (budan seiji) to the subtle manipulation of cultural rule (bunka seiji), the government general of Korea loosened its grip and allowed limited political and cultural freedoms.6 Both the death of Emperor Kojong and the March First Independence Movement had a monumental impact on Japan-Korea relations and inevitably affected the royal union as well. While the marriage had purportedly been arranged several years before the events of 1919, its function as a symbol of the unification of Japan and Korea resonated even more deeply in the aftermath of the events of March First. During this period of intense conflict and upheaval, Japanese colonial officials labeled this betrothal as an opportunity to legitimate the bonds between Korea and Japan and to stabilize Japan’s position in colonial Korea. Such treatment also extended to intermarriage in general. For example, in the wake of the March First Independence movement, Governor-General Hasegawa Yoshimichi (1916–1919) stated that mixed marriages, in addition to Japanese



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emigration and education reform, would “lead naturally to a unification of ways of thinking.”7 In the years of “cultural rule,” the colonial government thus evoked intermarriage as a means of legitimating and facilitating colonial relations. Korean and Japanese writers also incorporated images of interethnic romance and intermarriage in their literary work from the late nineteenth century and throughout the colonial period. Korean writers such as Yi Hyo-sok, Chang Hyok-chū, and Kim Sa-ryang created dramatic portrayals of interethnic relations, oftentimes focusing on the effects of these relationships on colonized Korean subjects.8 Likewise, Japanese writers, including Nakarai Tōsui, Ishikawa Tatsuzō, and Yuasa Katsue, also wrote fictional accounts of romance and intermarriage, with a significant number of these works centering on romantic relations between Japanese men and Korean women.9 Literary examples by both Korean and Japanese writers from 1920 on responded to and rearticulated the treatment of intermarriage in the media coverage of the royal wedding. Rather than portraying the harmony and unity celebrated in the official propaganda, however, these texts provided an alternate perspective on colonial unions by depicting the complexities and oftentimes the failings of such relations.10 This chapter will discuss the images of intermarriage and interethnic families in journalistic and literary texts in colonial Korea and their critique of colonial relations. The first section will examine the ways that official and journalistic coverage of the marriage of Yi Un and Nashimoto Masako in 1920 attempted to legitimize the colonial union of Japan and Korea through its reconfiguration into a familial form. Discussions of the royal marriage in the media set a precedent for the discourse of intermarriage and, by association, of the ties between these two nations. The next section will address significant themes and developments in literary representations of intermarriage between Japanese and Koreans and explore how such texts negotiated the changing social context of colonial Korea and portrayed the complexities and aftereffects of colonial union. Following this examination of literary treatments of interethnic relations, the chapter will focus on one specific example, Yuasa Katsue’s short story “Natsume” (Jujube, 1937), which depicts the coming-of-age of a young boy who is borne out of wedlock to a Japanese woman and Korean man.11 Amidst the confusing and contradictory web of popular and political discourses of Korean and Japanese cultural identity, the protagonist struggles with his status as an illegitimate, and consequently stateless, child. “Jujube” exposes the false promise of colonial union as a stabilizing and



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harmonious endeavor and ultimately challenges the foundations of colonial discourse. Yuasa’s story reveals the fictions of inclusion and legitimacy lurking behind the façade of colonial relations.

The topic of interethnic marriage first garnered public attention with the engagement of Japanese and Korean royalty. On April 28, 1920, the wedding of Crown Prince Yi Un and Princess Nashimoto Masako was held at Toriizaka, the Yi family’s residence in Tokyo. Occurring a little over a year after the March First uprisings, the arranged nuptials joined together the Japanese and Korean imperial lineages, and by association the nations of Japan and Korea. The celebratory images of the wedding festivities intimated that the conflicts in Japanese-Korean relations had been resolved. The details of the ceremony further reflect the significance of this union in the context of Japanese empire. The Yomiuri Shimbun, a leading Japanese newspaper, described the ceremony as a mix of Japanese and Western styles, way ō setch ū, or Taishō style, taish ōry ū.12 The bride wore a white Western-style wedding gown, a tulle veil elaborately decorated with ostrich feathers and a diamond tiara, while the groom was in formal military dress. The building where the ceremony was held had a Western façade and a Japanese interior.13 The abundance of hybrid Japanese-Western elements speaks to their popularity at the time, but also acts as an indicator of the modernity of both the marriage and Japan.14 In addition, the absence of any traces of Korean culture in the ceremony further emphasized Japan’s predominance and Korea’s resulting invisibility. Just as marriage legally recognizes the joining of two individuals and their families, the royal marriage also symbolically validated the union of Japan and Korea, a relationship that had been criticized as unlawful by Korean subjects since the signing of the protectorate treaty in 1905.15 In addition, the legitimation of the colonial relationship through this arranged marriage invoked the Confucian notion of the family as a pillar of society. Because the construct of the family occupied a central role in both societies, the significance of creating familial ties between Japan and Korea strengthened attempts to secure the colonial union. The use of family in the service of legitimating colonial relations was further expanded through the evocation of a putative shared “history” between Japan and Korea. In the Ch ōsen shimbun, the wedding was described as a “relationship of ethnicity and roots in



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common” (d ōzoku d ōkon no kankei) that “solidified the union of Japanese and Koreans” (naisen ry ōminzoku no ketsug ō o sara ni masumasu).16 The claims of an ethnic heritage possessed by both Japanese and Koreans reference different theories, categorized under the generic title Nissen d ōsoron, including the work of historians Hoshino Hisashi and Kume Kunitaka, linguist Kanazawa Shōzaburo, politician Ōkuma Shigenobu, and writer Tokutomi Sōho among others during the latter half of the Meiji period.17 While these writers used varying forms of historical, linguistic, and anthropological evidence, they all argued for the possibility of “shared origins” between Japanese and Koreans. Such narratives of a common history and lineage naturalized the connection between the two nations and helped justify the Japanese presence in Korea. Claims of shared ethnic roots were further extended to a shared familial connection. In a statement published in the Ch ōsen shimbun on the day following the wedding, the then Governor-General Saitō Makoto (1919–1927; 1929–1931) described the marriage as an expression of the bonding of Japan and Korea in one family or household (naisen ikka no shin) that will deepen the harmony and closeness of the two countries (y ūwa sara ni kinmitsu o kuwaeru).18 Saitō’s use of the term ikka evokes the dual meanings of one family and one household, and echoes the precolonial assertion that Japan and Korea were once part of the same “family.” Moreover, by stating that the marriage simply “adds to” (kuwaeru) the intimacy between Japan and Korea, Saitō reinforces a false narrative of Japanese-Korean harmony and ignores the numerous forms of anti-Japanese resistance, including the events of March First.19 Much of the journalistic coverage also emphasized the stability and length of a commitment such as marriage. The lead article of the April 29, 1920 Yomiuri shimbun, for example, described the wedding as an “eternal vow of Japanese-Korean unity” (nissen wagō no ikuhisashiki onchigiri) and an event “that must be recorded in Taishō history as the linchpin (kesshi) of Japanese-Korean harmony and integration.”20 While the phrase “eternal vow” is hardly unusual in the context of a wedding, this particular phrasing also reflects upon the colonial project and expresses the desire for the Japanese presence in Korea as a long-term endeavor. The term “[l]inchpin” as well emphasizes that the wedding has thus secured the unification of Japan and Korea and perhaps reinforced the possibilities of a harmonious relationship. Despite the official celebration of the royal marriage, critiques of both the marriage and the Japanese colonial presence persisted. In protest of the royal wedding, Sō San-han, a Korean student activist,





allegedly left threatening telegrams and phone calls to both the Korean and Japanese imperial families and planned to use a pistol and homemade explosives to assassinate the couple.21 In June 1920, the Paris-based Korean publication La Coree Livre (Jiy ū taikan, or in English, A Free Korea) criticized the marriage for contributing to the elimination of the Korean imperial lineage through a “tainting of the bloodline,” and beginning the process of implanting Japanese culture and policy into Korea.22 The latter claim was particularly pertinent as intermarriages between colonial subjects eventually became a venue for assimilation policy during the late colonial period. As these examples suggest, official legitimation was but one side of a hotly contested coin.

Intermarriage in Colonial Korea In addition to its symbolic resonance in the political sphere, the marriage of Yi Un and Nashimoto Masako also had an impact on the daily lives of many Japanese and Koreans. Specifically, the royal wedding cast a spotlight on the topic of intermarriage and paved the way for public discussions of the legal and political ramifications of such an undertaking. An article in the April 30, 1920 issue of the Ch ōsen shimbun declared that the royal wedding instigated the “resolution” (kaiketsu) of the long-term problem of Japanese-Korean marriages by initiating legal reform—specifically reform of marriage and family laws in Korea and Japan.23 While interethnic marriages had been possible even before the royal wedding, Japanese and Koreans marrying before 1920 could not be placed on their spouse’s family register due to differences in family law.24 As a result, many women, and some men as well, did not receive the benefits of marriage, including parental rights and inheritance in their spouse’s family, with some even losing their privileges with their birth families.25 In June 1921, the passage of Government General Order #99, the Intermarriage between Japanese and Koreans Act (Naisenjin ts ūkon h ōan) resolved inconsistencies in family law and legalized intermarriage in both Japan and Korea.26 The colonial administration celebrated the order as facilitating the unification and assimilation of Japanese and Koreans (naisenjin no y ūgō d ōka no tame).27 The government’s facilitation of intermarriage suggests a shift in the perceptions of interethnic relations and a move toward overcoming divisions between Koreans and Japanese. As suggested by the increase in the number of couples from 245 in 1923 to 1,029 in 1933, the order had an impact on interethnic couples and their families.28 Japanese and



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Korean women could now be placed on their spouse’s family register. In addition, the order also enabled Korean men to leave their own family registers for that of their wives. A Korean man who moved to his wife’s register could also become the legal head of household and, with that status, move his Korean relatives onto the Japanese family register as well.29 Yet, while the effects of the order are evident, the underlying motives behind these revisions to family law were not as apparent. Recent scholars state that, despite such reforms, intermarriage was not a high priority to the colonial government. Moriki Kazumi notes that, compared with the relatively minimal support of intermarriage, many more resources were used in the promotion of “brides to the continent” (tairiku no hanayome), that is, young Japanese women who were recruited to marry Japanese settlers in Manchuria.30 This allocation of government resources suggests the prioritization of the “brides to the continent” in the grand scheme of empire-building. Kim Yon-tal argues that the facilitation of intermarriage was motivated by the Japanese government’s desire to stabilize the family system and keep track of the citizens of empire.31 These concerns also surfaced in the 1920s. In one newspaper article, an employee in one of the branch offices of the GovernorGeneral of Korea, a Mr. Ōtsuka, stated that reforms would prevent instances of polygamy and other “unlawful” practices that were made possible by the gaps in Japanese and Korean family law.32 Ōtsuka gave the hypothetical situation of a Japanese woman marrying a Korean man in Korea. Even though the woman would be recorded on her husband’s Korean family register, she could also marry in Japan and have the second marriage valid under Japanese law, enabling her to commit “adultery” (y ūfukan). Legal reforms, according to Ōtsuka, would protect individuals from becoming victims of such unlawful acts by maintaining consistent records of marriages in Korea and Japan. The underlying concern of his argument is the management of the behavior and whereabouts of colonial subjects, particularly women. This line of thought thus points to the way in which the reform of marriage policies enabled the colonial government to retain control of its subjects and subsequently protect its authority in Korea. Throughout the colonial period, the colonial government continued to evoke intermarriage as a symbol of unification and harmony. In 1939, the journal Naisen ittai popularized the slogan “Advocating and practicing intermarriage as part of the move to unify Japan and Korea as a single entity.”33 In March 1941, two decades after the





royal wedding, intermarriage again came to the public’s attention when Governor-General Minami Jirō (1936–1942) presented commendations to couples of intermarriage.34 Minami awarded plaques to a total of 137 couples, commemorating their contribution to colonial relations. The plaques noted that the couples “as a part of their work for the empire, had promot(ed) the unification of Japan and Korea through intermarrying.”35 Minami’s gesture framed intermarriage as a way that Japanese and Korean subjects could both embody and facilitate colonial relations and participate in colonial assimilation policy. By the mid-1930s, the Japanese colonial government had already begun to implement policies that imposed Japanese cultural practices in the areas of religion, education, and language usage.36 Within this context, intermarriage represented another avenue for further inserting Japanese influence into the private lives of colonial subjects. Thus, while the colonial government’s promotion of these unions ostensibly surmounted ethnic biases, interethnic marriages were in fact co-opted for the purpose of furthering Japan’s cultural hegemony in Korea as both symbols of colonial union and sites for advancing the colonial project.37

Literary Renderings of Interethnic Relations Images of interethnic relationships, predominantly romance, appear in the work of both Korean and Japanese writers even before the beginning of Japan’s occupation of Korea. In the years before “annexation,” works by Japanese writers reflected the seeds of colonial hierarchy appearing in popular discussions of the “opening” of Korea and the introduction of “civilized” practices to Koreans.38 For example, Nakarai Tōsui’s Kosa fuku kaze (The Wind Blowing Incantation, 1891) is one of the earliest Japanese-language portrayals of interethnic romance. Tōsui (1860–1926), most well-known as Higuchi Ichiyō’s mentor, spent his youth in Pusan, Korea, while his father worked as a liaison in diplomacy and trade between Japan and Korea.39 One of the storylines of Tōsui’s novel focuses on the developing romance between a Japanese man and Korean woman after the man helps the woman escape the unwanted attentions of a Korean official.40 The novel contrasts the heroic behavior of a Japanese man with the crude violence of the corrupt Korean official, reinforcing an ethnic binary that characterizes Koreans as feudalistic and uncivilized. Other Japanese-authored texts from this period exhibited imperialist leanings through such elements as the uneven portrayal of



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Japanese and Korean characters and the focalization of the narrative through a Japanese perspective.41 Yosano Tekkan’s Tōzai namboku (North, South, East, and West, 1896), for example, demonstrates a proto-colonialist (as well as class and gender) hierarchy with Japanese occupying higher positions of power in relation to Koreans.42 The portrayal of romantic relations between a Japanese man and a Korean kisaeng utilizes constructions of gender that locate the Korean characters, and by association Korea, in a position of subalterity vis-a-vis Japan.43 In addition, by filtering the narrative through a Japanese character, Tekkan privileged the views and experiences of Japanese and relegated Korean characters to the status of objects. These Japanese literary portrayals of interethnic relations in the years before annexation thus reflected the development of colonialist attitudes toward Korea and the construction of Koreans as a colonial Other. Despite the Manichean portrayals of Koreans and Japanese prior to annexation, Japanese literary representations of interethnic relations became increasingly complex by late 1920s. In their portrayals of interethnic relations, Japanese and Korean writers negotiated with the popular treatment of such couples and, particularly during the 1920s and 1930s, reformulated such images to reflect alternative perspectives on the colonial enterprise itself. Instead of maintaining conventional hierarchies between Japanese colonizers and Korean colonized subjects, many writings from the late 1920s and 1930s portray characters whose lives are complicated by the intersections of gender, class, ethnicity, and nation. For example, while Ishikawa Tatsuzō’s “Hō Seika” (Hō Seika, 1938) contains the familiar pattern of a relationship between a Japanese man and a Korean hostess, the title character exhibits a strong sense of self, manifest in her repeated resistance to the advances of her Japanese client.44 Literary scholar Nam Pu-jin suggests that the increasing complexity of these depictions reflected the influence of proletarian literature, which stressed equal treatment of Korean and Japanese as “comrades” in class struggle, and opened up possibilities outside of an ethnocentric hierarchy of colonizer and colonized.45 Reaching its peak during this same period in both Japan and Korea, the proletarian arts movement focused on improving the lives of the working class and strove to join workers worldwide by transcending national boundaries.46 While many of the complicated portrayals of Korean-Japanese relations may have been influenced by proletarian ideology, these works do not completely elude colonial hierarchy. Increased interactions and awareness between Japanese and Koreans may have also played a part in the greater sophistication of





literary treatments of interethnic relations during this period. Throughout the colonial period, significant numbers of Japanese and Koreans traveled between Korea and Japan, gaining knowledge and experience from their interactions with each other. The Japanese population in Korea, for example, quadrupled between 1905 and 1910.47 By 1925, the number had increased to 411,595.48 Furthermore, confronted with the increasingly public presence of intermarriages in the wake of the royal wedding, Japanese writers may have been forced to modify their colonialist fantasies to accommodate the growing awareness of colonial Korea. While the increased popular awareness of interethnic marriages may have affected literary representations, it is important to note that the number of Japanese representations of interethnic marriage remained relatively small, even after the legal facilitation of such relationships in 1921. Starting in the late 1930s, representations of interethnic romance and marriage became a popular topic of literary exploration for Korean writers.49 Some of these works followed in the vein of popular portrayals of romances with café waitresses (joky ū) or kisaeng and focused their attentions on Japanese women. Yi Hyo-sok, for example, depicted a group of young Korean men’s fascination with a “chameleonlike” Japanese hostess in his short story “Gin no masu” (Silver Trout, 1939).50 On the other hand, a significant number of works, mainly written in Korean until the prohibition of Koreanlanguage publishing in 1940, reflected the critical perspectives on the Japanese colonial presence, ranging from commentary on specific colonial policies to explorations of the psychological effects of the Japanese occupation. After the advocacy of interethnic marriage by the then Governor-General, Minami Jirō in 1941, the depiction of marriages in particular became increasingly prevalent among literati and the mass media.51 Literary scholar Im Jon-hye notes that, in the later years of colonialism, romance and marriage became mainstays in the journal Kukmin munhak (National Literature), reflecting writers’ receptivity to the notion of naisen ittai.52

Yuasa K atsue and “Jujube” Yuasa Katsue’s short story, “Jujube,” is one of the only Japanese representations of interethnic marriage.53 The story first appeared in the July 1937 issue of Ch ūō k ōron and, as the author himself noted, was his last piece written during the wartime period to be free of censorship.54 Yuasa had already touched on the topic of interethnic romance and marriage in, respectively, his short stories “Kannani” (Kannani,



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1935) and “Imin” (Immigrants, 1936).55 Unlike these previous works, however, “Jujube” focuses primarily on an interethnic couple and their child. Produced within a context where intermarriage was yoked to colonial relations and the colonial project, this story starkly contrasts the images of harmony and unification prevalent in the earlier official and journalistic treatment of intermarriage. “Jujube” centers on Kim Tarō, the illegitimate son of a Korean man and a Japanese woman. Kim Tarō’s parents met in Japan where his father Tae-gil, a young Korean man of elite yangban lineage, was studying. The couple consummated their relationship while still in Tokyo, and planned to marry in Korea. However, upon their arrival, Tae-gil confessed to his lover that he had been in an arranged marriage since age thirteen. The situation is further complicated by the revelation that Tarō’s mother, who remains nameless throughout the story, was pregnant. The couple asked Tarō’s grandfather to annul the first marriage and allow them to marry, but he angrily rejected their request. Despite their inability to wed, the couple attempted to maintain some semblance of a familial structure. Tarō and his mother remained in Korea, living on the outskirts of town and respectability, while Tarō’s father Tae-gil, who lived with his Korean family, visited regularly. Because his parents do not marry, Tarō cannot receive legal recognition as his father’s son. Consequently, even though the patrilineal system would usually designate Tarō as Korean, he is in fact neither Korean nor Japanese in legal terms. To resolve this situation, Tarō’s parents have him adopted by a neighboring Japanese man, Inui. Several months later, Tarō’s mother flees the village, abandoning Tarō, who is forced to live permanently with his adoptive Japanese father. In between occasional visits with his father Tae-gil, Tarō attempts to escape the harassment by his peers and Inui by finding solace in fantasies about his biological parents. In Tarō’s mind, his parents were forced against their will to leave him and return to their respective “homes.” However, the story concludes with Tarō’s image of his parents being shattered as a result of two crucial events. First, upon watching his father kowtow to his grandfather, Tarō realizes Tae-gil’s complicity in Tarō’s exclusion from his Korean heritage. Second, by chance, Tarō discovers that his mother had run off to Keijō (Seoul) with her lover instead of returning to naichi (Japan) as he had imagined. These two revelations result in Tarō’s realization of his complete abandonment by his parents. Critics have generally interpreted “Jujube” through a biocritical lens, reflecting on both the author’s life experience and his political





stance on colonialism. Born in Japan in 1910, Yuasa lived in Korea from 1916 to 1925 where his father was a colonial policeman.56 Because “Jujube,” like other works by Yuasa, is set during this same period, several critics have labeled the character of Tarō as a surrogate for the author.57 Kurokawa Sō describes the work as a “literary selfportrait” (bungakutekina jigaz ō) and views Kim Tarō as the embodiment of Yuasa’s own confused identity and conflicted loyalties.58 The biocritical approach leads to questions on how the story reflects Yuasa’s stance on colonialism—specifically, whether he was complicit or resistant in the colonial project. In the postwar period, “Jujube” was included in the anthology Nihon teik ō bungakusen (Collection of Japanese Resistance Literature, 1955).59 While the editors do not explain the specific ways that “resistance” was manifest in Yuasa’s story, they note that each of the anthology selections represent diverse forms of opposition against Japanese imperialism and the war effort expressed by Japanese literati during World War II.60 More recently, however, scholars of Japanese literature have questioned the notion of Yuasa as a “resister” of Japanese imperialism and colonialism. Discussing several other works by Yuasa, Takasaki Ry ūji criticized Yuasa’s appropriation of colonized characters to voice his own colonialist views.61 Ikeda Hiroshi describes “Jujube” as a contradictory combination of colonial critique and a lack of awareness of colonizer privilege.62 According to Ikeda, although Yuasa critically underscores certain aspects of colonial society, such as Japanese discrimination against Koreans, he ultimately maintains the colonial structure in Korea by not questioning the very presence of Japanese, including himself, in colonial Korea. Im Jon-hye notes how Yuasa’s status as a second-generation colonizer implicates him in the colonial project and colors his nostalgic perceptions of Korea as his homeland (koky ō).63 Mark Driscoll introduces tenk ō, conversion, into his commentary on Yuasa’s work, aligning the writer with Korean, rather than Japanese, leftists.64 These evaluations are linked to the question of Yuasa’s personal views on the colonial project and, specifically, whether he resisted against or complied with colonialism. Yet, while it is important to acknowledge the inconsistencies in the story’s treatment of colonialism, this chapter will consider how such contradictions figure into one particular vision of the colonial project. Rather than viewing the story as a reflection of the experience of the author, this chapter will consider Yuasa’s use of tropes of family in the formulation of a specific kind of colonial identity that allows for both critique and compliance with the colonial project. In “Jujube,”



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Questioning Colonial Legitimacy Unlike official propaganda and media portrayals of interethnic families, “Jujube” starts from the premise of colonial union as illegitimate. The unmarried status of Tarō’s parents renders the relationship illegitimate and consequently excludes the individual family members from the privileges of a legally recognized family: inheritance and parental rights, and social acceptance. This portrayal also opens the door to alternative, and even critical, perspectives of colonial relations. As discussed earlier, images of interethnic marriage in the mass media resonated as symbols of colonial union, oftentimes with the purpose of imbuing the colonial relationship with the stability and legitimacy associated with the structure of family. Yuasa’s portrait of an “illegitimate” interethnic family, however, undermines such associations and, furthermore, evokes the popular critiques of Japan’s colonization of Korea as unlawful.65 The Korean patriarch’s resistance to the couple’s marriage also challenges idealized notions of intermarriage in the media by revealing conflicts between Japanese and Koreans in colonial Korea. The scenario of a Japanese woman moving to Korea to wed her Korean lover, who is, unbeknownst to her, already married, appears in several examples of Japanese and Korean literary texts.66 Whether the popularity of this storyline reflects actual circumstances, this setup portrays colonial relations as marred by deception and miscommunication. Moreover, this scenario posits a conflict between tradition and modernity in colonial Korea. Contrasting with the traditional practice of arranged marriage, interethnic romance and marriage privileged the desires of the individual subjects over the demands of the larger collective, the family or the nation. The conflicted choice between an arranged marriage and a modern one suggested the persistence of feudal beliefs in colonial Korea and, in particular, the suppression of individual desires. While the story is premised upon colonial union, it focuses primarily on the fruit of that union, here embodied in the illegitimate Korean-Japanese son. Yuasa’s centering the story on a child of



Yuasa explores the challenges faced by a child of colonial union and underscores the multiple factors contributing to the disharmony and fracture of colonial relations. By focusing on the disjuncture between political and cultural legitimacy, “Jujube” compels readers to reexamine assumptions about colonial relations and the formations of identity, both Japanese and “colonial,” within the colonial context.


colonial union inclines readers toward the story’s critical approach to the colonial family. Specifically, the naiveté and helplessness of Yuasa’s child protagonist evoke readers’ sympathies and further magnifies the effects of his parents’ neglectful behavior. The divisions between the interethnic couple, which they largely avoid by fleeing or neglect, are borne by their son, the story’s protagonist, who inherits their illegitimate status. As mentioned earlier, from a legal perspective, Tarō is in fact neither Korean nor Japanese and, as a result, is stateless and struggles to find a place for himself in colonial society. Yuasa emphasizes the protagonist’s divided position through the unique rendering of Tarō’s name throughout the work. His family name, Kim, identifies his ties to his Korean father, and his proper name, Tarō, indicates his Japanese mother. Although the protagonist’s name itself is not particularly surprising in light of his parentage, Yuasa continues to stress Tarō’s “divided” origins by consistently referring to him by his full name throughout the entire work. In addition, Yuasa clearly divides the two parts of Tarō’s name (and two facets of his identity) using punctuation to explicitly separate the Korean and Japanese elements.67 Unusual in the delineation of names in both Japanese and Korean, this insertion of punctuation prevents the Korean elements of the name from being subsumed by an audience reading the name as strictly Japanese, specifically, as the proper name Kintarō, and eliminating his Korean heritage.68 These efforts to prevent misreadings indicate the importance of the protagonist’s dual origins, whose conflicting loyalties ultimately plague Tarō throughout the narrative. The literal division of Tarō’s name also emphasizes the figurative boundary between these two identities that were constructed as mutually exclusive. Despite theories propounding Japan and Korea’s shared ethnic origins (nissen d ōsoron) in the past, official and popular discourse clearly differentiated between these two identities throughout the colonial period.69 In 1910, historian Kita Teikichi, for example, explained that the geographical separation of Japan and Korea resulted in the development of cultural differences despite their “common ancestry.”70 Such differences may have included the allegedly “unenlightened” nature of Koreans or their “unhygienic practices.”71 The delineation of differences between Japanese and Koreans disallowed identification with both identities. As a result, subjects of Korean-Japanese backgrounds, like the protagonist of “Jujube,” were forced to choose between these two identities. Yuasa was not the only writer to explore the challenges of Korean-Japanese subjectivity. Published shortly after the publication



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of “Jujube,” several stories by Chang Hyok-chū (1905–1997) and Kim Sa-ryang (1914–1950) depict the discrimination experienced by the children of “mixed marriages.”72 In Chang’s “Yūshū jinsei” (Best Life, 1937), for example, the first-person narrator, the son of a Korean laborer and a Japanese factory worker, endures bullying at school in Japan and rejection by his Japanese mother as a result of his Korean heritage.73 Chang’s short story “Fun’iki” (Atmosphere, 1938) focuses on the love affairs of a geisha, who was the daughter of a Korean landowner and a Japanese geisha. Both stories depict such characters as coming to despise their Korean heritage as a result of the Japanese prejudice they endure. After the protagonist of “Best Life” adopts a Japanese name, the discrimination he had regularly faced under a Korean name ends. Subsequently, he begins to reject all things Korean, including his father, whom he blames for his plight. Similarly, the young woman in “Atmosphere” experiences a comparable reaction when a marriage arrangement falls through as a result of her Korean heritage. Chang’s characters come to deny their Korean identities and instead attempt to pass as Japanese.74 In contrast, Kim Sa-ryang’s “Hikari no naka ni” (In the Light, 1939) also portrays a young boy’s struggle with his Korean and Japanese heritages. However, unlike Chang, his stories conclude with the protagonist’s decision to embrace his Korean identity.75 While the endings from these stories differ, the results are similar in that the protagonist must choose between identifying as Japanese or Korean. Yuasa also portrays his protagonist’s difficulties with discrimination and the dilemma of identity, and, while he comes to an altogether different conclusion, initially positions Tarō on the path toward a Japanese identity. The story’s use of adoption allows reflection upon the development of identity in the colonial context. In other literary traditions, the trope of adoption allows for discussion of such issues as the role of family in identity formation and the effects of lost origins.76 Tarō’s mother pushes a Japanese identity upon the young boy by having Tarō adopted by a Japanese neighbor, Inui. Through this process, Tarō is placed on a Japanese family register and given access to a legally recognized Japanese identity. Adoption, described by Taimie Bryant as the “creation of fictive kinship ties,” was a common practice in Japan as a means of continuing a family lineage.77 While in Japan adoption was often performed primarily for the benefit of the adopting family, the adoptee also gained access to the resources available through the family and the nation-state. In the case of “Jujube,” adoption functions as a way for Taro to access the privileges of





a Japanese subject and to craft a new narrative of identity. Tarō possesses kinship ties to both Korea and Japan and yet, because of the cultural construction of the patriarchal family and cultural identity in the Japanese empire, such ties are nullified. Through adoption, Tarō (re)gains ties with Japan and the accompanying privileges of citizenship. However, while adoption serves as a path to gaining legal status, legality does not necessarily guarantee legitimacy. Adoption also enables Tarō to access a specific kind of education reserved for Japanese subjects. Education plays a vital role in the formation of cultural identity and thus represents another avenue toward acquiring cultural legitimacy. In Korea, as in other sites of empire, schools functioned as venues for promoting the colonial project by facilitating “integration and assimilation” of colonized subjects.78 Between 1905 and 1922, Japanese and Korean students attended segregated schools differing in curriculum and resources. With different course offerings for Japanese and Korean students, colonial schools guided their young charges in their different roles in empire. By 1929, under the requirements of the government general, the curriculum for Korean students included Japanese language, history, and ethics in order to help Koreans become “good imperial subjects of the Japanese empire.”79 As part of the larger policy of assimilation, such schools worked to produce a Korean identity that was both separate from and inferior to Japanese.80 On the other hand, the curriculum in Japanese schools inculcated loyalty to Japan and the Japanese emperor and ingrained a sense of a unique national and cultural identity. The separate curricula and schools emphasize the divisions between Korean and Japanese identities. Yet, while the characters seek out legitimacy through adoption and education, these officially sanctioned methods remain inadequate in the face of popular constructions of Japanese identity. Even though adoption may give Tarō Japanese citizenship, it does not guarantee access to a Japanese cultural identity. As Yuasa shows, legitimacy entails not only official recognition by the state but also acknowledgement by other individuals. In other words, a Japanese identity requires more than an official seal of approval. By highlighting the insufficiency of official recognition, the narrative induces readers to consider the implications for intermarriage and the colonial union itself. Colonial officials and the media portrayed the royal marriage as the legitimation of the colonial union. Yet, as evinced by the history of anti-Japanese colonial resistance and Japanese discrimination against Koreans, such attempts remained unsuccessful and the promises of harmony and unity were not achieved.



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The insufficiency of officially sanctioned forms of legitimation, adoption and education, is further shown through the Japanese characters’ questioning of Tarō’s Japanese identity. Despite Tarō’s acquisition of legal status as Japanese, both his adoptive father and the boy’s Japanese classmates continuously challenge this affiliation. For example, in order to “bring (Tarō) up to be a good Japanese,” Inui subjects Tarō to physical training every day.81 Those times, stumbling on the hill of the shrine, falling and hitting his heavy head on the ice, and rolling down the slippery hill, Kim Tarō would involuntarily sob “Mommy.” From the top of the hill, Inui would cheer him on. “Tarō, aren’t you Japanese? If you are, hurry and get on up here.” Kim Tarō would sob “Yes, yes,” grit his teeth and run up the hill. At the top, Inui would pat his shoulders and happily wiggle his white brush-like eyebrows and say, “Well, I guess you do have the Yamato spirit after all.” However, sometimes, having fallen on the ice, Tarō would cry, “I don’t care about being Japanese.” Inui would walk down the hill and curse him, “Coward. What will you do then? Your mother abandoned you and ran off. Don’t you want to be a great man and get back at her?”82

By completing these physical challenges, Tarō would show Inui that he possesses the Yamato spirit (yamato-damashii), proof of his Japanese identity. The notion of the Yamato spirit frequently appeared in nationalist and militarist discourse of the first half of the twentieth century, and represented a uniquely Japanese ethos including such qualities as purity and resilience. Sandra Wilson notes that, in the media coverage of both the Manchurian and Shanghai incidents, the Yamato spirit was held up as a quality differentiating the population of Japan from those of “the West” and China.83 This abstract notion represented a means of defining national identity and cultivating support for Japan’s imperialist efforts. Furthermore, although public discourse claimed that all Japanese possessed this quality, the Yamato spirit was oftentimes manifest in a specifically masculine form associated with bravery and strength.84 Through Inui, Tarō is not just learning how to be Japanese but also how to be a Japanese man, something that his mother cannot teach him. This moment thus speaks to the gendered construction of national and cultural identities and also gestures at the patriarchal limitations on women’s access to privileges as national subjects. Yuasa emphasizes the impossibility of Tarō achieving his goal of a Japanese identity through the Sisyphean form of his task. Like



Embodying a Japanese Identity


Sisyphus, Tarō must reach the top of the hill in order to escape a “terrible fate.” In other words, he must physically train in order to inhabit a Japanese body and identity and avoid perpetual dislocation.85 But even with successful completion of his undertaking, Tarō must repeat the act in order to continue to prove himself to Inui and (re)claim Japaneseness.86 Tarō’s final destination at the top of the hill, a Shinto shrine, simultaneously evokes both a uniquely Japanese identity and Japanese assimilation policy. By identifying the destination of Taro’s race toward the Yamato spirit, Yuasa links Taro’s process of identity formation with the assimilation process that the colonial government imposed upon colonized subjects. In both Taiwan and Korea, the Japanese colonial government required colonized subjects to visit Shinto shrines as part of cultural assimilation policies.87 Tarō’s daily ordeal reflects upon that of colonized subjects who were repeatedly forced to prove their allegiance to Japan. Furthermore, in the same way that Taro’s successful completion of his daily tasks remained insufficient, the performance of assimilation by colonized subjects never resulted in the fulfillment of promises of equality with Japanese. The difficulty (and in fact impossibility) of fully achieving a Japanese identity becomes apparent as readers encounter multiple versions of Japaneseness in Yuasa’s story. While Inui constantly asks Tarō to prove his Yamato spirit through rigorous physical training, Tarō’s Japanese classmates dismiss the possibility of his being Japanese after seeing that his biological father is Korean. The day after a classmate sees Tarō eating noodles with his topknotted father at the market, Tarō arrives at school to discover that his secret has been revealed. Then, Tarō could hear Matsuda’s dramatic retelling of the previous day’s events. “Kim Tarō’s father had a topknot. He’s a topknotted yobo!” Kim Tarō retorted, “You’re lying. Who had a topknot?!” and grabbed Matsuda, but all around were the jeering eyes of the other students. Tarō wrestled with Matsuda and fell to the ground. Two or three other students descended upon Tarō in a cloud of poplar cotton and began to choke him. Overwhelmed, Tarō thought to himself, “Damn. I mustn’t cry. I do have the Yamato spirit!”88

The children’s exchange clearly shows the view of Japanese and Korean identities as mutually exclusive. In the eyes of Tarō’s Japanese classmates, filial ties to a Korean man invalidate Tarō’s claim to a Japanese identity. Because Taro had internalized these biases against Koreans, he denies that his father is Korean, presumably to protect his



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own Japanese identity. This passage thus underscores the dilemma that colonized subjects and colonial Korea faced: how can colonial Korea ever achieve parity with Japan and inclusion in empire if its Korean origins exclude it from such status? This passage is also significant for introducing different standards of Japaneseness in this particular context. Tarō’s possession of the Yamato spirit is irrelevant to the other children. While Inui may acknowledge Tarō as Japanese for fulfilling his arbitrary requirements, Tarō’s classmates, on the other hand, do not value or even seem familiar with this allegedly Japanese ethos. Instead, these Japanese children who have lived their entire lives in Korea possess a different notion of a Japanese, or naichi, identity. In fact, their ignorance of the Yamato spirit highlights the constructed nature of Japanese identity, produced in relation to the historical conditions in which it emerges as well as to the location of the subjects who are constructing these identities. Yuasa reveals the different valences that Japan, or the naichi, had for colonial subjects. While subjects born and raised in Japan view the Japanese archipelago as “home,” ethnically Japanese subjects born in Korea possess a different association with Japan. One day, (Tarō’s mother) asked in a voice as low as the murmuring of a stream, “Tarō, shall we return to Japan?” He looked at her face lit up by the moonlight and her brooding eyes framed by girlish bangs, and somehow had a sense of foreboding. When he responded, “Will Papa go with us?” his mother suddenly paused and then replied, “I was just kidding.”89 (italics, my emphasis)

The scene above takes place immediately after Kim Tarō’s parents argue over whether their son will attend a school for Koreans or for Japanese. His mother’s idea of returning to Japan reveals not only her concern about her son’s upbringing but also her own nostalgia. The conversation also establishes the different ties that Tarō and his mother have with Japan and Korea. The mother’s use of the verb “to return” (kaeru) indicates that she views Japan as a home base she will revisit. In contrast, Tarō’s use of the verb “to go” (iku) reminds her that Tarō has never been to Japan, a place that is neither the “home” of her son nor his father. This small detail highlights the gulf separating Tarō and his mother. Although Tarō may be biologically related to her, he does not possess the same cultural (or emotional) ties to Japan. The gap between them is further pronounced in Tarō’s concern for his father, a fact that reminds both the mother and the reader of Tarō’s connection to Korea. This scene thus emphasizes the





separation of subjects of colonial Korea from both Japanese and Koreans and places them in a liminal position (neither Japanese nor Korean). “Jujube” reveals the heterogeneity of Japanese identity in the colonies and the metropole. While Inui clings to a fiction of Japanese identity manifest in the Yamato spirit, the children possess their own fantasies of Japanese identity through their particular notion of the naichi. Not simply a location, the naichi represents an affiliation and identity that shapes the lives of the children, and other Japanese, in the colonies. For example, to young Tarō and his Japanese classmates, anything from the naichi, whether it is a pencil or a person, is viewed as stylish and exotic.90 At school, everything was naichi, naichi. “Cool, that’s a cool pencil.” “Well, that’s because it’s from the naichi.” “My older brother’s getting married, and his bride came from the naichi.” “You’re lying!” “No, really, she really came from the naichi.”

Envious of their classmate and fascinated by the aura of the naichi, the children rush to watch the bridal procession of their classmate’s brother and clamor to view the bride from the naichi. However, upon seeing her, they comment that she is not especially pretty. In fact, it is only her scent, like chestnut blossoms, which is identified as particularly distinct, the smell of the naichi. The children’s innocent perspective allows for honesty regarding their disappointment in the bride, and gestures at the exotic mythologizing of naichi. Furthermore, this particular scene also shows the importance of this belief in the naichi. Although the bride is disappointing in her looks, her scent distinguishes her from other women with whom the children have daily contact. The children grasp for anything, even smell, to justify the special quality of a woman from naichi. In light of the discourse of shared ethnic origins and the physical similarities of Koreans and Japanese, the choice of odor to distinguish between the naichi and the gaichi is revealing. The absence of visible physical differences would invalidate the distinction between naichi and the gaichi, but scent represents a plausible, if not completely convincing, signifier of difference. These children have created their own fiction of a naichi identity for the purposes of legitimizing their own heritage and their own status within colonial Korea. This moment thus points to the constructed nature of Japanese identity and the heterogeneous forms extant throughout the empire. For both Inui and Tarō’s classmates, managing the boundaries of Japaneseness protects their own claims to that identity. The



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interactions between these characters indicate the insufficiency of official recognition in proving cultural identity, and also emphasize the multiplicity of such identities. Yet, despite the different forms of Japanese identity circulating the colonies, the ethnically Japanese characters are able to maintain their access to colonizer privilege because of their lineage. On the other hand, for subjects like Tarō, the multiple forms of Japanese identity further exacerbate the dislocation and alienation of the colonial subject.

Locating Colonial Identity Yuasa also emphasizes Tarō’s figurative displacement by portraying his literal dislocation throughout the story. Various settings in the story, such as a local Shinto shrine and the marketplace, represent particular identities and allow Taro to explore his Japanese and Korean roots. One form of a Japanese identity, for example, is situated in the Shinto shrine to which Taro’s adoptive father had him run every day. By reaching this destination, Taro could “place” himself as an elevated Japanese and seemingly escape from his position of liminality. Yet, while some locales signify a single identity, others are occupied by multiple identities. The most significant location is the marketplace, where the story begins: Almost all of his memories of his mother were associated with the marketplace. Was it because the image of his mother disappearing out of sight at the market was seared into young Kim Tarō’s chest? Or was it because he waited with excitement for the small market to come every few days to his dull village?91

This opening passage captures the conflicting significances of this setting for our young protagonist. On the one hand, market day represents a time of reunion for Tarō and his parents; Taro’s father visits the boy and his mother when making his weekly trips to the market as a vendor of rubber boots. Alternately, the marketplace was also the site where Tarō last saw his mother, who bought her son a Japanese sword there before abandoning him. One could also read the symbolism of the marketplace as a gesture to Yuasa’s previous proletarian affiliations—specifically as a locale where subjects with different national and ethnic affiliations join together by unifying over class concerns. Yet, the function of the marketplace in the narrative as a site of both unification and abandonment suggests that while this locale may allow for exchange of goods and services between Japanese and Koreans, it does not represent a proletarian ideal. The vendors and





customers at the marketplace do not transcend their national and ethnic identities, nor do they escape the hierarchies of class, ethnicity, and colonialism. Instead, the market represents the (not necessarily harmonious) coexistence of Japanese and Koreans and in fact encapsulates the realities of colonial conflict. The fact that Taro is repeatedly identified as a “child of the market” (ichi no ko) further emphasizes the boy’s conflicted colonial identity. The irrevocability of Taro’s displacement becomes apparent in the final section of the story when he discovers that his mother has not returned to Japan as he had imagined and instead has been working as a waitress in Keijō. Learning his mother’s whereabouts forces Tarō to acknowledge that she left her life with him and not, as he thought, life in Korea. Upon discovering this information, Tarō sobs and tears up some pictures that he had drawn of their former home. By destroying the sketches, Taro rejects the fictions he had created about his mother and their life together. The demise of this final familial fantasy signifies Taro’s coming-of-age and his complete displacement in colonial society. He has learned the difficult truth about his parents and has realized his independence from them. The story’s conclusion thus reveals the inclusion and harmony of both colonial union and the notion of family to be fictions.

Conclusion This chapter addressed the ways that images of interethnic marriage were used to comment on the Japanese colonial presence in Korea. Official portrayals of the arranged marriage between Japanese and Korean royalty emphasized the harmony and unity of coupling in order to legitimate the unstable relationship between Japan and Korea. Literary representations of interethnic marriage and families drew upon such images popularized by both the colonial government and the media but provided alternate narratives on colonial relations. Yuasa Katsue’s short story “Jujube” stands out from other literary treatments because it reformulates the popular representation of interethnic marriage and focuses on the effects of colonial relations. By exploring the conflicts between Koreans and Japanese in the colonial context, “Jujube” provides a portrait of interethnic relations vastly different from the images of unity, harmony, and stability in the official treatment of interethnic marriages. Yuasa underscores the instability of both Japanese and Koreans in the colonial context and the resulting struggle for legitimacy. The Japanese characters in the story each work to justify their presence in Korea and affirm their status as



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colonizing subjects through specific constructions of Japanese identity. While receiving less attention in the narrative, the Korean characters also struggle for legitimacy through their attempts to resist marginalization in colonial society. The depiction of these characters’ struggles to establish their identities underscores the ways in which the colonial context further heightened the contests of nation, culture, and identity. Yuasa’s exploration of the issues of legitimacy and identity also provokes questions regarding Japanese claims on the colonial project. The protagonist’s conflicted ties to his parents reflect the dilemma of colonial Korea itself, negotiating between the influences of Japan and traditional Korea. Furthermore, the protagonist’s failed search for legitimacy suggests that colonial Korea too remains marginalized because of its illegitimate status. Tarō’s inability to obtain recognition as Japanese may be read as a critique of assimilation policy, which falsely promised Koreans equality with Japanese on the condition of their taking on Japanese cultural practices. These elements of the narrative cast a critical gaze upon Japan’s management of colonial Korea. Although Yuasa likens colonial relations between Japan and Korea to that of a fractured interethnic family and challenges the idealized images of harmony and unity, the story ultimately does not dismiss the colonial project as a whole. Instead, “Jujube” presents an alternative formulation of a colonial identity independent from Japan. Just as Tarō, a child borne of colonial union, grows up with minimal support from his parents, colonial Korea as well, having been “abandoned” by Japan, may also persist as an independent body. This gesture at independence, however, is not a call for decolonization but rather a subtle acknowledgement of a uniquely colonial subjectivity. While Yuasa distinguishes this hybrid subjectivity, he also acknowledges that this subject may remain in perpetual dislocation. The dilemma of the colonial subject then remains how to locate himself and escape from being the perpetually significant other to Japanese and Koreans.







M a r r i age , Mode r n i z at ion, a n d t h e I m pe r i a l Su bj ec t

A

fter being established as a symbol of colonial union in Korea in the 1920s, marriages between Japanese and colonized subjects took on further significance in the colonial project as a part of the imperial-subject movement (k ōminka, or imperialization) in Taiwan in the late 1930s. As noted in an earlier chapter, imperialization began in Taiwan in 1937 under Governor-General Kobayashi Seizō (1936– 1940) and pressured Taiwanese subjects to take on Japanese cultural practices.1 Such efforts, later expanded to target subjects in Korea, aimed to “shap(e) the loyalties and outlook of indigenous peoples toward Japan through moral education and Japanese language training and to limit their educational advancement to the acquisition of vocational and practical skills.”2 In Taiwan, the movement indirectly promised equality with ethnic Japanese if Taiwanese subjects engaged in such practices as mandatory Japanese-language education, military conscription, Shintō religious practice, and the acquisition of a Japanese name. These activities were framed as steps toward modernization and oftentimes juxtaposed with traditional practices. During this same period, the Government General of Taiwan promoted marriages between Taiwanese and Japanese subjects as a way for the former to publicly declare their ties to Japan and access the knowledge and status of Japanese through their spouses. At the same time, such colonial unions provided Japanese subjects with a way to (re)affirm their own colonizer status through their newly acquired roles as “educators” of their colonized spouses. Under imperialization policy, marriage thus functioned as a key element in the path toward imperial subjecthood for both Taiwanese and Japanese. This view of interethnic marriage appears in literature of the period, the most apt example of which is Shōji Sōichi’s award-winning novel Chin Fujin (Madame Chen, 1940). Shōji’s Madame Chen interweaves family melodrama and social commentary in its intricate



4


depiction of an interethnic marriage between a Taiwanese man and a Japanese woman living in colonial Taiwan. Filtered through the perspective of the title character, Chin Yasuko,3 the novel portrays colonial relations as a challenging but emotionally rewarding venture, implicitly endorsing collaboration among the nations and subjects of Greater East Asia. As one of two Japanese winners of the First Greater East Asia Literary Award, Madame Chen is particularly notable for its commentary on the status of the changing imperial subject in the context of Greater East Asia.4 Through its depiction of the modernization efforts of its Taiwanese protagonist Chen Qingwen, Madame Chen reveals the struggles of colonized subjects to carve a place for themselves amidst the conflicting pressures of cultural tradition and colonial reform. While the novel identifies imperialization as the responsibility of colonized subjects, it also emphasizes the importance of sentiment in this process. Focusing on Shōji’s novel, this chapter will discuss the transformation of a colonial subject into an imperial subject in the context of both interethnic relations and the broader political discourse of Greater East Asia. First, I provide a brief summary of the novel and discuss the critical response in both Japan and Taiwan. The next section addresses the literary and political connections between the “imperial subject” campaign and interethnic marriage in colonial Taiwan. Finally, I trace the novel’s trajectory of modernization through an examination of the different tactics the protagonist employs in order to assert his own modern status. By situating the desire for imperialization in a colonized subject, Madame Chen reformulates Japan’s colonial activity in Taiwan as one step on the path to modernity, in effect cloaking Japan’s own imperialist impulses. Furthermore, the novel extends the process of imperialization by concluding with an “imperial subject” who becomes an agent of colonization. This ending not only promotes the project of imperialization but further resolves the potential contradiction of the colonies in Japan’s purportedly anti-imperialist project of Greater East Asia. Namely, Taiwan is relocated within the sphere of colonial power by shifting it from the object of colonialism to a subject or agent of empire.

Sh Ōji S Ō ichi and M A DA ME C HEN Shōji Sōichi (1906–1961)5 possessed multiple ties to Japan’s colonial efforts. Having lived in Tainan city from age six until age twenty, Shōji had both knowledge of and personal experience in colonial



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Taiwan. His status as a second-generation Japanese colonizer imbued him with an authenticity and authority about Taiwan that many other Japanese writers lacked. Upon returning to Japan and eventually embarking on a career in writing, he became an active member of the Nihon Hōkokukai (Japan Literary Patriotic Association, hereafter JLPA), which, after its establishment on May 26, 1942, sponsored lecture series and conferences, edited anthologies, and engaged in other literary-related activities with the purpose of promoting Japan’s growing empire and war effort.6 In 1943, after the second half of Madame Chen was published, Shōji joined writers and fellow JLPA members Niwa Fumio and Togawa Sadao on a lecture tour through Taiwan promoting the development of Greater East Asian culture.7 Upon winning the Greater East Asia Literary award in 1943, Shōji expressed his happiness at receiving the honor but confessed that his feelings were tempered by his concerns with the intensification of the war effort.8 After the war, Shōji was criticized because of his support of Japan’s imperialist and military activity through his literary work and his participation in the Japan Literary Patriotic Association.9 As one of six winners of the first Greater East Asian Literary Award, Madame Chen was recognized by the JLPA for its “contributing to the construction of Greater East Asian culture” (dai t ōa bunka kensetsu ni k ōken suru).10 The novel, set during a twenty-year period from the mid-1910s until the mid-1930s, depicts the lives of a Taiwanese man, Chen Qingwen, and his Japanese wife, Yasuko, in Taiwan. The first part of the novel explores their struggles in colonial society. Readers initially encounter the couple as they sail from Japan to Taiwan. The stormy and difficult journey foreshadows the challenges that the couple will face on their arrival in Taipei, in particular their difficulties adjusting to life in colonial Taiwan. After settling in their new home, both husband and wife quarrel with different members of the Chen family. While Yasuko’s problems result from linguistic and cultural differences, Qingwen’s difficulties originate in his conflicting feelings of loyalty and responsibility to his Taiwanese family and their traditional beliefs, and the desire for recognition as a modern subject. These tensions emerge as the central themes in the first half of the novel. Yasuko eventually comes to understand the cultural practices and beliefs of her in-laws through observation and interaction. She develops close relationships with her sisters-in-law, and by the end of this first section Yasuko wins over the other family members through her kind and compassionate behavior. Qingwen, on the other hand, does not fare as well as his wife. He attempts to “improve” Taiwanese society by working for the colonial



Mode r n i z at ion a n d t h e I m pe r i a l S u bj e c t


government, but after experiencing discrimination because he is Taiwanese, he quits the position and instead takes a seven-month journey through Europe and parts of Asia. Transformed by his travels, Qingwen returns to pursue his goal of changing Taiwanese society by working as a teacher. However, he eventually quits this job as well after being arrested on the false charge of socialist activism. He tries to promote modernization and development with the purpose of helping Taiwan “advance” but encounters resistance from both Taiwanese, who question his loyalties, and Japanese, who look down on his ethnic origins. By the end of the first part of the novel, the Chen family patriarch dies. Qingwen, as the eldest son, thereafter takes charge of the family affairs. The second part, entitled “Oyako” (Parent and Child), explores Qingwen’s subsequent management of the family factory, which cans pineapples. As the title suggests, the text focuses on the relationship between the couple and their daughter Seiko, who struggles with her “mixed” background. Throughout this section, Seiko rejects her Taiwanese father and heritage, but later comes to accept her “mixed” background. After his unsuccessful attempt at running the factory, Qingwen decides to leave both the family business and the protective fold of the family. The novel concludes with Qingwen, Yasuko, and Seiko planning to move outside the family compound. While discussing their plans for a new home, Qingwen confesses, to the surprise of his wife and daughter, his dream of moving to Java. He quickly pushes this idea aside for the future, but reminds them that no matter where they live the most important requirement for their home is love, ai. In 1940, the first part of the novel, entitled “Fūfu” (Husband and Wife), was a candidate for the Shinch ō literary prize and received strong support from writer Satō Haruo, who had produced numerous works set in Taiwan. Thereafter, “Husband and Wife” was adapted by playwrights Morimoto Kaoru and Tanaka Sumie and performed at Tokyo’s Bungaku-za in April and May 1941 by actors Kubota Mantarō, Sugimura Haruko, Higashiyama Chieko, and Nakamura Nobuo. The performance received such positive reviews in Japan that three performances were added, a fact that attests to its popularity.11 It was staged again in August 1941 by Shinsei shimpa. The second half of the novel, “Parent and Child,” appeared in July 1942. After being published in its entirety in 1943, the novel won the Greater East Asia Literary Award. Despite the positive acclaim from winning the Greater East Asia Literary Award, the novel earned mixed reviews from Japanese and Taiwanese critics alike. On the one hand, several Japanese critics



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lauded the work for its treatment of interethnic marriage between Japanese and Taiwanese.12 Togawa Sadao, a member of the Greater East Asia Literary Award committee, described the novel as “suggesting a solution for the unification of Japan and Taiwan.”13 Writer Hamada Hayao, a contributor to Taiwan-based literary journal Bungei Taiwan, commended the novel for both its literary achievement and its many insights into colonial policy.14 Hamada specifically focused on Shōji’s use of the title character, Chin Yasuko, as a mirror of the “Taiwanese psyche,” the accurate portrayal of which was a challenge for a Japanese writer.15 Hamada’s comments show a consciousness of the difficulties of portraying the colonized “other.” At the same time, his praise of the novel, which indirectly promoted the imperialization of colonized Taiwanese, reveals the political ideologies at work. Faye Kleeman notes that, along with other writers affiliated with the Bungei Taiwan, Hamada viewed the imperialization movement as an inevitable part of the trajectory of modernization.16 Through their praise of this novel, both Togawa and Hamada lent support to the colonial project and, in particular, the efforts at imperialization in the colonies. On the other hand, around the time of the novel’s publication, several Taiwanese literary critics faulted the novel for misrepresenting colonial society and Taiwanese culture. Poet Wu Yongfu, writing under the pen name Tago Hiroshi, noted the many stereotypical images in the novel ranging from the opium-addicted Taiwanese patriarch and his three competitive wives to the “wild” Aboriginal woman unable to survive in an urban environment.17 Responding to the stage version of the novel, writer Lü Heruo expressed great appreciation for the portrayals of Chen Qingwen and his wife Yasuko, but also commented that the supporting characters were not fully developed.18 Critic Chen Shaoxing, who also praised Shōji’s realistic portrayal of the character of Yasuko, observed that the novel did not provide an organic portrait of Taiwanese culture and society.19 Through such negative appraisals of the novel’s depiction of Taiwan and its inhabitants, these critics implicitly questioned whether a Japanese writer could accurately depict Taiwan and Taiwanese society. Shōji’s experience in Taiwan during his childhood did not assuage these critiques as several of these literati evaluated his work as anachronistic or even misinformed. In contemporary scholar Tarumi Chie’s words, these critics recognized that this work “attract(ed) and satisf(ied) the Japanese gaze by, to and with ethnic Taiwan.”20 Unfavorable reviews were not unique to Taiwanese critics. Nakamura Tetsu, a Japanese critic affiliated with the literary journal





Bungei Taiwan, said that readers living in Taiwan would find the novel “unrealistic.”21 Even Hamada Hayao, who generously praised the novel’s treatment of its male protagonist, noted that the depictions of the supporting cast of characters were inaccurate and often veered dangerously close to being “popular fiction.”22 By finding fault with the novel’s treatment of Taiwanese culture, these Japanese critics, all of whom lived and wrote in Taiwan, may have been protecting their literary territory, or otherwise defending the authority of their knowledge of Taiwan. From their perspective, Shōji’s status as a writer based in Japan positioned him as an “outsider” whose perspective lacked authenticity and potentially tainted the representations of Taiwan crafted by Taiwan-based writers and critics. Over half a century later, contemporary critics have approached the novel as a crucible of identity production in colonial Taiwan. Several critics addressed the works’ depiction of the experience of the couple’s Taiwanese-Japanese daughter, Seiko. Hoshina Hironobu, for example, examined the novel’s treatment of colonial identity in “mixed” subjects and argued that, unlike imperial-subject writers, Shōji attempted to resolve the conflicts between Taiwanese and Japanese identities through bloodline.23 Wang Hsiao-yun discussed the novel’s portrayal of hybridity in the colonial context, both in terms of culture and the identities of “mixed” subjects and imperialized intellectuals.24 In an examination of different literary treatments of indigenous mourning, Huei-chu Chu critiqued the novel’s treatment of colonial identity as “reductive” through its reliance upon a “presumed racial dichotomy between civilized Japanese and uncivilized Chinese.”25 While these critics all consider the production of colonial identities within various aspects of the novel, this chapter will address the production of imperial subjecthood through intimate relations, specifically the marriage between Chen Qingwen and his Japanese wife Yasuko, and the resulting family unit. I argue that the novel, in tracing Qingwen’s struggle for recognition as an imperial subject, ultimately locates the solution to his dilemma in the colonial family that he has helped create. This focus on intermarriage and the family reflects shifts in colonial policies and attitudes in Taiwan around the same time.

Interethnic Marriage in Colonial Taiwan Interethnic marriages between Han Chinese and Japanese, referred to as naidai kekkon, were not legalized in Taiwan until 1932. Nevertheless, over a decade earlier, during the term of GovernorGeneral Den Kenjirō (1919–1923), it was temporarily possible for 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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Han Chinese wives to appear in their Japanese husbands’ family registries.26 This practice may have been in part due to the passage of a law to resolve inconsistencies between the laws of Japan and its colonies (naidai ky ōts ūh ō).27 However, because this allowance was temporary, interethnic couples desiring to marry after 1923 encountered legal and social impediments. As evidenced by interviews of Japanese women in interethnic marriages in the Taiwan Nichinichi shimbun in early 1932, many couples faced resistance and even censure from both Japanese and Taiwanese relatives.28 Japanese wives in Taiwan even had to contend with the rumor that financial gain was their sole motivation for marrying Han Chinese men.29 Much of the resistance against such marriages was resolved with the passage of the JapaneseTaiwanese Marriage Law (naidai ky ōkonh ō) in 1932. Similar to its Korean counterpart, ratified a decade earlier, this law allowed for interethnic marriages between Japanese and Han Chinese. When Japanese literary representations of interethnic romance and marriage set in Taiwan first appeared in the 1930s, the majority of such works focused on relations between Japanese and Aboriginal Taiwanese. This body of texts was in part a result of the scholarly attention and subsequent public fascination with the “exotic” Aboriginal Taiwanese.30 As mentioned in chapter 2, writers like Nakamura Jihei and Ōshika Taku centered several short stories on the plot of a Japanese man’s desire for an exotic Aboriginal Taiwanese woman.31 Sakaguchi Reiko also portrayed a “marriage” between Japanese and Aboriginal Taiwanese.32 Such literary depictions of intimate relations between Japanese and Aborigines contributed to the exotic image of colonial Taiwan in the Japanese popular imaginary.33 The treatment of romantic or marital relations between Han Chinese in Taiwan and Japanese was less frequent in colonial Japanese literary production. In fact, Shōji’s novel was one of the first works to extensively treat the issue of interethnic marriage between Japanese and Han Chinese. Following the critical recognition of Madame Chen, several other Japanese writers, including Niigaki K ōichi, Masugi Shizue, and Sakaguchi Reiko, produced literary works centered on Taiwanese-Japanese marriages.34 Unlike the exotic flavor of the representations of Aborigine-Japanese romances, these Japanese literary renderings of Taiwanese-Japanese marriages addressed the effects of different aspects of the imperial-subject campaign, including language education and the assumption of Japanese cultural practices. Niigaki’s “Jōmon” (Castle Gates, 1942) reflects the influence of Shōji’s novel with its similar treatment of the difficulties of interethnic marriage.35 Masugi’s short story, “Nampō no kotoba” (Language 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono




of the South, 1941) explored cultural and linguistic assimilation through the portrayal of a marriage between a Japanese woman and a Taiwanese rickshaw driver in colonial Taiwan.36 Likewise, Sakaguchi’s short story “Tei ikka” (The Zheng Family, 1941) examines several generations of a Taiwanese family, including an interethnic couple, and their differing stances on imperialization policy. While these works examine the effects of the imperial-subject campaign, they do so through the perspectives of observing Japanese rather than through the eyes of participating Taiwanese. During this period, images of interethnic romance and marriage appeared in a body of texts by Taiwanese writers, referred to as “imperial subject literature” (k ōminka bungaku). As part of the k ōminka campaign, the colonial government recruited Taiwanese writers to produce literary works in support of both the war effort and the colonial relationship between Japan and Taiwan.37 Such writers as Zhou Jinpo and Chen Huoquan depicted the process of becoming an “imperial subject” and explored the conflicts emerging from this endeavor, which posed Taiwanese cultural traditions against the “modern” cultural practices of colonizing Japanese.38 Their writings addressed the key elements of the imperial-subject campaign, including conscription, and the adoption of the Japanese language, Japanese names, and the Shinto religion. Within this body of literature, romantic relations with Japanese women oftentimes represented one signifier of imperial subjecthood. Although the colonial government did not identify intermarriage as a vital part of imperialization, Taiwanese male writers used the tropes of romance and marriage to show the production of imperial subjecthood through intimate relations. Specifically, these writers portrayed romantic relations between Taiwanese men and Japanese women as a way for their male protagonists to escape from their ambivalent roles in colonial Taiwan.39 For example, writers Wang Changxiong and Long Yingzong concentrated several of their short stories around Taiwanese male characters that fantasized about associating themselves with Japan and its modern status through involvement with Japanese women.40 These works reflect the infiltration of the colonial project to the very personal spheres of home and family.

Educating the Colonial Self Shōji Sōichi’s Madame Chen also approaches the dilemma of the modernizing colonized subject in colonial Taiwan through the lens of imperialization. Although the novel is set several decades before the



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implementation of the imperial-subject campaign, its protagonist, Chen Qingwen, resembles the ideal “imperial subject,” with his education in Japan and his enthusiasm for modernizing colonial Taiwan. In addition, like other protagonists in imperial-subject literature by Taiwanese writers, Qingwen occupies an ambivalent position in colonial society where he is caught between his desire for individual selfrealization and social and familial responsibility. Shōji immediately identifies Qingwen’s modern status through his educational background, which included elementary education at a mission school in Taiwan and several years of study in Japan. Through the mission school, which resonates as one of the main paths of Western colonialism in Asia, Qingwen is exposed to Western history and culture and eventually converts to Christianity. This association primes him for his studies in Tokyo, during which he immerses himself in the modern cultural practices of Japan and the West. His educational affiliations establish his identity as a particular kind of Taiwanese intellectual. Taiwanese young men who studied abroad in Japan figure prominently in imperial-subject literature. Although the imperial-subject campaign did not commence until 1937, the first Taiwanese students traveled to Japan in 1901. By 1922 around 2400 students were studying in Tokyo.41 Similar to their Chinese counterparts, Taiwanese students traveled abroad for their education in order to “learn about the West through Japan.”42 For these students, the acquisition of “Western” knowledge represented a path to modernity and progress. Sakane Keiko observes that the top three fields of study for such students were medicine, law, and political science.43 Yet, despite the potentially enriching qualities of these studies, such knowledge also placed these students in a precarious position. Many Taiwanese who studied in Japan experienced frustration upon returning home because of the difficulties in implementing their newly acquired knowledge.44 Imperial-subject writer Zhou Jinpo depicted the dissatisfaction of returning students in many of his stories including “Suigan” (Water Cancer, 1941), “Shiganhei” (Volunteer Soldier, 1941), and “Kyōshū” (Nostalgia, 1943).45 All three stories contain returnee protagonists who, estranged from their families and their cultural environs, endeavor to change the “backward” culture of their homeland. Similar to Zhou’s characters, Qingwen possesses an ambivalent relation to Taiwanese culture. At a banquet welcoming Qingwen and his wife to Taiwan, for example, the protagonist expresses a sense of alienation from the home and family that were once familiar. Having





forgotten certain Taiwanese customs, Qingwen ponders why he has become “distanced from his ethnic background” (kare jishin no minzoku kara itsu shika hanareteitanoda) and grimaces, “It seems that I cannot call myself a pure Taiwanese anymore” (Ore wa m ō junsui no Taiwanjin towa ienakunattarashii).46 His transformation is a result of his time in Japan, where he has learned and taken on modern cultural practices. By lamenting his “impurity,” Qingwen reveals his longing for an affiliation with a Taiwanese identity that has seemingly disappeared. At the same time, however, he attempts to distance himself from Taiwanese culture, resulting in a position of dislocation. This ambivalence further manifests in Qingwen’s disillusionment with his family and with Taiwanese cultural traditions. At the previously mentioned banquet, he criticizes his relatives’ behavior and the customary gift-giving, saying their actions would be “shameful in Western etiquette” (Seiy ōshiki no echiketto de sono yoru no y ōna bukiy ō o enjitanara, makkaninatte r ōbai shitade arōga . . .).47 His elitist critique privileges Western culture over Taiwanese traditions, revealing his internalization of the modern practices of the West. This moment thus indicates the ways that Qingwen fashions his identity in relation to the notions of modern subjecthood learned in Japan. In addition, his comment also locates him in a position of cultural superiority over his family. This cultural ambivalence doubly exiles Qingwen and propels him throughout the novel to find a place for himself in the context of colonial Taiwan and Greater East Asia.

Modernizing Women Qingwen’s marriage to Yasuko provides one way for him to negotiate his position of ambivalence in colonial Taiwan. Their relationship radiates with modernity, because it is a love marriage (ren’ai kekkon), based on romantic love (ren’ai) and instigated by the couple themselves. Love and love marriages emerged as an important discussion topic for young Taiwanese during the 1920s.48 Like their counterparts in Japan and China, liberal Taiwanese intellectuals viewed love marriages as a measure of the modernity of the nation and its subjects.49 Juxtaposed with the arranged marriages traditionally accepted in Taiwan, love marriage allowed for individual “self-realization” and “progress.”50 Hsin-yi Lu cites several examples in the memoirs of Taiwanese men from this period that frame Japanese women as “instructors who (lead) them to a new knowledge.”51 Through his love marriage to Yasuko, Qingwen engages in a modern practice that contributes to his own “progress” toward imperial subjecthood.52



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Yasuko’s Japanese identity further emphasizes Qingwen’s claim to a modern subjecthood. During the 1930s, Taiwanese male intellectuals in colonial Taiwan portrayed Japanese women as a threshold to modernity juxtaposed with the traditionalism symbolized by Taiwanese women.53 Anne McClintock explains that, in British colonial discourse, “women served as mediating and threshold figures by means of which men oriented themselves in space, as agents of power and agents of knowledge.”54 In other words, women demarcated the boundaries between such categories as colonizer and colonized, and modernity and tradition. Similarly, by consorting with Japanese women, Taiwanese intellectuals asserted a modern affiliation with Japan as well as equal status with Japanese men. Qingwen’s marriage to Yasuko thus secures his ties to Japan and modernity. His awareness of such symbolism is made apparent when Yasuko, attempting to show her acculturation to colonial Taiwan, surprises Qingwen by wearing a Taiwanese dress (taiwanfuku). Clearly expressing displeasure, he suggests that rather than wearing Taiwanese or Japanese dress, she should wear the dress, coat, hat, and shoes that he purchased for her.55 She in turn responds by saying that she is too embarrassed to wear Western styles. Qingwen replies: Some of my (Japanese) co-workers’ wives wear Western clothing. Haven’t you seen such women in town recently? It’s nothing to be ashamed about. Your feelings of shame are just a product of oldfashioned thinking. In the future, women will be liberated and will make great advancements. The societal position of women will naturally rise.56

Qingwen’s advocacy of Western clothing expresses his desire to affirm the modern identities of both his wife and himself. By wearing such clothing in public, Yasuko pronounces her modern and liberated status to the rest of the town. Furthermore, the public visibility of this gesture also affirms the modern identity of her husband Qingwen. Qingwen also declares his “enlightened” modern status in his comments regarding the future liberation of women. By supporting “modern” behavior and labeling Yasuko’s embarrassment as oldfashioned or even feudal (h ōkenteki), he implicitly asserts his own knowledge and authority on things modern. Qingwen’s ostensibly feminist notions reflect popular attitudes toward women in colonial Taiwan. During the 1920s, Taiwanese writers and intellectuals resolved their ambivalent feelings toward the colonial project through their intellectual and artistic appropriation of female subjects. For





example, the liberation of Taiwanese women took on larger significance in the colonial context as symbolic of the empowerment and independence of the Taiwanese nation as a whole.57 Intellectuals, such as Peng Hua-ying, argued that the weak social status of women reflected on Taiwanese society as a whole. Moreover, according to Peng, in order for Taiwanese society to avoid “being deserted by world civilization,” Taiwanese women must achieve equal status with their male counterparts.58 The appropriation of the female subject for the ethnic nationalist cause under the guise of women’s liberation appears in numerous colonial contexts.59 Although Yasuko is not a Taiwanese woman, Qingwen’s declaration of women’s liberation resonates both as a sign of his cosmopolitan knowledge and his patriarchal authority—both of which emphasize his own “modernized” status. He contrasts with one of his brothers who has several wives and says that women “stifle and destroy men.”60 Furthermore, his call for the “advancement of women” may be for the benefit of a specifically colonial Taiwan, of which Yasuko has become a subject through her marriage to Qingwen. Distinguishing himself from other Taiwanese through his modern behavior and beliefs, Qingwen continues down the path toward imperial subjecthood.

Placing Colonial Responsibility Qingwen attempts to utilize and spread his modern knowledge outside of his family as well. Shōji conveniently locates Qingwen’s career choices in different arenas where the colonial project was enacted: the governmental administration (political), education (cultural), and business (economic). Qingwen’s roles in each of these areas position him as a potential vehicle for promoting colonialism in the public sphere, and validate his active participation in the modernization of Taiwan. By taking on these roles, Qingwen attempts to assert his authority as a modern subject in different colonial spaces. Importantly, however, each role ends in failure. Qingwen attempts to impose his modern knowledge upon others (his governmental colleagues, his students, his employees), but none of them seems to acknowledge his status as a modern subject. Each of these failures results from his ambivalent position within the colonial project whereby essentialized notions of Japanese and Taiwanese identities deny his becoming a “modern” Taiwanese subject. First, as an employee of the colonial government, Qingwen is passed over for promotion several times as a result of the discrimination of his Japanese colleagues.61 Despite his educational background,



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he did not receive recognition for his modern status by his coworkers because of his identity as a colonized subject. In their eyes, his Taiwanese identity excludes him from taking a leading role in the colonial project. In other words, despite the promises of equality through assimilation, modern status is inextricably linked to a Japanese identity, thus preventing a Taiwanese subject such as Qingwen from ever completely achieving recognition as “modern.” Second, when he attempts to educate his Taiwanese students while working as a high school teacher, they ultimately reject him because of his embrace of Western thought and support of “development” under Japanese colonialism.62 Qingwen confesses to his wife Yasuko that his thinking (ideorogii) and that of his students are irreconcilable (aiirenai). Colonized subjects like Qingwen, influenced by education abroad, were oftentimes censured as pro-colonial and antinationalist for criticizing certain cultural traditions and advocating for societal change.63 The only options available in the colonial context, it seems, were to become a Taiwanese ethnic nationalist or a Japanese colonizer. As a result, supporting the colonial project and at the same time professing loyalty to Taiwan is not a possibility. The heightening of Qingwen’s ambivalent status in his efforts at modernization reflects literary scholar Leo Ching’s discussion of k ōminka as a problematic of the colonized.64 Ching distinguishes between assimilation (d ōka) and imperialization (k ōminka) discourse by identifying the ways that these movements were directed toward different audiences. Assimilation was framed as the responsibility of Japanese colonizers, who were urged to take on the project of helping colonized subjects assimilate Japanese cultural practices. On the other hand, the imperialization movement shifted accountability to colonized subjects, who were advised to become imperial subjects, and thus distance themselves from tradition, through processes such as conscription and learning the Japanese language. In the context of imperialization, the conflicts between modernity and tradition are not a result of the impositions of the colonizing Japanese on colonized subjects. Instead, these struggles are a dilemma affecting the colonized subject alone. The attribution of these problems to the individual subject rather than the colonial structure itself occludes the presence (and the accountability) of Japanese subjects at the top of the colonial hierarchy. The colonized subject may embark on the process of imperialization, but he is inextricably linked to, and thus “held back” by, his colonized background. As a result, he will never fully experience the privileges of a modern subject unless he discovers a way to negotiate between these identities.





In the context of the novel, Qingwen seems to take on both roles—to imperialize himself and to help indoctrinate others. Although Qingwen asserts his successful imperialization, he in fact is regularly reminded of his pre-imperialized past by his relatives. The majority of his family, with the exception of his wife and daughter, bristle at his attempts at reform and hold steadfastly to traditional practices such as the communal living situation. Their resistance highlights differences between Qingwen and his relatives, but it also serves as reminders of a specific Taiwanese identity that Qingwen presumably once embraced. Qingwen’s efforts to inculcate other Taiwanese in Japanese cultural practices then serves the multilayered purposes of asserting his own transformation, changing “Taiwan,” but also erasing the traces of his pre-assimilated past. Qingwen’s rejection of his Taiwanese traditional heritage resembles Komagome Takeshi’s discussion of the ambivalent status of “Japanese,” or civilized subjects.65 Evoking both Jacques Derrida and Ukai Satoshi’s treatment of the colonizer’s relationship to the colonized, Komagome underscores the precarious construction of civilized identity. Specifically, he notes that Japanese and other colonizing subjects were once “uncivilized” and thus had not always been civilized colonizers. The reality of this previous status undermines the power and authority of the colonizer and places him in a position of ambivalence. The colonizer resolves this ambivalence, according to Komagome, through the infliction of violence, an act that both asserts Japan’s civilized or modern status but also rejects, or, at the very least, distracts from Japan’s uncivilized past. In the case of Chin fujin, Qingwen occupies a similar position of ambivalence. While he has not fully achieved “colonizer” status, he is haunted by his “uncivilized past” and blames his failed attempts upon his Taiwanese lineage, at one point lamenting his inability to “overcome” the “Southern Chinese bloodline” flowing inside of him.66 Although highlighting this shared position of ambivalence poses a potential threat to the status of Japanese colonizers, Shōji evokes these similarities between his protagonist and other modernizing Japanese subjects and recasts the colonial project itself in a new light.

On the Road Shōji’s use of modern tropes of travel and alienation transforms Qingwen’s marginalization in colonial society into the plight of the alienated modern subject, an inevitable result of the condition of



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modernity rather than a problem with colonialism itself. In the middle of the first part of the novel, he takes a yearlong journey through Europe and Asia, visiting Singapore, England, France, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Palestine, and India. Notably, despite his visits to nations in Central and South Asia, the novel focuses on Qingwen’s experience in Europe. Unburdened by the national and cultural affiliations of both Taiwan and Japan, he is able to fully take on the role of cosmopolitan subject. While in Paris, he visits cafes and socializes with both locals and other travelers. He meets, among others, a young Russian Bolshevik with whom he discusses politics and social revolution.67 These interactions further educate him about the cultural practices of the “West,” while allowing to escape, albeit temporarily, from his position of colonial ambivalence. Shōji’s evocation of the trope of travel associates Qingwen with a lineage of Japanese characters struggling to establish a role for themselves in an increasingly modern world. His European interlude is particularly reminiscent of narratives of modern Japanese male subjects assuming a cosmopolitan guise by traveling through Europe and the United States. During the Meiji and Taishō periods, numerous Japanese writers depicted traveling subjects who embodied the dislocation resulting from the modern transformations of Japanese society. From the international sojourns of Mori Ōgai’s Ōta Toyotarō in “Maihime” (The Dancing Girl, 1890) and the narrators of Nagai Kaf ū’s Amerika monogatari (American Stories, 1908) and Furansu monogatari (Tales of France, 1907) to the domestic journey of a young man between the countryside and Tokyo in Natsume Sōseki’s Kokoro (Kokoro, 1914), Japanese subjects traversed the globe (and the Japanese archipelago) struggling to locate themselves amidst oftentimes competing discourses of nationalism and modernity. Ōgai’s Toyotarō, for example, attempts to escape from the responsibilities of the nation through cosmopolitan possibilities in Germany in order to assert his modern subjecthood.68 Sōseki’s first-person narrator struggles with the effects of modernization through his vacillation between two lineages represented by his biological father and his “adopted” father, Sensei. In each of these narratives, travel functions as a way for these Japanese protagonists to resolve their dilemma of cultural ambivalence. In his international journeys, Qingwen as well partakes in the global culture of modernity while in Europe, transcending the limitations of national, and to a certain extent colonial, culture. Like Ōgai’s Toyotarō or Sōseki’s narrator, Qingwen acquires knowledge and experience from his journeys that result in his alienation from his





“home” in Taiwan. Through this indirect association with other modern Japanese protagonists, Shōji renders Qingwen’s search for identity into the familiar form of the modern alienated subject. As a result, the novel attributes Qingwen’s ambivalent position in Taiwan not to the specificities of the colonial context but rather to the dilemma of modernization. Furthermore, this association with Meiji protagonists links Qingwen to a specifically “modernizing” past, which Japan has implicitly completed or left behind. Because Japan cannot ignore its difference from the West and simply assert a perpetual modern status, the focus on Japan’s past process of modernization rather than its status as a previously unmodern state allows for the best of both worlds. Such gestures at Japan’s modernizing past focus attention upon the modernization process that in turn affirms Japan’s difference from its colonies and the rest of Asia. In light of the discourse on Greater East Asia, which calls for the uniting of Asian nations to combat the threat of Western imperialism, it would not be prudent for Japan to liken itself to the West. In spite of the role of Japanese colonialism in producing Qingwen’s modern dislocation, however, the rendering of Qingwen’s experience as similar to that of other modern Japanese protagonists shifts accountability away from Japan. The modernization process is framed as inevitable in the development of nations, rather than an imposition by another colonizing nation. Thus, here we see how the imbrication of discourses of colonialism and modernity results in the reformulation of colonial responsibility as a simple effect of modernity.

Re-placing Colonial Modernity The novel closes with the resolution of the long-standing dilemma of whether or not to leave the protective fold of the Chen family. Since the couple’s arrival in Taiwan at the beginning of the novel, they debate over whether to leave the family compound and build a separate house for themselves. In encompassing the extended family, the Chen family residence represents the traditional family structure. While Yasuko argues that they must remain with the extended family, Qingwen is more inclined to leave entirely. His desire for a separate residence conveys his longing for independence from the traditional family as well as a move toward a modern notion of the nuclear family. This issue reflects on colonial Taiwan’s relationship with precolonial cultural practices—can or should colonial Taiwan move away from the “past” toward an independent and ostensibly modern



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identity? Shōji resolves this dilemma in the concluding chapter of the novel. After Qingwen’s final failure with the family business and numerous conflicts with his second brother, Qingwen convinces Yasuko and Seiko that they must move away from the rest of the Chen family. His conflicts with his relatives suggest the difficulties in the coexistence of “modern ideas” and “traditional” cultural practices. The decision to separate from the extended family thus represents Qingwen’s departure from the traditional familial responsibilities that have contributed to his conflicted status. Leaving the traditional family structure (private) does not resolve Qingwen’s continued ambivalent status within the public sphere. As a result, although the plan to move to a separate home indicates the possibility of leaving the “past” behind, Qingwen must still find a place for himself in the modern world. His lack of success in both colonial Taiwan and Japan suggests that he must search for another space in which he can assert his modern status. Shōji solves the dilemma by having Qingwen abruptly announce to both his wife and daughter his dream of moving to a village near Batavia in Java. Relocation to Java is particularly significant in light of the Japanese government’s plans to expand to the “south” (nanp ō or nan’y ō), specifically Southeast Asia and the Pacific. The ideology of “advancing southward” (nanshin) first emerged in Japan in the 1880s. The initial incentive to expand the Japanese empire to Taiwan and parts of Southeast Asia was grounded in emigration and trade. Such government attention toward the south was accompanied by a public fascination as well, evident in the abundance of political novels (seiji sh ōsetsu) focusing on the “south.”69 By the 1930s—with the introduction of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere—the “South,” composed of the Philippines, French Indochina, Thailand, Malaya, Borneo, the Dutch East Indies, and Burma, played a key role in economic and military strategies. Upon becoming a colony in 1895, Taiwan’s position in the discourse on the advance “southward” gradually shifted from that of occupied to occupier due to its strategic role as a military base in these efforts. This change in Taiwan’s role in the “southward advance” became particularly prominent during the 1930s. For example, the enthusiasm for “advancing southward” is evident in the song “Advancing Taiwan” (Yakushin Taiwan), chosen by the Taiwan Government General for the 40th anniversary of the Taiwan Exposition in 1935. The opening lines are as follows: “Japan’s Thriving Advance Southward, Its mission is strongly on both





shoulders, Abundant strength, Burning spirit, There is light in our future, Advancing, Taiwan our Taiwan”70 Significantly, the lyrics celebrate Taiwan’s role and responsibility in this military strategy. A year later, in 1936, Governor-General Kobayashi formally included the push southward as part of a three-part plan for colonial Taiwan: imperialization, industrialization, and building bases in the South (k ōminka, k ōgy ōka, nanshin kichika).71 Qingwen’s desire to move southward resonates as a declaration of his support of the Japanese empire and also functions as an affirmation of his position as an imperial subject. In this new location, Qingwen would transform into an agent of empire, a surrogate “Japanese” colonizer. He would not be weighed down by the limited notions of Taiwanese identity held by both Japanese and other Taiwanese. Instead, in Java, Qingwen would represent the success of Japan’s colonial project in Taiwan through his own assimilated status. Thus, he would in fact be in the position of “civilizer” or at least “more civilized,” in contrast with the colonized inhabitants of Java. By having Qingwen embark on his own colonial project, Shōji suggests that he will finally be able to achieve the “Japanese” privilege that he had been seeking. Relocating to Java will resolve his difficulties in Taiwan and enable him to truly embody his status as an imperial (and colonizing) subject. His trajectory toward the south thus reformulates colonialism as another phase of the process of modernization.

Conclusion Through his novel Madame Chen, Shōji Sōichi articulates a notion of Greater East Asian culture that seemingly diverges from colonial discourse, which did not allow for the possibility of a modern East Asian subject. The different manifestations of the Japanese colonial project throughout East Asia, and later the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, incorporated colonized subjects into empire by promising higher status while simultaneously using them for the purposes of furthering empire in the form of the Co-Prosperity Sphere. Colonized subjects were mobilized by the colonial project through such organized and coercive efforts as military conscription and Japaneselanguage education with the promise of recognition as imperial subjects. Despite such promises, however, many colonized subjects found themselves in a state of dislocation, positioned between different cultural affiliations. These conflicting loyalties located such subjects at a difficult impasse that underscored the falsity of colonial promises of equality.



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Madame Chen depicts the travails of one such colonized subject to escape from this displacement, but recasts these difficulties as one part of the path toward modernity. By likening Qingwen’s ambivalent positioning to that of Meiji period protagonists struggling with modernization, Shōji reformulates his hero’s ambivalence as part of the growing pains of modernity rather than the result of the false promises of imperial-subject discourse. The transference of responsibility within the text resonates simultaneously as an affirmation of Taiwan’s fraught, but from certain perspectives fruitful, modernization process as embodied in the male protagonist and as an elision of Japanese colonial responsibility. Qingwen’s journey is not just about comingof-age and becoming socialized, instead, it is specifically about a colonized subject finding a place for himself in colonial society, in Japanese empire. While this narrative resembles other coming-of-age narratives from Meiji era fiction, Shoji’s novel situates this dilemma within the colonial context and transforms the protagonist’s journey of self-development into a progression from object of empire to subject, in other words, from colonized subject to an agent of colonialism. To escape from his ambivalent position, Qingwen must trace the steps of his Japanese predecessors and engage in his own act of colonialism, following the promise of becoming a “Japanese” modern subject. Through this conclusion, the novel creates a trajectory of modernization that resolves the dilemma of modern dislocation through the act of colonization. As a result, Madame Chen not only portrays the colonial project, and in particular Greater East Asia, as the apex of (self-) development, but also renders Japan’s colonial efforts as part of the “natural” process of modernization. In depicting colonialism as a necessary phase of modernization, Shōji provides justification for Japan’s imperialist presence in East Asia and for the notion of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. This representation of the colonies may have been affected by the expansion of the intended audience of the discourse on Greater East Asia to include other nations in East and Southeast Asia. Rather than emphasizing the backwardness of such territories as evidence of need for Japan’s guidance (as in earlier colonial propaganda), Japanese officials needed to acknowledge progress within its colonies as proof of Japan’s “successful” guidance. At the same time, they also had to maintain a balance between progress and complete success in order to avoid the questioning of the continued Japanese presence in the colonies. The acknowledgement of colonial progress also helped reconcile the contradictory messages of the discourse on Greater East Asia,





which was grounded in both critiques of Western imperialism and the promotion of Japan’s colonial/imperialist advances in East and Southeast Asia. While Western imperialism was rendered as a threat to Asia, Japan’s colonization of Korea, Taiwan, and Manchuria was portrayed as acceptable (and not a form of imperialism) under the claims of shared ethnic and cultural affiliations. Focusing on the “successful” modernization of Japan’s colonies helped emphasize the shared experience as Asians and also advocate Japan’s role as a leader in Greater East Asia. While Qingwen’s disclosure of his desire to move to Java thus provides a potential resolution for the contradictory promises of imperialization, the last line of the novel harnesses the power of sentiment in the service of empire. Looking at his daughter’s design of a new home, Qingwen, with a twinkle in his eye, suggests that something vital is lacking. Yasuko and Seiko are at first puzzled by his comment, but soon Yasuko realizes that her husband is saying that “love,” ai, is the most important requirement for a home. This sentimental conclusion confirms the emotional bond that exists between the family members, despite the many difficulties they encountered throughout the novel, and leaves readers with a sense of hope for the future of the Chen family. This evocation of sentiment further serves as a reminder for readers of the intimate ties that connect subjects of empire and Greater East Asia, and enable them to continue building not just homes but paths toward modernity.



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C ol on i z i ng a Nat iona l L i t e r at u r e: Th e D e b at e s on M a nc h u r i a n L i t e r at u r e

D

uring the period between 1936 and 1939, Japanese writers and critics in colonial Manchuria debated the notion of Manchurian literature, Mansh ū bungaku. In the journals Sakubun (Composition), Mansh ū rōman (Manchurian Novel), and Mansh ū bungei nenkan (Manchuria Literary Arts Annual), Japanese literati discussed the possibilities of a new “literary tradition” and asked such questions as: what qualifies a work of literature as Mansh ū bungaku? who can write Manchurian literature? in what language(s) should this literature be written? what are the goals of this literature? These efforts to codify and develop a discrete literary tradition not only encouraged reflection upon the relationship between literature and nationalism, but also explored the deeper resonances of the Japanese presence in Manchuria. Explicitly delineating the boundaries of Manchurian literature, these critics exerted their privilege as colonizers and laid claim to literary and physical territory in Manchukuo. In contrast with their counterparts in Taiwan and Korea, however, Japanese writers and critics in Manchuria did not actively draw upon the tropes of family and marriage in these debates. Instead, the prospect of building a new nation and an accompanying national literature remained the focus of these particular discussions. As discussed in previous chapters, literary representations of colonial marriage and family imbued the relations between Japan and its colonies with an intimacy and stability that promoted Japanese imperialist activity in these territories. In the case of Manchukuo, however, Japan publicly declared itself as an outside supporter of this “new” nation rather than as an active occupying power. Consequently, the tropes of intimate relations used to reinforce the connections between Japan and its other colonial territories did not translate in useful or constructive



5


ways for Japanese writers in Manchuria. This attempt to recast Japan’s colonial presence in Manchuria becomes evident in the debates on Mansh ū bungaku through different perspectives on the influence of Japanese literature on this “new” literary tradition. Although Japanese critics all shared in colonial privilege and authority, they did not present a unified vision of Mansh ū bungaku. Some celebrated a literature that would advocate the building of a nation under the guidance of Japan, but others envisioned a tradition sown in the soil of Manchuria that would embody the everyday lives of its diverse population. The multiple definitions of this literature speak not only to differences in beliefs about the purpose of literature, but also in various visions of the colonial project in Manchukuo. This chapter will examine these debates on Mansh ū bungaku by Japanese in Manchuria in order to understand how these writers and critics alternately portrayed “Manshū” or “Manchukuo” as an imagined community,1 a political project, a geographical/cultural space, and as a place called “home.” This process of defining Manchurian literature endowed Japanese critics with the authority not only to guide this body of literature but also to articulate their own relationship to Manchuria. In particular, their co-optation of Manchurian literature signified a shift from status as colonizers to inhabiting the unique position of colonial subjects. These discussions also shed light on the relationship between literature and communal identity, in this case national or colonial identity. Literary canons purpose to affirm an already extant national identity. Yet scholars have shown that canons contribute to the creation of a specific identity through the invention of certain literary traditions.2 Some Japanese writers and critics in Manchuria viewed themselves as both the midwife and parent of this newly born literature. The latter concerns are of particular interest in relation to the ties between literature and the nation—and also reflect on the relationship between literature and colonial identity as well. In their delineation of the boundaries of Manchurian literature, these writers and critics carved out spaces for themselves in the larger project of Japanese empire. Discussions of this “national literature” then suggest several of the ways that Japanese subjects viewed Manchuria as well as their own existence in relation to it. The first part of this chapter will give historical background on the development of literary circles within Manchukuo. Literary activity in Manchuria preceded the debates over Mansh ū bungaku by several decades, but these earlier writings had a significant influence on the development of literary tropes and language used in



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relation to Manchuria. Early travel writings, in particular, serve as points of departure for later writers and critics attempting to define Manchurian literature. After exploring some of the examples of literary work on Manchuria from 1905 to 1931, this chapter will discuss two of the main literary journals established in Manchukuo after 1932.3 Although numerous small literary publications appeared in Manchuria during the 1930s, Sakubun and Mansh ū R ōman provided the main Japanese-language forums for the expansive debates on Manchurian literature. Addressing the alleged differences between these journals and their contributors, this chapter will then examine the key issues that course through the different debates on Mansh ū bungaku. This section will reference past approaches to the debates that are based in political and thematic categories in order to tease out the central concerns of critics at this time. In conclusion, I examine how these discussions reflect the different conceptualizations of the Japanese presence in Manchukuo, and how Japanese writers formulated their identities and positions vis-à-vis their projects in Manchuria.

Japanese Writing and Manchuria, 1905–1931 At the end of the Russo-Japanese War in 1905, Japan took over the lease of Russia’s railway lines in Southern Manchuria, what came to be known as the Kwantung Leased Territory. Japanese government officials, military, and businesses built up a significant presence in Manchuria by establishing the South Manchurian Railway Company in 1905. Some of the early Japanese-language writing about Manchuria directly resulted from this infrastructure project. After the transfer of its lease to Japan in 1906, the South Manchurian Railway invited famous Japanese to use the railway and affiliated hotels to travel throughout Manchuria.4 Numerous writers took up this invitation and recorded their journeys for public consumption. The best-known literary products from this arrangement include Natsume Sōseki’s travelogue Mankan tokoro dokoro (Here and There in Manchuria and Korea, 1909, hereafter Here and There) and a travel journal by poets Yosano Akiko and her husband Yosano Tekkan, Manm ō y ūki (Travels in Manchuria and Mongolia, 1928).5 By the time of his journey, Sōseki had established his literary reputation with his novels Wagahai wa neko de aru (I am a Cat, 1905), Botchan (Botchan, 1906), Kusamakura (The Three-Cornered World, 1906), and Sanshiro (Sanshiro, 1908).6 The SMR’s choice of Sōseki was important because he was already well-known by Japanese readers; his



C ol on i z i ng a N at ion a l L i t e r a t u r e


presence would lend moral weight to a venture of questionable legitimacy and legality. By 1928, Yosano Akiko as well had gained public renown and critical success with her tanka anthology, Midaregami (Tangled Hair, 1901), and her essays commenting on the role of women in Japanese society.7 The records of these writers’ railwaysponsored visits gave readers in Japan proper an opportunity to experience “Manshū” through the eyes of these literati, and also set precedents in the literary treatment of Manchuria.8 Sōseki’s depiction of Manchuria is particularly significant because of its production at such an early stage in the expansion of the Japanese presence in Manchuria. Serialized in the Asahi newspaper from October to December 1909, Here and There recollects Sōseki’s travels from Dalian to Fushun on the South Manchurian Railway.9 But, for all its pretensions to depict Manchuria and Korea, the majority of the travelogue centers on Sōseki’s interactions with other Japanese he meets on his journey. Most of them are connected to the railways in some way, either as officials responsible for administering the railways, as fellow travelers, or as members of the service industries providing transportation and accommodations for visitors. By contrast, scarce interactions with Chinese people—in part a consequence of the narrator’s position as a tourist who did not speak Chinese—also suggest a lack of interest on the part of the author. The focus on the Japanese community in effect obscures the presence of Chinese subjects, making the territory ripe for colonization and population. In those rare instances where the narrator steps off the steel track, his observations remain superficial, reflecting a lack of knowledge about contemporary Manchuria and its Chinese residents. The dynamics of travel, whereby a traveler spends a limited amount of time in a location, restrict the depths to which he can fathom the geographic and cultural environment. In the case of Sōseki and many other Japanese travelers, the inability to speak Chinese further impeded interaction with and, ultimately, understanding of Chinese subjects. But attached to the narrator’s superficial descriptions is an attitude of condescension or disdain. In the text, Chinese subjects are either formless masses or elements subsumed within that most traditional and archaizing of Chinese images, the landscape. Upon arriving in Dalian, the narrator likens a crowd of coolies to “angry wasps” that were “buzzing or swarming about.”10 Such descriptive phrases dehumanize and erase the individuality of the Chinese laborers by reducing them to pesky and small insects. It simultaneously reveals the narrator’s ignorance of the Chinese language, as their communications are reduced to buzzing. 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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The narrator continues to expand this unsavory description by noting that the coolies on the pier give him “the immediate impression of dirt” and “any two together were an even more unpleasant sight.”11 The language used is based entirely on the narrator’s observations (“impression” “sight”) rather than direct interactions with these workers, calling attention to the distance between the narrator and the objects of his gaze. Moreover, the derogations reflect both cultural and class biases on the part of the narrator.12 As Joshua A. Fogel has written, Sōseki was “unable to transcend the prejudices of his time.”13 By contrast, Beongcheon Yu and Inger Sigrun Brodey note passages where the narrator seems to show appreciation or sympathy for some Chinese he encounters.14 Yet, while the text occasionally expresses appreciation for certain aspects of Chinese culture, it ultimately does not explore beyond the surface of these superficial encounters. With its limited attention to Manchuria and its Chinese inhabitants, Here and There epitomized what Japanese writers and critics later cautioned against in the subsequent debates. Yosano Akiko and her husband Yosano Hiroshi (Tekkan) traveled to Manchuria almost two decades after Sōseki. Yet their stance toward China and Manchuria reinscribes many of the prejudices articulated by their literary predecessor. The couple’s journey, which lasted from May 5 to June 17, 1928, was recorded in their joint travelogue Travels in Manchuria and Mongolia (hereafter Travels). Like Sōseki, they mainly interacted with Japanese throughout their tour, indicating, as Joshua A. Fogel notes, the “relative insularity of the Japanese community on the mainland.”15 In 1909, when Sōseki ventured to the continent, the number of Japanese residents in Manchuria was 65,901.16 Two decades later, in 1930, the Japanese population in Manchuria nearly quadrupled, to 233,320.17 Despite limited exchanges with Chinese people, Akiko devoted much effort to recording her observations on the natural and cultural environment she encountered on her travels. Unlike Sōseki’s relatively mundane depiction of his journeys along the South Manchurian Railway, Akiko takes what might be described as a scholarly approach, interweaving copious references to Chinese literature and philosophy to her observations of the physical and cultural landscape.18 By quoting classical Chinese poems to describe her various travel locales and evoking the names of various Chinese literati, Akiko reveals her knowledge of classical Chinese literature and asserts her literary authority. Allusions to Peach Blossom Spring, a utopia described by the fourth-century poet Tao Yuanming, or the Shi Jing (Book of Songs), the classical poetry collection, and numerous other classical Chinese poets and philosophers suffuse the travelogue. In a 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono




poetic description of the Jinzhou landscape, for example, she expresses excitement at her first sighting of willow catkins, a popular image in Chinese literature.19 Viewing the plants in their natural habitat expands her understanding of their resonance in Chinese poetry. Notably, her enthusiasm is for enhancing her own understanding of classical literature rather than learning about contemporary Chinese society and culture. Her preoccupation with the beautiful scenery and the relics of ancient Chinese culture suggests that her travels are part of her literary or artistic pursuits, and not grounded in political motives. This point becomes especially apparent when the couple comes into contact with troops from Korea, who move about “in an excited state, as though war was commencing.” Akiko notes, “Imperialism and the smell of liquor rippled through, and the atmosphere of this inn became thoroughly incompatible with our desire to write poems about the gentle White Pagoda and the willow catkins.”20 Clearly, she envisions her journey as an artistic pilgrimage, far from the smoke and dust of the militarism embodied by the soldiers. Yet, despite her attempts to disavow the political implications, Akiko was inevitably affected by her experience. Steve Rabson has shown that several of Akiko’s poems and essays from the 1930s expressed enthusiastic support for the Japanese military presence in Manchuria.21 For instance, her 1932 poem “Nihon kokumin, asa no uta” (Citizens of Japan, A Morning Song) honors the bravery of the imperial forces on the continent, and commends their “dedicating their lives day by day to serve on the nation’s behalf.”22 Akiko’s (self-identified) position as an authority on ancient Chinese culture facilitates commentary on the contemporary state of Chinese culture. While her appreciation for the cultural production of premodern China celebrates the country’s glorious past, this knowledge then serves as a prism through which she views her encounters on her journey. The concomitant juxtaposition of literary fantasy with contemporary observation leads her to conclude that the state of Chinese culture is seriously degenerating.23 Conveniently, her literary knowledge dovetails with arguments for Japan’s colonial project. Her preoccupation with China’s past continues a trajectory first established by scholars of China in Meiji Japan.24 Such Japanese sinologists as Shiratori Kurakichi often invoked two Chinas: the glorious and ancient empire and its semicolonized contemporary husk “that had fallen into decay.”25 These contrasting visions of China highlighted modern Japan’s transcendence over its “older brother,” while justifying Japan’s colonial efforts. Similarly, Akiko’s celebration of China’s



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ancient past contrasts sharply with the dirty and backward present; this both reinforces the colonial hierarchy and ultimately positions Japan as a modern nation that should assist China out of its impasse and onto the path to modernity. Thus, even while expressing appreciation for Chinese literature and culture, Akiko’s focus on China’s past rather than its present represents an orientalizing of China. Though two decades elapsed between Sōseki’s visit and Akiko’s, they partake of a similar discourse, which later emerges in the discussions of Manchurian literature. Both works exude colonial authority through the gaze of travelers. With the sponsorship of the South Manchurian Railways and the Asahi newspaper, both writers enjoyed the privilege of traveling through Manchuria to record their observations for public perusal. Such a stance enables a critical, even disdainful, gaze on Manchuria and its inhabitants. This evokes a similar dichotomy that David Spurr has described in his discussion of the rhetorical mode of surveillance in journalism.26 As explained above, both writers enacted such a gaze through their writing. Regardless of Akiko’s abundant appreciation of the Chinese classics, her gaze “is no less a product of deeply held colonialist values, and no less authoritative in the mastery of its object than the surveying eye.”27 In addition, this “mastery” of Manchuria and its inhabitants conversely affirmed the role of Japanese as writing and speaking subjects and reinforced colonial hierarchy.28 These travelogues established several precedents in terms of language and perspective invoked by Japanese writers in relation to Manchuria. First, the language and imagery used in earlier work, particularly that of Sōseki, prefigure the discourse employed by subsequent Japanese readers and writers. Akiko, for example, refers to both Chinese and Japanese writers such as Zhang Wenzhen,29 Ōmachi Keigetsu,30 and Tayama Katai31 who preceded her on her journey, and situates her work firmly within the tradition of travel writing. These references also point to a recognition of the extant body of Japaneselanguage writing about Manchuria and consequently an awareness of the language and tropes expected in depictions of Manchuria. In his discussion of the gaze in Western journalism and travel writing, David Spurr notes that writers are “literally on the lookout for scenes that carry an already established interest for a Western audience, thus investing perception itself with the mediating power of cultural difference.”32 In light of Sōseki’s literary authority, subsequent writers, including Akiko, may have felt obliged to direct their gaze at elements, such as Chinese coolies or the “empty” landscape, that their esteemed predecessor addressed in his famous travelogue. Elleke





Boehmer discusses the ways that literature in the early years of British colonialism cemented specific notions of both the colonies and the colonizing nations. For later colonial writers to “resist the prevailing representation of Empire would have meant resisting the very selfperceptions on which late nineteenth-century society grounded itself.” Thus, according to Boehmer, later writers “wrote in the interpretative shadow of earlier colonial and exotic fictions.”33 This observation also applies to Japanese writing on Manchuria. The prevalence of travel writings combined with ideological distancing through colonial hierarchy contributed to the treatment of Manchuria and its subjects in much of the literature in Manchuria from the late Meiji until the early 1930s. The preoccupation with landscape and the lack of acknowledgment of Chinese as individuals manifest this prevailing attitude. In addition to travel literature written by visitors to Manchuria, literary texts by Japanese residents also began to proliferate in the 1920s, particularly in Dalian (Dairen). Kawamura Minato and other literary scholars have discussed, for example, the “birth of Japanese modernist poetry” in Manchuria.34 The seminal poetry journal “A,” edited by Kitagawa Fuyuhiko and Anzai Fuyue, was published in Dalian between 1924 and 1927.35 Both Kitagawa and Anzai were tangentially related to the South Manchurian Railways. Kitagawa grew up in Manchuria, the son of a railroad engineer. Anzai briefly worked there until a leg injury sent him back to Japan to convalesce.36 Despite their location in Manchuria, these journals maintained their connections with Japanese literary circles and did not explore the possibilities of developing Mansh ū bungaku. Other literary journals published before 1931 include Tairiku seikatsu (Continental Living) and Saigai shish ū (Poetry from Overseas), published in 1930 by Anzai, Takiguchi Takeshi, Kato Ikuya, and Jō Ôsu.37 While some of these works maintain the objectifying gaze established in the aforementioned travel writings, others reflect a shift in the perceptions of Manchuria as a place of difference, but also a place of literary possibility. However, it is only in the wake of political and cultural transformations in the relationship between Manchuria and Japan that the discussion of Manchurian literature emerges in the mid-1930s.

Nation-Building through Literature: The Beginnings of Mansh Ū Bungaku Starting with the Manchurian Incident (1931), and the subsequent announcement of Manchukuo as an independent nation (1932), the



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expansion of Japan’s military presence in Manchuria signified a period of political and cultural upheaval.38 The Kwantung army orchestrated what came to be known (in Japanese) as the Manchurian Incident, mansh ū jihen, to solidify the Japanese presence in Manchuria. On September 18, 1931, a bomb exploded along the South Manchurian Railway line outside the city of Mukden. Blaming the explosion on the Kuomintang, the leading Chinese political party, Japanese troops seized Mukden on the pretext of protecting the Japanese population there. Despite international calls for Japan to withdraw after securing the lives and property of its citizens, the Kwantung Army continued to occupy the city and eventually expanded its control to occupy South Manchuria in its entirety. In March 1932, the Japanese military installed Pu Yi, Manchu emperor, as a figurehead of Manchukuo. The declaration of Manchukuo as an independent nation-state was accompanied by a public, and presumably government-sponsored, discourse on nation-building (kenkoku). In the metropole, Japan’s military conflicts in Manchuria received much media attention, particularly following the Manchurian Incident in 1931. Consequently, popular interest in Manchuria surged and resulted in massive production of books, magazines, films, and music covering the “Manchuria problem.”39 In addition, during the 1930s, the proliferation of travel writing (kik ōbun) on Manchuria “packaged Manchukuo for domestic consumption” and “disseminated an image of Manchukuo as urban utopia—a modernist El Dorado that Japan had fabricated on the vast, open plains of the Manchurian frontier.”40 The transformation of Manchuria’s landscape from a harsh and unwelcoming space to a vast, open plain waiting for development is what Elleke Boehmer, in relation to British colonial literature, has described as a “thickening of representation.”41 Writers such as Muramatsu Shōfu and Shimaki Kensaku continued to work with the established images of Manchuria’s sere landscape but transformed the value of this emptiness into a fecund, even welcoming, form.42 Rather than signifying the uncivilized, empty nature of Manchuria and its inhabitants, the evocations of Manchuria’s empty landscape in the 1930s resonated as both evidence of the need for agricultural and economic “development” (kaitaku), and also as a blank canvas, a place of literary possibility.43 By this time, Japanese literary activity in Manchuria had expanded greatly, as evidenced by the establishment of numerous literary associations and journals in Manchuria throughout the 1930s. For example, the Manchurian Literary Association (Mansh ū bunwakai), which was founded in June 1937 for the purpose of actively promoting





cultural activities in Manchukuo, started with 433 members and sponsored a regular journal Mansh ū bunwakai ts ūshin, a literary annual, and a literary award.44 Also in 1937, literary arts columns became regular features in two Manchuria-based newspapers, the Mansh ū nichinichi shimbun (Manchuria Daily) and the Dai Shinky ō nipp ō (Xinjing Daily).45 The 1939 volume of Mansh ū bungei nenkan (Manchurian Literary Arts Annual) records sixteen literature-centered publications, including general interest journals such as Kōry ō (1932– 1935)46 and genre-specific journals focusing on tanka, haiku, senry ū, or children’s literature, as well as twenty-one magazines and newspapers with literature columns.47 The diversity of publications indicates active artistic and literary communities in Manchuria. During this time of literary and cultural activity, Japanese writers and critics discussed the notion, definition, and goals of Manchurian literature. The debates on Mansh ū bungaku, which appeared between 1936 and 1939 in Japanese-language publications in Manchuria, addressed the role of cultural production in the development of Manchukuo. Specifically, Japanese writers and critics defined the parameters of Manchurian literature and its intended aesthetic and political purposes. Two Japanese-language publications, Sakubun (1932–1942) and Mansh ū rōman (1938–1941), articulated two opposing views as to the possibilities of Manchurian literature.48 In one camp were writers for the bimonthly journal Sakubun, which first appeared in October 1932 under the title Bungaku, and ran until December 1942.49 Produced primarily in Dalian, Sakubun contained Japanese-language poetry, fiction, and criticism written by Japanese residents in Manchuria. Contributors included Aoki Minoru, Ochiai Ikurō, Shimazaki Kyōji, Jō Ōsu, Akihara Shōzo, Takeuchi Shōichi, Machiwara K ōji, Ōtani Takeo, Sakai Tsuyashi, Miyake Toyoko, Yoshino Nobuo, and Hinata Nobuo.50 Few of these contributors had professional experience as writers in Japan, a fact seized upon by critics of the journal. Literary critic Furukawa Tetsujirō, for example, characterized literary activity in Dalian as frivolous and divorced from everyday life; he likened this activity to “literary youth playing with fire.”51 Proletarian novelist and critic Yamada Seizaburō echoed this sentiment and described the journal as mainly consisting of the “amateur writing” of employees of the South Manchurian Railway.52 While several of the contributors—such as Akihara, Machiwara, and Takeuchi—did in fact work in different departments of the railways, others worked in wholly unaffiliated jobs, such as journalist Yoshino Nobuo or librarians Aoki Minoru and Sakai Tsuyashi. Yamada’s description of the



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Sakubun contributors as “amateurs” reflects a general criticism of their attitude toward writing, where they allegedly viewed it as a casual pastime rather than a profession. Highlighting the implied lack of seriousness of their writing also indirectly points to the credentials of the members of Mansh ū Rōman, many of whom had established literary reputations in Japan. In addition, by pointing out their affiliation with the railways, Yamada also identifies the writers in Sakubun as part of the colonial machine in Manchuria and questions the political agenda behind their writing. In addition to the journal Sakubun, the members of this group also published a literary annual Mansh ū Bungei Nenkan and a collection of short fiction by Sakubun contributors, as well as organized a Manchuria-specific literary prize, the Mr. G literary award.53 Although none of the fifty-five issues of Sakubun are available in archives in Japan, contemporary readers can access the writings of Sakubun contributors in the anthology Miyaohoi: Mansh ū sakka kyuninsh ū (1940) and the three volumes of Mansh ū Bungei Nenkan (Manchurian Literary Arts Annual).54 The literary annual collected criticism, poetry, fiction, and essays from that year as well as provided directories of writers and critics active in Manchuria and lists of publications from that year. While a significant number of the contributors were members of Sakubun, Mansh ū rōman-ha organizer Kitamura Kenjirō contributed to the second, and by the third volume a significant number of Mansh ū rōman members appeared. On the other hand, a different group of writers participated in the publication of Mansh ū rōman, which appeared between 1938 and 1941 in Shinkyō. It started out as a general interest magazine featuring poetry, fiction, essays, and criticism on the literary and performing arts, but concluded with special issues focusing on criticism or short fiction, mainly on literature.55 The journal folded, however, after the seventh volume, when the organizers focused on publishing individual works under the rubric of Mansh ū rōman gyōsho.56 Contemporary scholar Lu Yuanming asserts that, due to its large readership and focus on nonliterary arts, Mansh ū rōman significantly influenced the development of culture in Manchuria.57 In the first issue, Mansh ū rōman-ha founder and editor Kitamura Kenjirō described the aim of the publication as the initiation of a “Manshū renaissance.” He aspired for the journal to become the foundation of literary arts in Shinkyō.58 Kitamura said that the journal aimed to allow contributors to develop their “souls as artists,” and “(purify) their aesthetic sense.”59 Major contributors to Mansh ū rōman included Kitamura, Yokota Fumiko, Hasegawa Shun, Ōuchi Takao, Kizaki Ry ū, Ushijima Haruko,





and Korean writer Imamura Eiji. Several contributors— including Kitamura, Yokota, Hasegawa, Ōuchi, and Kizaki—were also members of Nihon rōman-ha (the Japan Romantic School) in Japan proper. The Japan Romantic School, which emerged under the leadership of Yasuda Yōjurō, engaged with the crisis of national identity and modernity by positing a premodern cultural tradition in their literary and critical work.60 Despite this connection, the members of Mansh ū rōman claimed that they were not mere derivatives or extensions of their Japanese counterpart. Rather, they declared that the core aim of Mansh ū Rōman was literary and artistic production in Manchuria; Japanese national identity was an epiphenomenon. Contemporary literary scholar Okada Hideki categorizes Manchurian literature into Dalian and Shinkyō ideologies, evoking the locations of these journals as representative of their political stance on Manchuria.61 As the center of the Japanese presence in Manchuria from 1905 to 1931, Dalian represented an explicitly colonialist vision of Manchuria focused on Japanese military and economic priorities. In 1932, however, Shinkyō (“new capital,” Xinjing in Chinese) became the capital of the new nation of Manchukuo and eclipsed Dairen as the center of Japanese activity in Manchuria. After Shinkyō became the “political and administrative center of the Northeast” as well as a transportation hub and a center for manufacturing, the Japanese population increased sevenfold in the period between 1931 and 1941.62 Undergoing immense construction and development, Shinkyō came to be the cosmopolitan showcase of Japan’s successful modernization efforts in Manchuria. Verdant city parks, symmetrically planned streets, and modern sewage all testified to the aesthetic, architectural, and industrial progress possible under the guidance of Japan.63 In light of such developments, it is understandable that Nishimura Shin’ichirō characterized the Dairen ideology as outdated, in contrast with the new and modern vision espoused by the Shinkyō ideology. Furthermore, by likening Dairen ideology to an “illegitimate child” (shiseiji naishi shoshi), he implied that these writers were not the rightful heirs of Mansh ū bungaku and were not part of a legitimate literary lineage. He also declared that Shinkyō ideology would cancel out Dairen ideology because the Dairen writers had lost their passion, enthusiasm for building Manchuria.64 In other words, Nishimura viewed the Dairen writers’ stake in, or commitment to, the new nation of Manchukuo as weaker, and perhaps inferior, to that of their counterparts in Shinkyō. Critics also distinguished between the Dairen and Shinkyō ideologies through their differing attitudes toward the influence of Japanese



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literature upon its Manchurian counterpart. Critic Furukawa Tetsujirō claimed that the culture in Dalian was directly “imported from Japan” and literary activity was “imprinted with a ‘made in Japan’ insignia.” By contrast, the new culture developing in Shinkyō, even if it had origins in Japan, was Manchurian culture, Mansh ū bunka.65 In other words, according to Furukawa, writers in Shinkyō made efforts to produce work that reflected the unique perspective and cultural milieu of Manchukuo, while writers in Dalian viewed Manchuria with an exotifying gaze, similar to the early examples of travelogues. Furukawa claimed that the literary activity in Shinkyō was also influenced by the increased political stability of Japanese living in Manchuria and the economic and social conditions.66 Such stability in turn enabled writers to engage in (self-)critique of past literary activity and contributed to the increasing seriousness of literature from Shinkyō. While the division between Shinkyō and Dalian highlights the political positions voiced in literary production in Manchuria, these categories do not adequately reflect important differences in literary content and style. Contemporary scholar Okada Hideki notes that the overlap among writers in Dalian and Shinkyō (as well as in Sakubun and Mansh ū Rōman) limits the usefulness of these categories.67 After Shinkyō became the capital of Manchukuo in 1932, government and business centers, along with many Japanese, moved there from Dalian. Notably, more than a few Japanese writers and critics began publishing in both Sakubun and Mansh ū rōman, a fact that challenges the alleged rivalry between the two journals. Nishimura Shin’ichirō proposed an alternative typology, dividing Mansh ū bungaku into mainstream, constructionist, and realist.68 The mainstream (shury ū) category, represented by writers Jō Ōsu and Ōtani Takeo, identifies Japanese literature as the “main current” for Mansh ū bungaku. In other words, Manchurian literature required the guidance of its Japanese counterpart to develop into a national literature. Furthermore, following such guidance would incorporate Manchurian works into Japanese literature, similar to the regional literatures of Hokkaido or Ky ūshū. The second category, the constructionist or kensetsu-ha, viewed Manchurian literature as an independent body separate from Japanese literature. Nishimura included himself and Kizaki Ry ū as representative proponents of this perspective. The constructionists believed that while certain aspects of Japanese literature could be relevant, ultimately Manchurian literature should be constructed with the ideals of Manchukuo, not Japan, in mind.





The third category, realists or genjitsu-ha, largely ignored the influence of Japanese literature. Instead, the critics in this category focused upon accurately depicting the everyday lives of residents of Manchuria. This category, according to Nishimura, was strongly influenced by proletarian realism, which aimed to depict the authentic voices of the oppressed rather than simply observe their experience from an external position. An examination of examples from each of these factions will reveal where these critics diverge and converge in their visions of Mansh ū bungaku.

Following the Current Nishimura Shin’ichirō identifies poet Jō Ōsu as one representative of the “mainstream” faction of Manshū bungaku. Before helping found the journal Sakubun, Jō was active in poetry circles in Dalian, sponsoring the Dalian Poetry Club (Dairen shisho kurabu), and organizing several poetry journals, including Shindairen-ha and Tsuchi no ki. His poetry collection Kasetsu no haru (Imaginary Spring) was published by the Dalian Poetry Club in 1931. Later, his collection Kinu kaid ō: Jō Ōsu shish ū (Silk Road: Collected Poems of Jō Ōsu) was published in Mukden in 1943. He also funded the first literary prize in Manchuria, the Mr. G Award (G-shi sh ō).69 The mainstream critics justified the importance of modeling Manchurian literature after the literary tradition of Japan by framing the literary territory as “undeveloped” as the land itself. In his essay, “Manshū bungaku no seishin” (The Spirit of Manchurian Literature), Jō describes this body of literature as “virgin territory” (shojochi) that has not yet been cultivated.70 The use of this term “virgin territory” draws upon popular images of Manchuria as an empty landscape.71 At the same time, it elides the presence of the inhabitants, society, and culture already firmly established in the territory but not recognized by the writer and other colonialists. Later in the essay, he does acknowledge the three thousand year history of Manchuria but notes the absence of literary production, and specifically texts that qualify as “Manchurian literature,” during this period.72 Emphasizing Manchuria’s status as a new nation that still lacks cultural foundations, Jō states that Manchurian literature must follow the example of Japanese literature in order to develop a proper national literature.73 For Jō, then, Japanese literature functions as a model to aid the development of Manchurian literature.74 It should be noted that Jō does not specify which aspects of Japanese literature are particularly worthy of emulation, nor does he provide a detailed definition of the



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purposes of a national literature. The absence of these details is telling in light of his proposed nexus between building a national literature and the project of nation-building. The mainstream critics’ definition of Manchurian literature echoes the justifications for colonization used throughout the Japanese empire. Jō’s portrayal of the literary landscape as “undeveloped” mirrors propaganda calling for Japan to guide other Asian nations in the process of modernization. Other “mainstream” critics articulated similar sentiments but were more explicitly colonialist and militarist in their wording. For example, Ōtani Takeo, a contributor to Sakubun, described “colonial literature” shokuminchi bungaku, or the literature of Japanese emigrants to Manchuria, as the advance (shinshutsu) of Japan’s national literature into Manchuria (Mansh ū).75 Framing the influence of Japanese literature as an “advance” evokes the military offensives of the Imperial Japanese army, and particularly the Kwantung army, which expanded Japan’s presence and influence in Manchuria. Ōtani’s jingoism further emphasizes the infiltration of Japanese writers and their subsequent occupation of the Manchurian literary landscape. Though mainstream critics emphasized the central role that Japanese literature would play in this literature-building process, Jō also declared that Manchurian literature cannot merely be an extension of Japanese, or for that matter Chinese, literature.76 Instead, this body of literary work should represent the views and experiences of the citizens of the independent nation of Manchukuo and must be written by residents of Manchuria. By stating the importance of literature by (but not necessarily just for) residents, Jō privileges the authenticity gained from the knowledge and experience of living in Manchuria. Moreover, he implicitly indicates that writing produced by visitors does not and cannot fulfill the requirements for the national literature of Manchukuo. According to this theory, the travelogues by Sōseki and Akiko would fall outside the category of mainstream writing because their authors lack an authentic understanding of Manchuria bred of the experience of living there. Ōtani echoes this belief by cautioning against blindly “spicing up” one’s work with landmarks and cultural objects of Manchuria, or using the Chinese language without having any knowledge or experience of life in Manchuria.77 Like Jō, Ōtani differentiated between an exotifying literature that simply uses the colonies as a landscape or backdrop versus a work that expresses the realities, experiences, and feelings of those living in the colonies. The mainstream critics thus assert that, unlike other Japanese visitors, their own experience as





Japanese in Manchuria (zaiman naichijin/nihonjin) endues them with the authority to build a literary tradition that accurately represents Manchuria. The mainstream critics also envisioned literature as a vehicle for representing the unique ideals of the nation of Manchukuo and promoting the project of nation-building. Jō, for example, stressed that literature should capture the feeling of ethnic harmony (gozoku ky ōwa) and the spirit of building the nation (kenkoku seishin). Furthermore, he noted that literature would play a role in the development of the nation by “strengthening (residents’) love of the local, of Manchukuo.”78 The goals of Manchurian literature extended not only to the content of the literary texts but also to the writers themselves. In order to produce literature that will successfully promote nation-building, Jō stated that writers themselves must make a commitment to Manchuria and sacrifice their love of their homeland in order to produce work that adheres to the standards of world literature.79 Mainstream critics thus clearly identified the role of Manchurian literature in the project of nation-building, an endeavor that could only be understood by Japanese who have committed to their new “home” in Manchuria.

Constructing a Manchurian “Worldview” Nishimura Shin’ichirō described the constructionist, kensetsu-ha, writers, including both himself and Kizaki Ry ū, as those who emphasize “the worldview of Manchukuo.”80 Nishimura grew up in Manchuria and, after majoring in English literature at Hōsei University, worked as a journalist for such publications as the newspaper Mansh ū taimusu (Manchuria Times) and the journal Mansh ū kaiz ō (Manchuria Reconstruction).81 “Constructionist” critic Kizaki Ry ū left Tokyo for Manchuria in 1937, and worked for both the Manchukuo Government Advertising Agency and later the Manchurian Motion Picture Company. While in Manchuria, he actively participated in the Mansh ū rōman literary faction.82 Unlike their “mainstream” counterparts, the constructionist critics acknowledged the existence of literary activity in and about Manchuria. Yet, both Kizaki and Nishimura disqualified these works from the category of Mansh ū bungaku because they did not possess the qualities necessary for a “national literature.” Kizaki noted in the opening of his essay “Kensetsu no bungaku” (Literature of Construction) that a Manchurian literary tradition approximating that of Japan or France did not exist because of the amount of time and space needed for a



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national literary philosophy to develop.83 By excluding extant literary works from the category of Mansh ū bungaku, the constructionist critics rejected previous literary developments in Manchuria and demanded the “construction” of their own vision of Manchurian literature ex nihilo. The constructionist version of Mansh ū bungaku relied heavily on Japanese literature. Nishimura notes that, while the influence of Japanese literature cannot be avoided, constructionist writers must critically assess Japanese literature and use those critiques to create an independent Mansh ū bungaku.84 Using condescending imagery, Kizaki echoed this sentiment, saying that Manchurian literature can learn much from Japanese literature, in the same way that one can learn about the human anatomy through the anatomy of a monkey.85 In other words, while there are some useful similarities, one should not treat them in the same way because they are, after all, different animals. The separation of Japanese and Manchurian literature emphasizes the constructionist critics’ focus on the “independence” of Manchuria. Nishimura elaborated that the divide between the literatures of Manchuria and Japan resulted not from regional difference, such as the relationship between the Japanese cities of Aomori and Tokyo, but rather due to their being two distinct and independent nations.86 This statement suggests that, unlike Aomori and Tokyo, Manchuria and Japan do not (and perhaps will not) share the same culture. By identifying Manchurian culture as distinct from that of Japan, Nishimura also rejects the mainstream critics’ vision of Manchurian literature as following the current of Japanese literature. Instead, the constructionist critics thus viewed Manchurian literature as an independent entity. Despite the differences between the mainstream and constructionist critics, they shared the common goal of creating a literature that promoted the project of nation-building. Like their mainstream counterparts, the constructionist critics evoked the notion of “home” in their efforts to garner support for the nation. Nishimura, for example, called for Japanese writers to develop both a consciousness of Manchukuo as a homeland and the feelings of love and attachment necessary for building a national literature.87 Here again we see the project of Manchurian literature placed squarely in the hands of Japanese writers who are based in Manchuria. Thus, the constructionist critics envisioned Mansh ū bungaku as literary work by Japanese representative of the developing national culture of Manchukuo.




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The third category of critics, the realists or genjitsu-ha, advocated for literary treatment of the realities of colonial Manchuria. Critics in this particular category, such as Aoki Minoru and Kanō Saburō, aspired to portray the truths of daily life in Manchukuo. Kanō, for example, states that Mansh ū bungaku should depict “the reality in front of us.”88 Their emphasis on actual experience contrasts with the idealized visions of Manchukuo promoted by the “constructionist” writers, who allegedly based their notion of literature on a “brilliant future” rather than a “social reality.”89 Kanō goes so far as to describe constructionist Kizaki Ry ū’s notion of Manchurian literature as a “fascist” literary theory that privileges only one vision of Manchukuo.90 Kanō also declares that the constructionist and mainstream critics’ focus on the idealized future of Manchuria leads them to impose their own desires upon their definition of Manchurian literature and consequently overlook, or perhaps even neglect, the possibilities already available in the present day. Realist critics, such as Kanō, posited a vision of Manchurian literature that was not limited to specific political beliefs, such as the ideology of nation-building advocated by the constructionist and mainstream critics. Rather, the realist critics envisioned Manchurian literature as encompassing a thematically diverse body of literary texts that had been, and were still being, produced in Manchuria. As proponents of realism, both Aoki and Kanō discussed the importance of accurate portrayals of the ethnic diversity of Manchukuo. Although numerous Japanese writers had included Chinese and Manchu characters in their work, critics found these portrayals were inadequate in a couple of ways. In his essay “Manjin mono ni tsuite” (On Stories About Manchurians), Aoki criticizes certain portrayals of “Manjin” as examples of “exoticism” that merely treat Chinese or Manchu characters as objects.91 He instead calls for writers to portray the “inner selves” (uchi no jikō) of Chinese and treat these characters as subjects.92 Unlike other critics, Aoki views Manchurian literature as representing all residents of Manchukuo rather than just Japanese subjects. In addition, Aoki cautions against simply imposing the (presumably Japanese) author’s own views on Chinese characters and calls for cultural sensitivity through attention to the beliefs and practices of Chinese and Manchu.93 Their concern for the internal and external lives of Chinese characters suggests that Aoki and other realist critics recognized Chinese subjects as part of Manchukuo and thus should be represented accurately in its national literature. Such attention led



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contemporary scholar Shan Yuanchao to describe the realist critics as more “compassionate” and “human” than their counterparts.94 Kanō also notes that certain other writers had overcome their own subject positions in order to portray the experiences of subjects different from themselves. Specifically, he points out the example of Pearl Buck, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1938. Buck’s novel The Good Earth (1931), according to Kanō, provided insight into the essence of the Chinese even more penetratingly than Japan’s sinologists.95 Buck spent much of her life in China, the experience of which ostensibly enabled her to understand the psychology of Chinese better than Japanese scholars who obtained their knowledge secondhand from textual sources. In addition to privileging literary realism, Kanō thus also indicates the importance of writers having firsthand experience in Manchuria. Politics plays a less important role for the realist critics than the “mainstream” and “constructionist” critics. While Kanō and Aoki actively discussed the process of cultural production in Manchuria, they focused on accurately capturing what they saw as the realities of Manchukuo in the present rather than creating a particular image of Manchukuo. This emphasis upon realism may be a reflection of the influence of the proletarian arts movement. At the same time, the critics’ focus on “realistic portrayals” suggest a view of the development of a national literature as an organic process rather than something that can or should be managed.

Perspectives on Manchurian Literature The links between the efforts at building the “new nation” of Manchukuo and the project of constructing Manchurian literature are particularly evident in the essays by mainstream and constructionist critics. Paralleling the government’s promotion of Manchukuo as a young nation under construction, critics such as Nishimura Shin’ichirō and Jō Ōsu discussed the literary possibilities available in developing the “virgin territory” of Manchuria.96 Such references to “territory,” “development,” and “construction” clearly reframe this literary endeavor as a part of the colonialist project and reflect the political agenda embedded within these efforts at building a national literature. Critics further asserted their colonialist privilege by staking their claims on the “territory” of Manchurian literature through literary requirements that maintained their positions of authority. The constructionist critics seem to waver on how much influence Japanese





literature should have on literary production in Manchuria. Yet, despite the constructionists’ seemingly ambivalent position on the role of Japanese literature, the focus upon Japanese as one of the main, if not central, languages of Manchurian literature ultimately points to a Japan-centered vision of Manchukuo in these debates. Constructionist Nishimura emphasizes that Manchurian literature will be written in Japanese by Japanese in Manchuria and not in other languages.97 The prioritization of the Japanese language reflects ideas about the intended readership of such work. Specifically, by advocating Japanese as the sole language of Manchurian literature, these critics limit their readership to Japanese and colonized subjects literate in Japanese. Furthermore, this attitude allows the Japanese critics to maintain authority and ignore the history of Chinese literature in the region. The Japan-centered perspective of these critics becomes even more apparent when juxtaposed with the views of Chinese poet Wang Ze who, in an essay in Mansh ū rōman, discussed the possibility of “exchange” between Manchurian and Japanese literature.98 Not only did Wang view Manchurian and Japanese literature as equals, but he also defined Manchurian literature as an independent tradition that existed before the Japanese presence in Manchuria.99 This view disputes Japanese critics’ assertion of the absence of Manchurian culture and highlights their privileging of Japanese literary works. Further challenging the Japanese critics’ prescriptives on Manchurian literature, Wang identifies Japanese writers in Manchuria as contributors to, but not necessarily the originators of, Manchurian literature. Other Chinese writers and critics showed a similar stance by identifying work written by Japanese as émigré literature, challenging Japanese writers’ claims to status as “locals.”100 Wang proposes an alternate vision of Manchurian literature that further highlights the ethnocentrism of the Japanese writers. He subtly chides the Japanese critics’ celebration of literary exchange and ethnic harmony as superficial by stating that exchange requires more than “small talk and tea sweets,” because “the literary world is not the world of bureaucrats.”101 Wang challenges Japanese critics to act upon their voiced support of ethnic harmony by engaging in discussions on Manchurian literature with Chinese critics. Furthermore, after emphasizing the importance of literary exchange and collaboration, Wang clearly defines Manchurian literature as encompassing writing in both Chinese and Japanese. His inclusion of Chineselanguage writing presents a vision of Manchurian literature immanently different from that proposed by many of the Japanese critics, further underscoring their ethnocentrism. 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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At the same time, Wang’s vision of Manchurian literature veers the closest to the “ethnic harmony” celebrated in the propaganda on Manchukuo. For example, Wang emphasizes the importance of translation in facilitating cultural communication and collaboration. Specifically, he calls for training more translators and increasing the availability of translations between Japanese and Chinese. The dearth of translations, according to Wang, resulted in Japanese writers having no knowledge about their Chinese counterparts except for Gu Ding, the sole Chinese writer whose work had been translated into Japanese by Ōuchi Takao.102 The lack of access to Chinese writings, Wang notes, prevented Japanese in Manchuria from fully understanding the views and experiences of Chinese and resulted in broad generalizations about Manchurian society without linguistic or cultural knowledge.103 Wang’s critiques of stereotyped portrayals of Chinese culture resemble the concerns voiced by realist Japanese critics Kanō Saburō and Aoki Minoru. Yet, while the Japanese critics prioritize the writings of those residing in Manchuria, Wang indicates that mere experience in Manchuria is insufficient to give Japanese writers the insight into the views and experiences of Chinese. Rather, such knowledge requires a more sustained engagement, as may be available through literary exchange. Japanese critics in Manchuria tried to differentiate themselves from their literary predecessors, but they in fact maintained a narrow (and Japan-centered) view of Manchurian literature. Compared with S ōseki and other Japanese writers from the late Meiji and early Taishō periods, the Japanese writers and critics of the 1930s possessed a deeper familiarity with everyday life in Manchuria and used this experience in their literary work. Furthermore, such writers made an effort to avoid the exotification of life on the “continent” that was prevalent in travel writing. Yet, as previously shown, in spite of these gestures at “authentic” literary representations, in their theorizing of the goals of Manchurian literature, many continued to privilege a Japanese perspective and ignore the voices of other residents of Manchuria.

Dissolution and Canonization The debates lasted a little over two years and disappeared as quickly as they had emerged in Manchurian literary circles. A year after the debates subsided, Furukawa Tetsujirō suggested that the increased literary activity in 1936 and 1937, the period when these debates emerged, followed the efforts at building an economic and industrial infrastructure within Manchuria. The flourishing of literary production during this time met a need for a cultural basis to support that 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono




infrastructure.104 In other words, these debates responded to a sense of instability surrounding not only the body of cultural work referred to as Manchurian literature, but also the position of nation-building. Defining Manchurian literature was a way for Japanese writers to assert their place in this “newborn nation” that some aimed to call “home.” Consequently, the end of the debates in early 1939 indicates a resolution of the issues discussed by critics, and may be a reflection of the stability of the Japanese presence in Manchuria. Throughout 1938, in the political realm, the Japanese military seized many of the major cities in China, and gained control of transportation outlets.105 This expanded military presence on the continent undoubtedly contributed to a sense of security (and perhaps entitlement) for Japanese. From a literary standpoint as well, Japanese writers and critics in Manchuria seem to have solidified their roles in Manchurian literature. This resolution is particularly evident in the publication of an anthology of Manchurian literature produced by the Sakubun editorial collective, Miyaohoi: Mansh ū sakka ky ūninsh ū (Temple Festival: The Works of Nine Manchurian Writers, 1940). Published in Tokyo, this collection introduced Manchurian literature to readers in the metropole and only contains writings by Japanese living in Manchuria, who, as the title shows, have taken on the mantle of “Manchurian writer” mansh ū sakka.106 The anthology included works by Takeuchi Shōichi, Aoki Minoru, Akihara Shōzō, Machiwara K ōji, and Miyake Toyoko. In the afterword to the reprinted collection (2000), editor Asami Fukashi makes an effort to distinguish between “continental literature” tairiku bungaku and the writings in the collection in terms of perspective and authenticity. While “continental literature” reflects the “gaze of travelers” and a “journalistic sense,” the stories in the anthology represent what the young generation of Japanese living in Manchuria see, think, and feel.107 Asami stresses that while the collection may not represent the best literature produced in Manchuria, the authors are all individuals who view Manchuria as their homeland (koky ō) and are “creating works produced from the soil of Manchuria” and “from their own lives.”108 The emphasis upon writers’ authenticity through the focus upon “homeland” and “soil” clearly differentiates these works from writings by Japanese who had only spent a short time on the continent. Because these writers had “implanted” themselves in Manchuria, their writing ostensibly showcases a side of life that visitors are unable (or, for some, unwilling) to see. Taking on this central role in Manchurian literature, these writers and critics asserted their successful occupation of the literary territory of Manchuria.



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By declaring their status as Mansh ū sakka, these writers asserted their dominance in Manchurian literature and became the representative voices of life on the continent. Inevitably, such positioning further stifled the voices of colonized subjects in Manchuria. Yet, by taking on this affiliation with Manchuria, these writers became vulnerable to some of the same colonial stereotypes and unwittingly complicated their own ties to Japan. The production of the anthology reveals the ambivalent status of these writers. The title of the collection, which uses the Chinese characters for temple festival, Miaohui transliterated as Miyaohoi, evokes a sense of foreignness and exoticism for readers in Japan proper. Because the anthology was produced during a period when continental literature was popular, what editor Asami Fukashi called a tairiku bungaku buumu, the title may have been chosen to attract readers in the metropole.109 Yet, even though such strategic marketing is understandable, the use of such a title is curious, particularly in light of the resistance to exotification on the part of the critics in the debates on Mansh ū bungaku. The linking of the Chinese image of the temple festival to Manchurian literature imbues these writers with an exotic hue. Upon relocation to the metropole, these writers transform into colonial (but not colonized) others. During the wartime period, this colonialist and imperialist difference had a positive resonance in Japan proper. However, after Japan’s defeat in 1945 and the subsequent repatriation of Japanese from the continent, these colonial others “returned” to Japan to an unwelcome society that identified their otherness as a reminder of Japan’s imperialist period.

Conclusion Between 1936 and 1939, Japanese critics carved out literary territory for themselves in the debates on Mansh ū bungaku. The mainstream and constructionist critics dismissed previous literary works written about Manchuria and instead wrote prescriptively on the primary purpose of Manchurian literature: the promotion of nation-building. These critics differentiated themselves from Japanese writers based in the metropole but oftentimes succumbed to some of the same tactics of privileging a Japanese perspective and overlooking the perspectives of colonized Chinese and Manchu. The prescriptive approach in itself reveals their Japan-centered attitudes, despite their claims of support for an independent Manchukuo. These debates reveal a consciousness of the role of literature and other forms of cultural production in the formation of the “imagined





community” of the nation.110 Like the nations they purportedly represent, national literatures are carefully constructed entities rather than natural products. In order to promote the nation, national literatures evoke a shared history and common ideology, both of which contribute to the “narration of the nation.”111 In the case of Manchuria, a nation under construction, neither a shared history nor ideology had developed, a fact that critics addressed in their theorizing of Manchurian literature. While the realist critics suggested that such elements would eventually emerge with the passage of time, the mainstream and constructionist critics took a more active approach by focusing on the presumptively shared experience of nationbuilding. These debates on Manchurian literature thus call attention to the fundamental role that national literature plays in constructing the nation. These debates also reveal the development of a uniquely colonial identity. Amidst the propaganda on building the “new nation” of Manchukuo, some Japanese writers and critics avoided potential censure as colonizers by positioning themselves as “insiders” and assuming a uniquely Manchurian identity. In taking on this colonial identity, these literati staked their claim in this “new” literary territory and ultimately enacted their colonialist desires under the guise of nationbuilding. Despite their resistance to associating themselves with the colonial project, these writers enacted their own literary colonization and in fact further confirmed the undeniably imperialist nature of their endeavors.



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rom the colonial romances of Manchurian motion pictures to the arranged marriage between Japanese and Korean royalty, officially sanctioned images of intimate and familial relations between Japanese and colonized subjects imbued the colonial project with the emotional resonances associated with romance and family. These evocations of sentiment transformed Japan’s colonial efforts into a venture that carried the excitement of romance, the commitment of marriage, and the stability of family. Tugging at the heartstrings of colonizing and colonized subjects alike, such images contributed to a narrative of Japanese colonialism as an appealing and ultimately beneficial enterprise. In addition to its sentimental pull, the rendering of colonialism in a familial form also naturalized Japan’s efforts at imperialist expansion, providing justification for the relations between Japan and its colonial territories. Specifically, the evocation of empire in familial terms reformulated the invasive Japanese encroachment into the colonies as a reunion of long-separated relatives, thus cloaking the exploitative nature of the colonial project. This notion of shared lineages was further bolstered by the scholarship of Japanese historians and anthropologists who claimed, for example, that the Japanese Imperial family originated in Korea.1 As a result, the evocation of familial imagery contributed to the notion of a colonial identity shared among Japan and its colonial territories. The use of intimate relations in the colonial context further infiltrated colonialism into both the public and the private spheres. While scholars have discussed the political, economic, and military factors motivating the drive for colonial expansion in the public sphere,



C onc lusion: Sign i f ic a n t O t h e r s i n Ja pa n ese C ol on i a l L i t e r at u r e


these images of personal relations acted as a bridge whereby public goals were enacted in the private sphere. The depictions of romance, marriage, and family distracted from the economic and political transformations of the Japanese colonial presence and instead focused on the effects within the most intimate of settings—the home and the family. The prevalence of these images of family and marriage in official discourse thus highlights the importance of the private sphere in the colonial machine and concomitantly underscores the seemingly inescapable influence of colonialism on all subjects of empire, from factory workers and civil servants to housewives and young children. The literary texts examined in this study diverge from the sentimentalizing images of the colonial project found in governmentsponsored representations. Instead, they reveal the political and personal conflicts emerging in the colonial context and, more specifically, how both colonizing and colonized subjects struggled with dislocation and alienation. Each chapter explored the different ways that these subjects occupied positions of alterity in relation to Japan, the colonies, and each other. These “significant others” ranged from the uniquely colonial identities in the works of Yuasa Katsue, Sakaguchi Reiko, and the Manchurian literary critics to the alternative forms of Japaneseness in Yuasa’s work, and the fluctuations of colonized identity in the work of Yokota Fumiko and Shōji Sōichi. By providing alternate narratives of colonial conflict and dislocation, these texts not only register critiques of the colonial enterprise but also disclose fissures in the notions of romance, marriage, family, and nation that serve as foundational elements in colonial discourse. Within these texts, one prevalent critique of the colonial project is the destabilization of identity in the colonial context—not just the “mixed” or “hybrid” subjects borne of interethnic relations but also the challenges posed to colonized subjects through Japanese efforts at assimilation and imperialization, and to “Japanese” subjects whose different locales and allegiances resulted in the production of multiple notions of Japanese identity. In each of these narratives, the diverse negotiations of subjects in the colonies underscore the production of identity as a continuous process, while calling attention to the emergence of identities in between categories of ethnicity, culture, and nation. The “mixed” characters in the work of Yuasa and Sakaguchi, for example, embody the tensions at the intersection of national and cultural affiliations in the colonial context and challenge the stable notions of ethnicity and culture as articulated in the metropole. The intense anxiety produced by these “hybrid” characters attests to the



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challenge they posed to the fixity of identity and colonial hierarchy itself. Several texts reveal different perspectives on the ways that colonized subjects negotiated their position within the transformations of colonial society. The colonized characters examined in this study might also be described as “hybrid” in their location “in-between” ethnic identities and colonial affiliations. While Yokota’s protagonist eventually rejects the colonial pressures of assimilation and extricates himself from the whims of his Japanese beloved, Shōji’s Taiwanese protagonist fully immerses himself in the colonial project to the extent of transforming himself into a (surrogate) colonizer. These contrasting reactions to alienation represent two opposing extremes along the spectrum of participation in the colonial project and provoke questions about other possibilities for colonized subjects in the process of identity formation. The multiple manifestations of Japanese identity appearing in Yuasa’s work likewise emphasize the constructed nature of Japanese identity and challenge the notion of Japaneseness as a unified, homogeneous identity. In keeping with Oguma Eiji’s debunking of the “myth of ethnic homogeneity,” colonial writers like Yuasa reveal productions of “Japanese” identity in the colonies that diverged from the narratives of “Japaneseness” in the metropole. For example, some productions of a “Japanese” (naichi) identity positioned colonial identity at the center and relocated “Japan” as a significant other, thereby privileging a uniquely colonial perspective. These diverse forms of Japanese national and cultural identity produced in the colonies undermine the assumed fixity of “Japaneseness” as well as reveal its marginalization in shifts in colonial hegemony. The embrace of Mansh ū bungaku by the Japanese literary critics in the final chapter shows how colonizing Japanese writers crafted a uniquely colonial identity for their own literary and political agendas. Their construction of Manchuria as an adopted “home,” and Manchurian literature as separate from Japanese literature, responds to critiques of their explicitly colonialist literary predecessors while exposing the ways that identities are produced in relations between subjects. By deliberately taking on an identity as a colonial other, these critics provided justification for what could be described as their own project of colonizing Manchurian literature. Their appropriation and redefinition of the colonial, while strategic, poses the possibility of uniquely “colonial” identities. The alternative forms of colonial and national identities that emerge in these literary texts call attention to fissures in the notions of family,



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marriage, and nation that serve as foundational elements in the discourse on colonial relations. Specifically, these identities challenge the assumption that family, marriage, and nation, what Edward Said would describe as filiative ties, are “natural.” Said describes the difference between filiative and affiliative relations as follows: “The filiative scheme belongs to the realms of nature and of ‘life,’ whereas affiliation belongs exclusively to culture and society.”2 In other words, while filiation is based on “natural bonds” such as biology, affiliative relationships are culturally constructed in the absence of the filiative to “compensate for” or “reinstate” the authority of the past.3 The rendering of colonial relations in filiative forms was thus aimed to naturalize the colonial project and endow it with authority. Yet, in the colonial context, with, for example, the existence of multiple (and oftentimes conflicting) definitions of “Japaneseness,” or the pervasive dilemma of locating one’s “home” (koky ō), the filiative ties of family and nation are revealed to be every bit as constructed as their affiliative counterparts.4 As a result, the authority extended to filial bodies, such as the family or the nation, and their associated identities begins to disintegrate. The texts in this study, in their portrayal of fragmented colonial families, further call into question assumptions about family and nation and, by association, the justifications for the colonial project itself. These particular texts also complicate and challenge the notion of a unified colonizing perspective. Their departure from officially sanctioned declarations of colonial support suggests diversity among colonizing Japanese in terms of their views of the colonial project and their motivations for participation. In other words, their visions of the “colonial project” centered on different literary, political, and personal agendas that help explain their participation in these efforts. Each of the writers addressed in this study expressed varying degrees of ambivalence in relation to Japanese colonialism. Yet, even amidst their critiques of different aspects of the colonial agenda, these writers and critics formulated narratives that allowed for their participation.

Colonial Literature as a Significant Other In addition to exploring the ways that these texts intervene in constructions of Japanese national identity, this study’s focus on colonial literary production calls for a reconsideration of the relationship between these texts and the modern Japanese literary canon. Until Kawamura Minato’s seminal Iky ō no sh ōwa bungaku (Showa Literature of a Different Homeland, 1990), colonial literature had 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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received minimal scholarly attention.5 In a sense, the literary production of colonialism has been positioned as a “significant other” to modern Japanese literature. Kawamura’s expansive research on literary production of the colonies, however, changed the marginal position of colonial literature by intervening in prevailing assumptions about modern Japanese literature and relocating the foundations of modernism from the metropole to the colonies. On the one hand, the minimal attention to colonial literary works until recently may be attributed to what T. Fujitani, Geoffrey M. White, and Lisa Yoneyama describe as “nationalist frameworks for remembering.”6 These works recall Japan’s colonial and imperial past, a period that was best left unremembered in the years after 1945. Consequently, because these texts interrupt the nationalist narratives of modern Japan, and question its supine position as victim and loser of World War II, they have been excluded from the modern Japanese literary canon. As James Fujii puts it, this discourse “refuses or is unable to address the imperialist dimensions of Japanese modernity.”7 Apart from being tokens of Japan’s imperial past, these works reveal the instability of Japanese identity, undermining the narrative of an ethnically homogeneous Japanese nation. The depictions of hybrid subjects—second- and third-generation settler Japanese, assimilated colonized subjects, offspring of “mixed” marriages— threaten contemporary definitions of Japanese language and identity and, consequently, also contributed to the exclusion of colonial literature from the modern Japanese literary canon. The emergence of hybrid subjects was accompanied by the need to renegotiate the bounds of identity, Japanese and colonized, and to discover different methods of asserting legitimacy. Through their production of alternative subjectivities, these colonial literary texts reveal the fissures of identity in the colonial context and challenge notions of a stable, homogeneous Japanese population. The neglect of these texts also relates to definitions of Japanese literature in terms of language and authorship. As a result of the assimilation and imperialization policies of the Japanese colonial government, many Chinese, Korean, and Taiwanese authors wrote literary texts in Japanese. These writers straddled national literary boundaries and presented a conundrum for literary critics throughout East Asia. Japanese critics questioned whether these works qualified as Japanese literature, particularly because of the ethnicity of the authors. Critics in China, Korea, and Taiwan also hesitated to include many such works within their own national literary canons for reasons of language, content, and politics. Can or should Japaneselanguage literature be included in a non-Japanese literary canon? 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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Insignificant Others? Following Japan’s surrender in August 1945, over five million Japanese returned to a nation that was facing the repercussions of its prior imperialist efforts. Despite minimal resettlement assistance from the government, Japanese colonialists exchanged colonizer privilege for marginalized status at home.8 Many experienced difficulties as a result of their ties to the colonial project. For example, soldiers experienced censure as a result of the public belief that the military was responsible for Japan’s defeat in the war. Japanese who had spent most or all of their lives in the colonies further struggled to acclimate to the culturally different environs of their alleged “homeland.” These former colonialists served as an unpleasant reminder of the Japanese empire and, as a result, in postwar Japan became “insignificant others” to Japanese who had remained in the metropole. While some of the authors in this study simply ceased writing in the postwar period, those who remained active produced work whose reception was shaped by the nature of their colonial affiliations.9 Shōji Sōichi, for example, resided in Japan throughout the war years and did not undergo the experience of repatriation. Despite his position in the metropole, however, Shōji never again attained the heights he had during the colonial period. Although he had a few pieces published in Mita bungaku during the 1950s, his literary production eventually tapered off. Critics suggest that his postwar literary works shied away from the romanticism of his wartime pieces and instead veered toward literary realism as a result of criticism for his complicity in the colonial efforts.10 Despite the wartime popularity of his novel Madame Chen, Shōji’s contributions to Japanese literature remained marginal in postwar Japanese literary history. The Manchurian literary critics also disappeared from the public eye in the postwar period. Their active promotion of the nation-building project in Manchuria and their self-identified position outside of Japanese literary circles undoubtedly contributed to their absence. Only the recent attention to colonial literature has salvaged these writers from the dustbin of oblivion, providing a space to discuss their experience in colonial literary circles. For example, several of these writers and critics, such as Akihara Shōzō, have participated in interviews and contributed essays on their experiences in the colonies.11 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


Does the act of writing in the language of the colonizer necessarily make these writers collaborators, complicit with the colonial project? If so, what does it mean to include these voices within a national literary canon?

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Other writers avoided this “insignificance” by reformulating their ties to the colonies in creative ways. Sakaguchi Reiko, for instance, maintained her literary work on Taiwan even in the postwar period. Between 1954 and 1978, she published several collections of short stories centered on Taiwanese Aborigines. At the end of the war in 1945, Sakaguchi and her husband lived for several months in an area in central Taiwan near several Taiwanese Aborigine communities. Her fictional portrayals of Aboriginal Taiwanese met with critical appreciation. Indeed, one story, “Banpu ropō no hanashi” (The Story of Aborigine Woman Ropō, 1960) even garnered a nomination for the prestigious Akutagawa Prize. Sakaguchi’s focus on the Taiwanese Aborigines and their culture presented an alternate image of Taiwan, not as a reminder of Japan’s colonial past but rather as a territory populated by these indigenous peoples with a unique and colorful culture. Sakaguchi’s postwar literary texts thus replaced a colonial Taiwanese other with that of an indigenous other, and crafted an image of the former colony appropriate for a postwar Japanese audience. Like Sakaguchi, Yuasa Katsue remained quite active in Japanese literary circles, producing work on topics as varied as repatriation and Japanese emigration to Brazil, but also continued his writing on Korea. Because postwar critics viewed his writing as critical of the colonial project—some called it “resistance literature”—Yuasa escaped the censure that other colonial writers met.12 Furthermore, as a second-generation Japanese colonialist, Yuasa did not have a choice in his ties to colonial Korea. Unlike other writers who traveled to gaichi and actively participated in the colonial enterprise in various capacities, Yuasa could not deny his birthplace of Korea.

Contemporary Remnants of Colonial Romance By examining the different narratives of colonialism created by Japanese and colonized subjects alike, we can better understand the ways that constructions of national, ethnic, and cultural identity are used in projects of colonialism and imperialism. This archaeology will also illumine the role of Japan in East Asia in the present day. Such tropes of intimacy persist in the present despite the end of Japanese empire in 1945. In the 2008 romantic drama Cape No. 7, the second most popular film in Taiwan’s history, a subplot centers on a colonial-period romance between a Japanese schoolteacher and his Taiwanese love interest, a former student who took on the Japanese name Tomoko. The couple’s story is told through letters that the Japanese teacher wrote to his beloved explaining his feelings and the reasons for his return to Japan in December 1945. The teacher fell in 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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love with his student but waited to reveal his feelings until after graduation. However, with the intervention of fate (or history), the teacher was sent “home” to Japan, and their relationship was never realized. This lack of resolution is portrayed as a tragedy that must be resolved by another interethnic couple, a Japanese woman, also named Tomoko, and a Taiwanese man Aga, in the present day. The contemporary pair are joined together by the discovery of the Japanese man’s letters, sent posthumously, and the mission to deliver them to the teacher’s beloved. The colonial era relationship is infused with romantic sentiment. In one of the letters, the teacher writes to his beloved lamenting their separation. Tomoko . . . I fell hopelessly in love with you. But when you finally graduated, we (Japan) lost the war. I was a member of a defeated nation. Once as arrogant as aristocracy, we (Japanese), in a matter of seconds, were shackled like criminals. Why should, I, a poor teacher, bear the burden of my race? The destiny of an era is the crime of an era. I am a mere teacher. Even though I loved you, I had to give up.13

By waiting until graduation to act on his feelings for his student, the teacher is characterized as a noble, restrained gentleman. Yet, his proper behavior is not rewarded. Instead, he portrays himself as a victim of history, of the nation, of circumstances outside of his control. This romanticized vision of colonialism attempts to eschew the political ramifications of the relationship through the teacher’s denial of his responsibility in the colonial project. By asking why he should bear the burden of his race (minzoku) and be forced to repatriate to Japan, the teacher separates his individual actions and feelings from that of other Japanese and of the Japanese nation and empire. Yet, in light of the important role that education played in the colonial project, this man’s denial is at best naïve and at worst bad faith, since his profession as a teacher put him on the frontlines of cultural assimilation and imperialization policy. At another interlude, the teacher asks, “Am I headed toward my homeland or am I leaving it behind?” (Boku ga mukatteiru no wa koky ō nano ka, soretomo koky ō o ato ni shiteirunoka?) This question reveals the dislocation of colonial subjects and challenges definitions of home based on biological, ethnic, or national lineage. At the same time, it also seems to be suggesting that home is where the heart is—that love transcends the national, the political. While such a conclusion suggests the possibility of rising above national and



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cultural difference, the focus on sentiment, as this study has shown, once again provides a convenient way of cloaking the political ramifications of the colonial. Even with the sepia-toned romantic images of a young Japanese man scribbling professions of love while the boat he is on sails into the distance, the colonial-era couple does not avoid colonial power dynamics. The portrayal of the relationship solely through the voice and perspective of the Japanese man reflects conventional colonial hierarchy whereby the Taiwanese woman is silenced. Viewers mainly encounter the young woman through the teacher’s descriptions and do not hear her feelings for this man. Only in a brief scene near the end of the film do we observe her in the present day. Furthermore, even in her final appearance, when the letters are delivered to her, we do not see her reaction to the letters nor do we hear her voice. Ostensibly, this silence is not intended as a repetition of the colonial marginalization of colonized subjects, and instead functions as a narrative gesture protecting the mystery and excitement of the rediscovery of her “lost love.” Yet, the woman’s muteness evokes the silencing of other colonized subjects from characters in these stories to the reallife victims and survivors of Japanese empire, and suggests a continued prioritization of certain perspectives over others. The film starts with the question, “Are you still standing there?” (Kimi wa mada asoko ni tatteiru no kai?) addressed to the Japanese teacher’s beloved student Tomoko. While the young man is asking his lover whether she is still waiting for him on the dock, we might consider the question on a broader level. Rather, do remnants of colonial romance still remain? The answer, of course, is yes. As evidenced by this film, these tropes of colonial romance and family continue to circulate in East Asia, albeit in slightly updated forms. The lasting presence of such sentimentalized visions of colonialism is part of a historical revisionism that obscures the realities of the colonial project. Like their colonial-era counterparts, contemporary images of colonial romance focus on empire as a sentimental enterprise. Moreover, the appearance of these seemingly benign images of romantic colonialism in the popular media indicates the vital role these narratives occupy in the production of contemporary narratives of identity, national and individual. Consequently, the persistence of such imagery reinforces the need to deconstruct the romantic and nostalgic sentiment yoked to these images in order to defuse the traces of the colonial project once and for all.



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Introduction 1. While Japan’s efforts at imperial expansion can be dated back to the integration of the Ry ū ky ū islands and the subsequent establishment of the prefecture of Okinawa in 1879, the “formal” colonial empire begins in 1895 with the acquisition of Taiwan in the wake of the first Sino-Japanese war. Ramon Myers and Mark Peattie identify “formal” empire as including Taiwan, Korea, Karafuto, the Kwantung Leased Territory, and the Nan’yō. Japan’s subsequent victory in the Russo-Japanese War, 1904– 1905, resulted in the addition of the Kwantung Leased Territory, Karafuto, and parts of Manchuria to the growing list of territories under Japanese control. The establishment of Korea as a protectorate in 1905, followed by its “annexation” in 1910, further expanded Japan’s presence on the continent. “Informal” empire in Manchuria began in 1932 following the Manchurian Incident. Ramon H. Myers and Mark R. Peattie, “Preface,” in The Japanese Colonial Empire, 1895–1945 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984), ix. 2. Mark R. Peattie, “Japanese Attitudes Toward Colonialism, 1895–1945,” in The Japanese Colonial Empire, 1895–1945, ed. Ramon H. Myers and Mark R. Peattie (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984), 108. 3. Suzuki Yū ko, Jūgun ianf ū, Naisen kekkon: Sei no shinryaku, sengo sekinin o kangaeru (Tokyo: Miraisha, 1992), 86–88. 4. Louise Young, Japan’s Total Empire: Manchuria and the Culture of Wartime Imperialism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), 366. 5. Doris Sommer, Foundational Fictions: The National Romances of Latin America (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991). 6. The phrase “imagined community” is from Benedict Anderson’s seminal work on the process through which nationalist consciousness emerges. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, Revised Edition (London: Verso, 1991). 7. Susanne Zantop, Colonial Fantasies: Conquest, Family, and Nation in Precolonial Germany, 1770–1870 (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1997), 101. 8. Carol Gluck, Japan’s Modern Myths: Ideology in the Late Meiji Period (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1985).



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9. Aoki Yayoi, “Feminism and Imperialism,” in Sources of Japanese Tradition 1600 to 2000, Part Two: 1868–2000, comp. Wm. Theodore de Bary, Carol Gluck and Arthur E. Tiedemann (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006), 490. 10. Kathryn Ragsdale, “Marriage, the Newspaper Business, and the NationState: Ideology in the Late Meiji Serialized Katei Shōsetsu,” Journal of Japanese Studies 24.2 (Summer, 1998): 229–255. 11. Ken K. Ito, An Age of Melodrama: Family, Gender, and Social Hierarchy in the Turn-of-the-Century Japanese Novel (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2008) 30. 12. Ito, An Age of Melodrama, 46–85. 13. Michael Bourdaghs, The Dawn that Never Comes: Shimazaki Tōson and Japanese Nationalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 2003) 89. 14. Young, Japan’s Total Empire, 366. 15. Anne McClintock, Imperial Leather: Race, Gender and Sexuality in the Colonial Contest (London and New York: Routledge, 1995), 45. 16. Ibid., 38–44. 17. Zantop, Colonial Fantasies, 13. 18. Kawamura Minato, Iky ō no Showa bungaku: ‘Manshu’ to kindai Nihon (Tokyo: Iwanami shinsho, 1990), 23–25. 19. Natsume Soseki’s famous travelogue Mankan tokorodokoro documents his travels along the South Manchurian Railway. For an English translation, see Natsume Sōseki, Travels in Manchuria and Korea, trans. Inger Sigrun Brodey and Sammy I. Tsunematsu (Kent: Global Oriental, 2000). Yosano Akiko’s Man’m ō Y ūki (1928) described her visit to Manchuria and Mongolia. See Yosano Akiko, Travels in Manchuria and Mongolia: A Feminist Poet from Japan Encounters Prewar China, trans. Joshua A. Fogel (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001). For more on Japanese travel literature on the colonies, see Joshua A. Fogel, The Literature of Travel in the Japanese Rediscovery of China 1862–1945 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996). 20. Abe K ōbō spent his childhood in Manchuria from 1924 to 1940. His 1957 novel Kemonotachi wa furusato o mezasu (The Beasts Are Heading Home) portrays the repatriation of a young boy from Manchuria to Japan at the end of World War II. Kajiyama Toshiyuki’s 1963 short fiction collection Rich ō zan’ei (The Clan Records) provides subtle critiques of Japanese discrimination against Koreans in colonial Korea. Hayashi Kyoko’s Shanhai (Shanghai, 1983) and Missheru no kuchibeni (Michelle’s Lipstick, 1980) critically portray the intersections of ethnicity, class and gender that divided the Japanese community in semicolonial Shanghai. 21. Ushijima Haruko lived in Manchuria between 1936 and 1945. Her most famous works include “Wan zokkan” (1937), which won the first Kenkoku kinen Literary Arts Award, and “ ‘Shuku’ to iu otoko” (1940), which was a finalist for the Akutugawa Literary Award. For more



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23.

24.

25.

26.

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on Ushijima, see Kawamura Minato, Bungaku kara miru ‘Mansh ū’— ‘Gozoku ky ōwa’ no yume to genjitsu (Tokyo: Yoshikawa kōbunkan, 1998). Sakaguchi moved to Taiwan to teach music in 1938 and lived there for eight years. She published numerous works of short fiction in Taiwan and was an active member of the literary coterie for the journal Taiwan Bungaku. For additional information on Sakaguchi, see chapter 2. For information on Yuasa Katsue, see Ikeda Hiroshi, “Kaisetsu: Yuasa Katsuei no Chōsen to Nihon,” in Kannani: Yuasa Katsuei shokuminchi sh ōsetsush ū (Tokyo: Inpakuto shuppankai, 1995), 577–662; Mark Driscoll, “Introduction,” in Kannani and Document of Flames: Two Japanese Colonial Novels (Durham: Duke University Press, 2005), 1–35. Shōji S ōichi lived in Taiwan between 1912 and 1926. For more on Shōji, see Ozaki Hotsuki, Kindai bungaku no sh ōkon: Ky ūshokuminchi bungakuron (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1991), 140–143. Yang Kui is best known for his short story “Shinbun haitatsujin” (Newspaper Boy, 1934). For information on Yang Kui, see Faye Kleeman, Under an Imperial Sun (Honolulu: University of Hawai Press, 2003), 160–196. Korean writer Chang Hyok-chū (1905–1997) wrote mainly in Japanese during the colonial period. For more on Chang, see Nam Pu-jin, “Chō Kaku-chū ron: Nihongo to kindai ni mukau yokubō,” in ‘Gaichi’ nihongo bungakuron, ed. Kamiya Tadataka and Kimura Kazuaki (Tokyo: Sekai shisōsha, 2007), 79–92. Korean writer Imamura Eiji took on a Japanese name ostensibly as a result of assimilation policy. His short story “Dōkōsha” (Companions) appeared in the first issue of Mansh ū rōman in 1938. For more on Imamura, see Kawamura Minato, “Kaisetsu,” in Nogawa Takashi, Imamura Eiji, Hanawa Fusao sakuhinsh ū (Tokyo: Yumani shobō, 2001), 4–7. Fujii Shōzō, Kawahara Isao, Faye Yuan Kleeman, and Ozaki Hotsuki, among others, have written on these literary journals in Taiwan. See Fujii Shōzō, Taiwan bungaku kono hyakunen (Tokyo: Tōhō shoten, 1998); Kawahara Isao, Taiwan shinbungaku und ō no tenkai: Nihon bungaku to no setten (Tokyo: Kenbun shuppan, 1997); Faye Yuan Kleeman, Under and Imperial Sun: Japanese Colonial Literature of Taiwan and the South (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2003); Nakajima Toshio and Kawahara Isao, eds., Nihon t ōchiki Taiwan bungaku Nihonjin sakka sakuhinsh ū (Tokyo: Ryokuin shobō, 1998); Ozaki Hotsuki, Kindai bungaku no sh ōkon: Ky ū shokuminchi bungakuron (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1991). For background on these writers, see Fujii, Taiwan bungaku kono hyakunen; Kawahara, Taiwan shinbungaku und ō no tenkai; Kleeman, Under an Imperial Sun; Tarumi Chie, Taiwan no nihongo bungaku (Tokyo: Gory ū shoten, 1995); Leo T.S. Ching, Becoming ‘Japanese:’ Colonial Taiwan and the Politics of Identity Formation (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001). Kleeman, Under an Imperial Sun, 78.



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27. The monthly publication of the Ryokki renmei (Green Flag Association), Ryokki, which ran from January 1936 to December 1943, had an average circulation of 1500, but by 1942 it reached as much as 4000. The Green Flag Association was an organization funded by the colonial government for promoting assimilation in Korea. For more on Ryokki, see Tsurushima Shunichirō, Kim Sejung, and Washizu Masumi, “Ky ūshokuminchi, Senryō chiiki hakkō no zasshi ni okeru bungaku: Zhonghe yuekan to Ryokki,” Meikai Daigaku ky ōy ō ronbunsh ū 14 (December 2002): 85–92. 28. Kim Yun-sik, “1940-nen zengo zai-Sôru nihonjin no bungaku undō: ‘Kokumin bungaku’shi to kanrenshite,” trans. Serikawa Tetsuyo, in Kindai Nihon to shokuminchi 7, Bunka no naka no shokuminchi, ed. Kawamura Minato et al. (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1993), 231–251. 29. Faye Yuan Kleeman, “Inscribing Manchuria: Gender, Ideology and Popular Imagination,” East Asian History 30 (December 2005): 52. 30. Satō Haruo wrote numerous works on colonial Taiwan and supported such writers as Shōji S ōichi. Kawabata Yasunari coedited two volumes of Manchurian literature in 1942 and 1943. Kawabata Yasunari and Sugino Yōkichi, ed. Mansh ūkoku kakuminzoku s ōsakusensh ū 1 & 2 (Tokyo: Yumani shobō, 2000). 31. Liao Ping-hui, “Print Culture and the Emergent Public Sphere,” in Taiwan Under Japanese Colonial Rule, 1895–1945: History, Culture, Memory, ed. Liao Ping-hui and David Der-Wei Wang (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006), 91. 32. It is important to note that not all literature produced in the colonies overtly proclaimed their colonial origins. Examples of historical fiction and experimental fiction, were produced in the colonies. 33. A discussion of the Musha Incident appears in chapter 2. For information on anti-Japanese resistance by Korean resisters (futei senjin) and Chinese bandits, see Suzuki Masayuki, “Manshū, Chōsen no kakumeiteki renkei,” in Kindai nihon to shokuminchi 6, Teik ō to kutsuj ū, ed. Gotō Ken’ichi et al. (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1993), 29–60. 34. For an in-depth discussion of the differences between the notions of assimilation and imperialization, see Leo T.S. Ching, Becoming Japanese: Colonial Taiwan and the Politics of Identity Formation (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001). 35. Sakaguchi Reiko, “Shunjū,” in Gaichi no nihongo bungaku sen 1: Nanp ō, nan’y ō/Taiwan, ed. Kurokawa S ō (Tokyo: Shinjuku shobo, 1996), 168–192. 36. See Todd Henry, “Sanitizing Empire: Japanese Articulations of Korean Otherness and the Construction of Early Colonial Seoul, 1905–1919,” The Journal of Asian Studies 64.3 (August 2005): 639–675; and Helen Lee, “Voices of the ‘Colonists,’ Voices of the ‘Immigrant:’ ‘Korea’ in Japan’s Early Colonial Travel Narratives and Guides, 1894–1914,” Japanese Language and Literature 41.1 (April 2007): 1–36.



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1

Performing Ethnicity, Gender and Modern Love in Colonial Manchuria

1. Despite futile attempts at receiving recognition from the League of Nations as an independent nation, Manchuria never successfully concealed its reality as a “puppet state,” administered by the Japanese government between 1932 and 1945. Contemporary studies of Japan’s colonial activities during the first half of the twentieth century include Manchuria as an integral part of the process of building empire and identify its status as similar to the formal colonial territories of Korea and Taiwan. 2. In popular film, Japanese actress Yamaguchi Yoshiko (Ri K ō -ran, Li Xianglan) became the epitome of such romances through her roles in Byakuran no uta (Song of the White Orchid, 1939), the immensely popular Shina no yoru (China Night, 1940), Nessa no chikai (Desert Vows, 1941), and Sosh ū no yoru (Suzhou Night, 1941). Yamaguchi, who was born in Manchuria, masqueraded as a Chinese woman both on- and offscreen until the mid-1940s, when her ethnic identity was revealed publicly. For more information on Yamaguchi’s other “propaganda” films, see Joseph L. Anderson and Donald Richie, The Japanese Film: Art and Industry (Expanded Edition) (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1983) 155; and Yamaguchi’s autobiography, Yamaguchi Yoshiko with Hayawara Sakuya, Ri Kō-ran, Watashi no hansei (Tokyo: Shinchōsha, 1987). 3. While the films circulated throughout East and Southeast Asia, their initial fan base derived mainly from Japanese audiences. Only later, with the increasing popularity of the actress and singer Li Xianglan, did the films reach a larger audience. Peter B. High, The Imperial Screen: Japanese Film Culture in the Fifteen Years’ War, 1931–1945 (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2003), 272; and Sato Tadao, Kinema to hosei: Nicch ū eiga zenshi (Tokyo: Riburupoto, 1985), 251. These cinematic portrayals of interethnic romance were not limited to SinoJapanese relationships. The Li Xianglan vehicle, Watashi no hotaru (My Firefly, 1938) depicted the relationship between a Japanese singer and a white Russian composer in Harbin. Yamaguchi Takeshi, Maboroshi no kinema Man’ei: Amakasu Masahiko to katsud ōya gunz ō (Tokyo: Heibonsha, 1996), 183. 4. A disciple of Natsume Soseki, Kume Masao (1891–1952) began writing during the early years of Taisho and eventually established a reputation as a novelist and playwright. During World War II, he was president of



37. Robert J.C. Young, Colonial Desire: Hybridity in Theory, Culture and Race (London and New York: Routledge, 1995): 2. 38. Elleke Boehmer, Colonial and Postcolonial Literature: Migrant Metaphors (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), 112.

5.

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10. 11. 12. 13.

No t e s the Japan Literary Patriotic Association. The novel version concludes with the Chinese woman discovering that she is Japanese, and thus nullifying the idea of love transcending ethnic/national boundaries. Yomota Inuhiko, Nihon no joy ū (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 2000), 104. “Love Letter,” a short story by Yokota Fumiko, is the second of three vignettes included under the title “Utsukushiki banka” (Beautiful Elegy, 1942). All three vignettes—“Kaze” (Wind), “Love Letter,” and “Aru kurisumasu no monogatari” (A Christmas Tale)—take place in Kuanchengzi. The trilogy was included in the first volume of Kawabata Yasunari’s anthology of literature written in and about Manchuria (Mansh ū kakukoku minzoku s ōsaku sensh ū, 1942), indicating Yokota’s acceptance in the developing canon of Mansh ū bungaku (Manchurian literature), as defined by Kawabata Yasunari and other (mostly Japanese) editors of the anthology. Yokota Fumiko, “Utsukushiki banka,” Mansh ū kakukoku minzoku s ōsaku sensh ū, (1), ed. Kawabata Yasunari et al. (Tokyo: S ōgensha, 1942), 65–93. Suzanne Zantop, Colonial Fantasies: Conquest, Family, and Nation in Precolonial Germany, 1770–1870 (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1997), 122–123. For additional information on Yamaguchi Yoshiko, see Yamaguchi; High 264–285; Stephenson; and Yamaguchi Takeshi, Aish ū no Mansh ū eiga (Tokyo: Santen shobō, 2000), 48–75. James A. Fujii notes the role of trains and railroads, including the South Manchurian Railways, in the projects of modernity and imperialism. James A. Fujii, “Intimate Alienation: Japanese Urban Rail and the Commodification of Urban Subjects,” Differences: A Journal of Feminist Cultural Studies 11.2 (Summer 1999):108. Despite their different settings, respectively, in Manchuria, Shanghai, and Beijing, the three films of the series, Byakuran no Uta (Song of the White Orchid, 1939), Shina no yoru (China Nights, 1940), and Nessa no chikai (Vow in the Desert, 1941), as well as Sosh ū no yoru (Suchow Nights, 1941) possess similar plots, and all feature the Japanese actress, Yamaguchi Yoshiko. For a more detailed description, see Anderson and Richie 154–155. René Girard, Deceit, Desire and the Novel: Self and Other in Literary Structure (Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1965), 40. Michel Foucault, The Archaeology of Knowledge and the Discourse on Language (New York: Pantheon Books, 1972), 46. A month after arriving in Dalian, Yokota published an essay on her initial impressions of Manchuria in the Japanese women’s literary journal Kagayaku (To Shine), in which she had participated while living in Tokyo. Throughout her stay in Manchuria, several of her short stories and essays appeared in the Manchurian publications Mansh ū josei (Women of Manchuria), Mansh ū gy ōsei (Manchurian Administration), and Mansh ū bungei nenkan (Manchurian Literary Arts Annual). She was also a member of the Mansh ū roman-ha (Manchuria Romantic



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School) and Mansh ū bungeika ky ōkai (Manchuria Literary Artists Association). In addition, she maintained ties to Japanese literary circles and contributed several short stories to Sakuhin (Literary Work) and Nihon bungaku (Japanese Literature). She also published several articles in the Manchurian newspapers Dai shinky ō nipp ō and Mansh ū nichinichi shimbun. Biographical information on Yokota Fumiko has been drawn from Higashi Eizō, Yokota Fumiko: Hito to sakuhin (Nagano: Shinano mainichi shimbunsha, 1993); Ogata Akiko, Nyonin geijutsu no hitobito (Tokyo: Domesu Shuppan, 1981); and Ogata Akiko, ‘Kagayaku’ no jidai: Hasegawa Shigure to sono sh ūhen (Tokyo: Domesu Shuppan, 1993). The influence of her participation in NAPF is most prominent in her 1931 short story, “Dōkasen” (Fuse), which describes the efforts of young men and women involved in labor organizing at a factory in rural Japan. She later shifted from proletarian realism to what some critics have called dekadensu no bungaku (a literature of decadence). Her novella, Hakujitsu no sho (Letter in Broad Daylight), which was nominated for the 1936 Akutagawa literary prize, epitomizes this ironic reaction to the times through its depiction of two young women struggling to come to terms with their desire for each other. Yokota was also one of a few women writers who participated in Nihon Rōman-ha (Japan Romantic School). Her cohorts included Hirabayashi Eiko, Wakabayashi Tsuya, and Masugi Shizue, who all contributed to Nyonin geijutsu. Biographers of Yokota, such as Higashi Eizō, have insisted on her being drawn to the Japan Romantic School through its emphasis on decadence and German romanticism, rather than the purportedly cultural nationalistic goals espoused by Yasuda and company. It is difficult to assess Yokota’s own motivations for participating in this literary coterie, as there are few traces of her own commentary on the topic of ethnic identity. In fact, participating in a literary coterie does not necessarily say anything about a writer’s philosophical and ideological leanings. For more information on the Japan Romantic school, see Kevin Michael Doak, Dreams of Difference: The Japan Romantic School and the Crisis of Modernity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994), 155. In the text, the narrator refers to Wang as a manjin, a Manchu, and in my reading of this work, I take this term literally. However, it is important to note that during the 1930s and 1940s, according to Mariko Asano Tamanoi, the term manjin elided differences between Han Chinese and ethnic Manchu through its usage in reference to both groups. See Mariko Asano Tamanoi, “Knowledge, Power, and Racial Classifications: The Japanese in Manchuria,” The Journal of Asian Studies 59.2 (May 2000): 248–276. Yokota, “Utsukushiki banka,” 82. Ibid., 77. Ibid., 78. Ibid., 80.



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20. Ibid., 85. 21. Kawamura Minato, Bungaku kara miru “mansh ū:” “Gozoku ky ōwa” no yume to genjitsu (Tokyo: Yoshikawa Hirobumikan, 1998), 58. 22. It is also possible that a woman other than the narrator is the object of Wang’s affections. Wang does not explicitly identify the narrator, and instead states in his love letter that he wanted “someone, anyone” to read the letter, and she was the only possibility. In addition, a previous story by Yokota, “Banka” (Elegy, 1937), contains a similar structure with a mother discovering a set of love letters that her now-deceased son had written to a young woman. The mother acts as a mediator for the relationship by publicly revealing them, and enabling the voice of her son to be heard. However, before jumping to conclusions about the similarity of these two stories, it is necessary to consider the different contexts in which these works were produced. While “Banka” originally appeared in the September 1937 issue of the Japanese literary journal Sakuhin, “Love Letter” is linked to the colonial context of Manchuria through its setting in Kuanchengzi and its publication in the anthology, Mansh ūkoku kakuminzoku s ōsaku sensh ū. The colonial setting for both the narrative and the production of the text introduces the category of ethnicity and colonial hierarchy into the text and further complicates the interaction between the characters. Although I agree that Yokota employs mediation in “Love Letter,” I believe that colonial discourses of gender and ethnic difference, rather than a third party, like the figure of the mother in “Banka,” mediate the relation between Wang and his beloved. Yokota Fumiko, “Banka,” in Yokota Fumiko: Hito to sakuhin, ed. Higashi Eizō (Tokyo: Shinano mainichi shimbunsha, 1994), 211–222. 23. Yokota, “Utsukushiki banka,” 77. 24. Janet Gurkin Altman, Epistolarity: Approaches to a Form (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1982), 13. 25. Ibid., 42–43. 26. This statement is true for almost any text, but the epistolary form, in particular, highlights the presence and participation of readers. 27. Yokota, “Utsukushiki banka,” 77–78. 28. Ibid., 78. 29. Hirano, Ken’ichirō, “Manshū ni okeru nihon no kyōiku seisaku: 1906– 1931,” Ajia kenky ū 15.3 (October 1968): 42. 30. Ibid., 44. 31. In an elementary school Chinese-language textbook, one chapter discusses how, following a visit to Japan, Manchu Emperor Hsuan Tung (Henry P’u-yi) praised Japan’s emperor and educational system, and declared that Manchuria must follow Japan’s example. Another section of the same textbook contained a Chinese translation of the Japanese Imperial Rescript on Education, which emphasized filiality and loyalty to the Japanese Emperor. Nomura Akira, ‘Mansh ū, manshukuo’ kyoikushi kenky ū josetsu (Tokyo: Emuti shuppan, 1995), 70. For comparative



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33. 34. 35. 36.

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38. 39.

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studies of colonial education policies, see E. Patricia Tsurumi, “Colonial Education in Korea and Taiwan,” in The Japanese Colonial Empire, ed. Ramon Myers and Mark Peattie (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984), 275–311. For discussion of colonial language education, see I. Yonsuk, “Kokugo” to iu shis ō: kindai nihon no gengo ninshiki (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1996). Nomura Akira identifies Japanese as the most important of the three languages (Chinese, Japanese, Mongol), and advocated the expansion of Japanese language education in Manchuria. Nomura, 75. Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks (New York: Grove Press, 1967), 38. Ibid., 38. Ibid., 18. Louise Young, “Imagined Empire: The Cultural Construction of Manchukuo,” in The Japanese Wartime Empire 1931–1945, ed. Peter Duus, Ramon H. Myers, and Mark R. Peattie (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1996), 92–93. Chinua Achebe, “The African Writer and the English Language,” in Colonial Discourse and Postcolonial Theory: A Reader, ed. Laura Chrisman and Patrick Williams (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994), 428–434. Yokota, “Utsukushiki banka,” 82. For a discussion of discourses of assimilation and imperialization in colonial Taiwan, see Chapter 3 of Leo T.S. Ching, Becoming “Japanese”: Colonial Taiwan and the Politics of Identity Formation (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001), 89–132. The view of an individual subject as a distinctly modern construct pervades Japanese discourses of modernity, as evidenced in Meiji period literary works by such writers as Natsume Sōseki and Mori Ôgai. James A. Fujii discusses the construction of the modern subject in Meiji period prose narratives in his Complicit Fictions: The Subject in the Modern Japanese Prose Narrative (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1993). Film and literature produced in and about the colonies depicted arranged marriage for the sake of one’s family as a traditional Chinese practice, and love marriage as a modern and Japanese practice. Shōji S ōichi’s novel, Chin fujin (Madame Chen), written and set in colonial Taiwan, juxtaposed the modern and Japanese practice of a ren’ai kekkon (love marriage) with the traditional and Taiwanese custom of arranged marriage. Romantic love has appeared throughout the Japanese and Chinese literary traditions since the premodern period. However, I believe that, in the colonial context, this concept is being redefined and reconstructed in a way to create a specifically colonial form of modern romance. Further examination of the Ri K ō -ran films by Man’ei may be helpful in showing how colonial romance was constructed as modern.



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43. Yokota, “Utsukushiki banka,” 84. 44. Ibid., 82. 45. Barbara J. Brooks, “Peopling the Japanese Empire: The Koreans in Manchuria and the Rhetoric of Inclusion,” in Japan’s Competing Modernities: Issues in Culture and Democracy, 1900–1930, ed. Sharon A. Minichiello (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1998), 25–44. 46. Yokota, “Utsukushiki banka,” 84. 47. Ibid. 48. My discussion of Wang’s attempted performance of an ethnicized, in this case Japanese, identity is inspired by Judith Butler’s work on the performativity of gender. Ethnicity, like gender, is a culturally constructed category that, as Butler describes, “is always a doing, though not a doing by a subject who might be said to pre-exist the deed.” While I will not pursue Butler’s discussion of the absence of a preexisting subject here, I will explore how ethnic identity is performatively constituted through interactions between colonial subjects. Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (New York and London: Routledge, 1990), 25. 49. The paradigm of a benevolent Japanese and a supplicating Chinese appears throughout the immensely popular Man’ei “continental trilogy” series of films. 50. An alternate reading of this scene would have the woman avoiding Wang’s request by deliberately misreading his confession as a traditional gesture of Chinese drama. Such a misreading would further underscore the ethnic differences between the two subjects, implicitly gesturing at the impossibility of such a romance. 51. Yuzurihara Masako’s short story “Chō sen yaki,” published in 1949 and Imamura Eiji’s 1939 short story “D ōkō sha” both use performance to discuss constructions of ethnicity used in colonial discourse. Yuzurihara Masako, “Chō sen yaki,” Shin nihon bungaku 26 (April 1949): 59–68. Imamura Eiji, “D ōkō sha,” Mansh ū bungei nenkan 3 (1939): 292–307. “D ōkō sha” was also recently in the Gaichi no nihongo bungakusen anthology edited by Kurokawa S ō . See Imamura Eiji, “D ōkō sha,” ‘Gaichi’ no nihongo bungakusen 2: Mansh ū, Uchi m ōko, Karafuto, ed. Kurokawa S ō (Tokyo: Shinjuku shob ō, 1996), 183–197. 52. My use of the term “passing” is inspired by the work of Harlem Renaissance writer Nella Larsen, whose novels Quicksand (1928) and Passing (1929) portray the dilemmas of what David Levering Lewis refers to as the “voluntary” African American. Larsen’s biracial African American characters grapple with the dilemma of identifying as black or white, just as many colonized subjects in Japan’s gaichi questioned the consequence of “assimilation” and the possibilities of masquerading as Japanese. For more on Larsen, see David Levering Lewis, ed. The



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Portable Harlem Renaissance Reader (New York: Penguin Books, 1995). See Oguma Eiji, Tan’itsu minzoku shinwa no kigen: “Nihonjin” no jigaz ō no keifu (Tokyo: Shinyosha, 1997). The narrator ignores the differences between Han Chinese and Manchu, assuming that Wang is giving her an “authentic” performance of Chineseness. This conflation reflects ethnic discourse at the time, as shown by Mariko Tamanoi, who notes that the terms manjin and shinajin were used interchangeably to refer to Manchu and Han Chinese. The elision of differences between Manchu and Han Chinese reflects an ignorance regarding the cultural distinctions between these two groups, as well as a homogenization of colonized subjects into the category of Other. Tamanoi, 269. Hayashi Fumiko’s postwar novel Ukigumo (Drifting Clouds, 1951) depicts the colonial territories as a space of liberation and self-discovery. Several of Amino Kiku’s postwar short stories, such as “Kin no hitsugi” (Golden Coffin, 1948), briefly mention Japanese women escaping from gender constraints through travel to Asia during the 1930s and 1940s. For a detailed analysis of Hayashi Fumiko’s Drifting Clouds, see Faye Kleeman, Under an Imperial Sun: Japanese Colonial Literature of the Taiwan and the South (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2003), 54–66. Kleeman notes that, in the case of Hayashi’s postwar novel, while colonialism liberates the Japanese female protagonist, colonized women, in contrast, experienced intense oppression. In her short story “Onna” (Woman, 1942), Ushijima Haruko, a Japanese woman writing in Manchuria, delineates how motherhood served as a way for women to serve their nation. See Ushijima Haruko, “Onna,” Geibun (April 1942). For specific discussions of the ways in which Japanese women participated in the colonial project, see Louise Young, Japan’s Total Empire: Manchuria and the Culture of Wartime Imperialism; Kanno Mikiyo, ed., New Feminism Review Vol 6, Bosei fashizumu (Tokyo: Gakuyo shobō, 1995); Suzuki Yū ko, Feminizumu to sens ō: fujin und ōka no sens ō kyoryoku (Tokyo: Marjusha, 1997); Ueno Chizuko, Nashonalizumu to jendaa (Tokyo: Seidosha, 1998). Inderpal Grewal and Caren Kaplan, “Introduction: Transnational Feminist Practices and Questions of Postmodernity,” in Scattered Hegemonies: Postmodernity and Transnational Feminist Practices, ed. Inderpal Grewal and Caren Kaplan (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994). I am curious whether Wang’s characterization of the female narrator as a cold, insensitive beauty draws on popular images of bourgeois Japanese women in the colonies. This would turn the tables on her, allowing her to experience firsthand how colonial discourses of ethnicity and gender mediate their relations.



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2

(Re)writing Colonial Lineage in Sakaguchi Reiko’s “Passionflower”

1. Numerous postcolonial writers and critics have discussed the linguistic, literary, and political challenges facing colonized writers, from the dilemma of writing in the language of the colonizer to the possibility of co-opting colonialist literary techniques. In Japanese colonial studies, in particular, Leo Ching, Fujii Shōzō, Faye Yuan Kleeman, Kurokawa S ō, Ozaki Hotsuki, and Tarumi Chie, among others, have variously addressed the ways that colonized writers responded to such challenges. While these scholars have also explored the work of Japanese writers of the colonial period, they have not fully addressed the different limitations facing such writers. Leo Ching, Becoming “Japanese:” Colonial Taiwan and the Politics of Identity Formation (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001); Fujii Shōzō, Taiwan bungaku no hyakunen (Tokyo: Tōhō shoten, 1998); Faye Yuan Kleeman, Under an Imperial Sun: Japanese Colonial Literature of Taiwan and the South (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2003); Kurokawa S ō, “Kaisetsu: Tamentai no kagami,” in ‘Gaichi’ no nihongo bungakusen 1: Nanp ō, Nan’y ō, Taiwan, ed. Kurokawa S ō (Tokyo: Shinjuku shobō, 1996), 287–331; Ozaki Hotsuki, Kindai bungaku no sh ōkon: Ky ūshokuminchi bungakuron (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1991); Tarumi Chie, Taiwan no nihongo bungaku: Nihon t ōchijidai no sakkatachi (Tokyo: Gory ū Shoin, 1995). 2. Sakaguchi Reiko, “Tokeisō,” in Nihon t ōchiki Taiwan bungaku: Nihonjin sakka sakuhinsh ū, Daigo-maki, ed. Nakajima Toshio (Tokyo: Ryokuin shobō, 1998), 149–219. 3. Tarumi, Taiwan no nihongo bungaku, 134–135. 4. I use the term Han Chinese in reference to the descendants of sixteenthand seventeenth-Century immigrants from the mainland. While the term “Taiwanese” is used in popular discourse, I use “Han Chinese” in this chapter in order to differentiate these individuals from the indigenous peoples of Taiwan, whom I refer to as Aborigines. 5. According to Ozaki Hotsuki, during the period between 1940 and 1945, the two main Japanese-language literary journals in Taiwan were Bungei Taiwan (Literary Taiwan) and Taiwan bungaku (Taiwanese Literature). The former was supported by mainly Japanese, who wrote works for Japanese audiences that privileged romanticism, whereas the latter, dominated by Taiwanese writers, prioritized the issues of realism and aimed at creating a new tradition of Taiwanese literature. Sungsheng Yvonne Chang notes that some of the Taiwan bungaku writers



60. Yokota, “Utsukushiki banka,” 80. 61. Imamura Eiji’s “Dōkōsha” tells the story of a Manchu dressed as a Korean, and returning to his hometown to retreat from the challenges of modern colonial life.

6.

7. 8. 9.

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11.

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focused on depictions of the local and folk in order to provide an alternative to the romanticized versions of many Japanese writers. See Ozaki, Kindai bungaku no sh ōkon, 121–137; and Sung-sheng Yvonne Chang, “Taiwanese New Literature and the Colonial Context: A Historical Survey,” in Taiwan: A New History, ed. Murray A. Rubinstein (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, Inc., 1999), 273. For an overview of the Taiwanese literary landscape between 1940 and 1945, see Chang, “Taiwanese New Literature and the Colonial Context,” 261–319; and Ozaki, Kindai bungaku no sh ōkon, 104–193. Huang Deshi, quoted in Ozaki, Kindai bungaku no sh ōkon, 123–124. Chang, “Taiwanese New Literature and the Colonial Context,” 273. Sakaguchi Reiko, “Shunjū,” in ‘Gaichi’ no nihongo bungakusen 1: Nanp ō, Nan’y ō, Taiwan, ed. Kurokawa S ō (Tokyo: Shinjuku shobō, 1996), 168–192. Sakaguchi Reiko, “Tei ikka,” in Nihon t ōchiki Taiwan bungaku: Nihonjin sakka sakuhinsh ū, Daigo-maki, ed. Nakajima Toshio (Tokyo: Ryokuin shobō, 1998), 9–60. I use the terms natives, indigenous peoples, and Aborigines to refer to the indigenous peoples of Taiwan. Although I do not place the term native within quotation marks, I trust that readers will view my usage of the term as a reflection, not an endorsement, of colonial discourse. While the term indigenous peoples is currently the preferred terminology in anthropological and many activist circles, I follow the precedent set by Melissa J. Brown in her work on ethnic identity in Taiwan and also use the term Aborigines. Brown states that “ ‘Aborigine’ is the preferred English appellation of the Alliance of Taiwan Aborigines (Taiwan Yuanzhuminzu Quanli Cujinhui).” Melissa J. Brown, “On Becoming Chinese,” in Negotiating Ethnicities in China and Taiwan, ed. Melissa J. Brown (Berkeley: Institute of East Asian Studies, 1996), 38. “Passionflower” was Sakaguchi’s only wartime work to depict Aborigine characters. Most of her works that center around the indigenous peoples of Taiwan were produced during the postwar period and are based on stories she heard in Banchi Nakahara, an area populated by Aborigines where she spent ten months after the end of the war. She published several collections of short fiction, including “Banchi” (Native Territory, 1954), “Banpu Ropō no hanashi” (Native Woman Ropō’s Story, 1961), “Bansha no fu” (Native Notes, 1978), and “Musha” (Musha, 1978). The title story of the second collection was nominated for the Akutagawa literary award in 1960. In explaining the censorship of the 1942 version of “Passionflower,” Sakaguchi states that “one hundred pages” were cut because the work “critiqued the riban seisaku.” Sakaguchi Reiko, “ ‘Banchi’ to no kakawari,” in Musha: Sakaguchi Reiko sakuhinsh ū 2 (Tokyo: Korube shuppansha, 1978), 292. Nakajima Toshio notes that “Passionflower” was the first work published in Taiwan to directly discuss the Musha Incident. Nakajima Toshio, “Sakaguchi Reiko: Sakuhin kaisetsu,” in



No t e s

14.

15. 16.

17.

18.

19.

20.

21.

22.

No t e s Nihon t ōchiki Taiwan bungaku: Nihonjin sakka sakuhinsh ū, ed. Nakajima Toshio (Tokyo: Ryokuin shobō, 1998), 562. For discussion of other works addressing the Musha incident, see Kawahara Isao, “Nihon bungaku ni arawareta musha hōki jiken,” in Taiwan shinbungaku und ō no tenkai: Nihon bungaku to no setten (Tokyo: Kenbun shuppan, 1997), 69–105. Sakaguchi Reiko, Tei ikka (Taiwan: Shimizu shoten, 1943). In addition to the alternate version of “Tokeisō,” this collection also includes the title story, as well as “Shunjū,” “Biryō,” “Kokudo,” and “Hikari.” Nakajima Toshio, “Sakaguchi Reiko: Sakuhin kaisetsu,” 562. Tarumi, Taiwan no nihongo bungaku, 135–147. “Musha” focuses on the events leading up to the Musha Incident, while “Passionflower” addresses the aftermath, including a critique of the colonial policies regarding Aborigines. I recognize the problems in not addressing the issue of censorship in relation to this text. Particularly in light of the context in which this “second” text was produced, it would be interesting to imagine the ways in which Sakaguchi changed the original in order to pass the censors. However, it is impossible to tell how much or how little Sakaguchi revised her novella. Rather than commit the “intentional fallacy” and attempt to deduce Sakaguchi’s intentions in her “second” text, I attempt to approach the text as a contemporary reader who is ignorant of the censorship might approach it. The terms listed here were all used interchangeably during the colonial period. However, because of their derogatory nuance, the current Japanese term used to refer to Aborigines is Taiwan no genj ūmin. Kondō Masami identifies seven tribes: Taiyal (Atayal), Bunun, Tsou, Saiset (Saisyat), Paiwan, Ami (Amis), and Yami. Kondō Masami, “Taiwan s ō tokufu no ‘riban’ taisei to Musha jiken,” in Kindai Nihon to shokuminchi 2- Teikoku t ōchi no k ōz ō, ed. Wakabayashi Masahiro (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1992), 35. Ronald G. Knapp, “The Shaping of Taiwan’s Landscapes,” in Taiwan: A New History, ed. Murray A. Rubinstein (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 1999), 14. Ching-chih Chen, “Police and Community Control Systems in the Empire,” in The Japanese Colonial Empire, 1895–1945, ed. Ramon H. Myers and Mark R. Peattie (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984), 218–219. An official colonial government publication dates the reinstatement of the Han Chinese system of guards, aiy ūsen, beginning in 1897. Government of Formosa, Report on the Control of the Aborigines in Formosa (Taihoku, Formosa: Bureau of Aboriginal Affairs, 1911), 5. Kondō Masami notes that in 1904, after the oppressive ventures of Governor-General Sakuma, 202 “protected areas” ch ūzaijo had already been established. Two years after the completion of the riban policy efforts in 1915, there were 831 “protected areas.” Kondō, “Taiwan sōtokufu no ‘riban’ taisei to Musha jiken,” 38.



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23. For detailed discussion of these policies, see Kondō, “Taiwan sōtokufu no ‘riban’ taisei to Musha jiken,” 35–60. 24. Chen, “Police and Community Control Systems in the Empire,” 228. In addition, it is important to note that several years after the initiation of the riban policy, Aborigine men who underwent rigorous training were also allowed to serve as police. Chen, “Police and Community Control Systems in the Empire,” 236–238. 25. Kiyasu Yukio notes that between 1896 and 1924 about 6,901 people died in clashes between Aborigines and Japanese police, and in Aboriginal attacks on villages bordering the tribal territory. Kiyasu Yukio, Taiwan t ōchi hishi (Tokyo: San’yōsha, 1981), 160–161. 26. Accounts of preparation for the uprising indicate that the leaders of the uprising focused their efforts on Japanese and made special efforts to avoid injuring Han Chinese subjects, suggesting the purpose of the uprising was primarily to express resistance against Japanese only. 27. These two men were not related to each other, and instead may have been given the same surname Hanaoka, literally hill of flowers, because of a shared tribal affiliation. 28. Many popular texts cite the mistreatment of native women as a major cause of the uprising. Not only were there numerous cases of native women being abandoned by their Japanese police husbands, but there were also accounts of women being taken to Japan and sold to brothels, as well as women who were forced to work as “comfort women” for the Japanese military forces. Another cause of the uprising was the poor working conditions imposed on native laborers. Aborigines were forced to work building colonial facilities, fixing roads, and transporting lumber to build dormitory for the Musha elementary school. Saotome Katsumoto, Taiwan kara no tegami: Musha jiken, Sayon no tabi kara (Tokyo: Kusa no ne shuppankai, 1996), 48. Mukōyama Hirō, Taiwan Takasagozoku no k ōnichi h ōki: Musha Jiken (Tokyo: Chūō keizai kenky ūjo, 1999), 45–47. 29. “Volunteer soldiers” were recruited from among Aborigine men, and Atayal men were forced to fight other Atayal in the days following the Musha Incident. Kiyasu, Taiwan t ōchi hishi, 205–206. 30. Kondō, “Taiwan sōtokufu no ‘riban’ taisei to Musha jiken,” 54–56. 31. Kondō Masami, S ōryokusen to Taiwan: Nihon shokuminchi h ōkai no kenky ū (Tokyo: Tōsui shobō, 1996), 262–263. 32. Leo Ching discusses the significance of this change in terminology in relation to the shift in colonial attitudes toward the Aborigines. See Ching, Becoming “Japanese,” 133–173. 33. Wan-yao Chou, “The Kōminka Movement in Taiwan and Korea: Comparisons and Interpretations,” in The Japanese Wartime Empire, 1931–1945, ed. Peter Duus, Ramon H. Myers, and Mark R. Peattie (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1996), 44. Nakagawa K ōichi and Wakamori Tamio, ed., Musha jiken: Taiwan Takasagozoku no h ōki (Tokyo: Sanseido, 1980).



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34. The term Takasago originated from an Okinawan term for Taiwan. 35. In describing the failure of the Japanese army to “subjugate the natives,” Japanese Diet member Takekoshi Yosaburo noted that “the savages can run like deer and climb like monkeys, sometimes springing up into trees for refuge when closely pursued, and sometimes covering the ground in long leaps or skillfully hiding themselves in the bushes.” Takekoshi associates the natives with animals and suggests their affinity for the natural environment. Takekoshi Yosaburo, Japanese Rule in Formosa (New York: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1907), 217. 36. Ironically, Kurokawa S ō notes that the term “banjin” was also used by Han Chinese in reference to Japanese. Kurokawa S ō, “Kaisetsu: Tamentai no kagami,” 287. 37. Ching, Becoming “Japanese,” 151. 38. Shōji S ōichi, Chin fujin (Tokyo: Shin’yōdo, 1940), 169. 39. Sakaguchi, “Tokeisō,” 149. 40. The revised 1943 version identifies the setting as M-sha, while the censored 1942 version explicitly lists the location as Musha. The Musha area, located in a mountainous region in central Taiwan, was one of the areas to where Aborigine tribes were relocated and was the setting for the Musha Incident in 1930. 41. In a strange twist, Jun may have received his surname from his Japanese father, who, as a Japanese character, is separate from nature. However, it is not made clear whether he has taken his father’s surname or has received a Japanese name as part of assimilation policy. 42. Ann Laura Stoler and Frederick Cooper, “Between Metropole and Colony: Rethinking a Research Agenda,” in Tensions of Empire: Colonial Cultures in a Bourgeois World, ed. Ann Laura Stoler and Frederick Cooper (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), 9. 43. Sakaguchi, “Tokeisō,” 150. 44. Ibid., 155. 45. Ibid., 159–160. 46. Ibid., 177–178. 47. Raleigh Ferrel, Taiwan Aboriginal Groups: Problems in Cultural and Linguistic Classification (Taipei: Academia Sinica Institute of Ethnology, 1969), 23–24. 48. In his survey of representations of the Musha Incident, Kawahara Isao identifies forty-nine Japanese literary texts containing representations of Aborigines. The majority of these texts focused on “upland” tribes and, as noted by Kawahara, reflected the conventional image of Aborigines as uncivilized. Kawahara, “Nihon bungaku ni arawareta Musha hōki jiken,” 69–105. 49. Leo Ching notes that in “Yabanjin” the location of savagery within a “civilized” Japanese subject reinforces the binary structure of savagery and civility and thus upholds the structure of colonial modernity. Ching, Becoming “Japanese,” 148–151. 50. Sakaguchi, “Tokeisō,” 200.



168

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51. Ibid., 202. 52. Originally produced in Brazil, passionflower, used for both culinary and medicinal purposes, resembles the face of a clock, and thus in Japanese is called tokeis ō, grasses of time. The name in English supposedly originated from sixteenth-century Spanish priests, who associated parts of the flower with Jesus’s Passion, corresponding the three pistils in the blossom with the nails of the cross and the corona with Jesus’s crown of thorns. 53. Sakaguchi, “Tokeisō,” 208. 54. Ibid., 209. 55. Mary Louise Pratt, Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation (New York: Routledge, 1992), 38–85. 56. Ibid., 7. 57. Ibid. 58. Ibid., 78. 59. Shōji S ōichi’s literary depiction of a marriage between a Taiwanese man and a Japanese woman, Chin fujin, was one of the winners of the 1943 Greater East Asia Literary Prize and was praised for “contributing to the unification of Japan and Taiwan through his powerful literary work.” “Ajia bungaku no senkaku: Daiikkai jushōsha rokushi kettei,” Bungaku h ōkoku 2 (September 1, 1943): 3. The arranged marriage between Korean Crown Prince Yi Un and Nashimoto Masako, a member of Japanese royalty, was discussed in the media as the embodiment of the harmonious union of Korea and Japan. Watanabe Midori, Nikkan k ōshitsu hiwa: Ri Masakohi (Tokyo: Yomiuri shinbunsha, 1998), 82–87. 60. Both Suzuki Yū ko and Oguma Eiji highlight the colonial government’s promotion of intermarriage through the example of Governor-general Minami Jirō’s official commendation of Japanese-Korean couples in March 1941. Suzuki Yū ko, Jūgun ianfu, Naisen kekkon: Sei no shinryaku, sengo sekinin o kangaeru (Tokyo: Miraisha, 1992), 86–87. Oguma Eiji, A Genealogy of ‘Japanese’ Self-Images (Melbourne: Trans Pacific Press, 2002), 208. 61. Kawahara, “Nihon bungaku ni arawareta Musha hōki jiken,” 69–74. 62. Ōshika Taku, “Yabanjin,” in Nihon t ōchiki Taiwan bungaku: Nihonjin sakka sakuhinsh ū, bekkan ‘naichi sakka,’ ed. Nakajima Toshio (Tokyo: Ryokuin shobō, 1998), 355–389; Ōshika Taku, “Banpu,” in Yabanjin (Tokyo: Yumani shobō, 2000), 59–90; Nakamura Jihei, “Bankai no onna,” in Nihon t ōchiki Taiwan bungaku: Nihonjin sakka sakuhinsh ū, bekkan ‘naichi sakka,’ ed. Nakajima Toshio (Tokyo: Ryokuin shobō, 1998), 237–263; Nakamura Jihei, “Kiri no bansha,” in Taiwan sh ōsetsush ū (Tokyo: Bokushui shobō, 1941) 1–66; Nakamura Jihei, “Banjin no musume,” in Taiwan sh ōsetsush ū (Tokyo: Bokushui shobō, 1941), 67–77. For discussion of these stories, see Kawahara, “Nihon bungaku ni arawareta Musha hōki jiken,” 78–84. Even Satō Haruo, who is frequently described as sympathetic to Taiwan, writes in his travel account “Musha” about the temptations of a fifteen-year-old Aborigine



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63.

64.

65.

66.

67. 68.

69. 70. 71.

72.

No t e s girl offering herself to him. Many works of colonial literature follow Satō’s lead in emphasizing the dangerously erotic possibilities of interacting with native Taiwanese, and in particular with native females. Satō Haruo, “Musha,” in Nakajima Toshio and Kawahara Isao, ed., Nihon t ōchiki Taiwan bungaku nihonjin sakka sakuhinsh ū, bekkan ‘naichi sakka’ (Tokyo: Ryokuin shobō, 1998), 42. In his discussion of the factors contributing to the Musha Incident, Mukoyama Hirō includes the abuse and exploitation of Aborigine women by Japanese police officers. Mukoyama Hirō, Taiwan Takasagozoku no k ōnichi h ōki, 45–46. See also Kiyasu, Taiwan t ōchi hishi, 177–179. Sakaguchi herself stated that the original version of “Tokeisō” was censored because it critiqued colonial policies. While she does not detail the specific critiques voiced in her story, it is plausible that the connection between failed Japanese-Aborigine marriages and the unsuccessful colonial policies may have resulted in the initial censorship of the story. Nakajima Toshio, “Sakaguchi Reiko—sakuhin kaisetsu,” in Nihon t ōjiki Taiwan bungaku Nihonjin sakka sakuhinsh ū, ed. Nakajima Toshio (Tokyo: Ryokuin shobō, 1998), 562. Oguma Eiji notes the prevalence, particularly in Japan proper during the 1940s, of the “pure blood” ideology, which critiqued intermarriage and called for the maintenance of a “pure” Japanese bloodline. Oguma, A Genealogy of ‘Japanese’ Self-Images, 220. Takenaka Nobuko cites an instance where Japanese parents of a policeman in Taiwan protested his marriage to an Aborigine woman on the grounds that it would “taint the bloodline.” Takenaka Nobuko, Shokuminchi Taiwan no Nihon josei seikatsushi—Taish ō-hen (Tokyo: Tabata shoten, 1996), 343. For an examination of different representations of “mixed” subjects in Japanese colonial literature, see Hoshina Hironobu, “Shokuminchi no ‘Konketsuji’—‘Naidai kekkon’ no seijigaku,” in Taiwan no ‘Dai t ōa sens ō’—bungaku, media, bunka, ed. Fujii Shōzō, Huang Yingzhe, Tarumi Chie (Tokyo: Tokyo Daigaku shuppankai, 2002), 267–294. Sakaguchi, “Tokeisō,” 164. Popular representations of the Musha region include the 1942 film “Sayon no kane,” which starred Li Xianglan (Ri K ō -ran) as a “native” girl, as well as fiction by Nakamura Jihei and Ōshika Taku. Takenaka, Shokuminchi Taiwan no nihon josei seikatsushi, 343. Ibid. For discussion of the responsibilities of Japanese police in relation to Aborigines, see Ching-chih Chen, “Police and Community Control Systems in the Empire,” in The Japanese Wartime Empire, 1931–1945, ed. Peter Duus, Ramon H. Myers, and Mark R. Peattie (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1996), 229–230. An anecdote recorded by Takenaka Nobuko reveals additional official treachery involved in these marriages. Takenaka recounts the story of a young Japanese officer who was ordered by his superiors to marry an



170

73. 74. 75.

76. 77. 78.

79. 80.

81. 82. 83. 84.

85.

171

Aborigine woman. He and his family in Japan protested, expressing concerns about “tainting the bloodline” if the couple were to have children together. In the end, however, the officer agreed to the arrangement after being told by his senior officers that he could abandon his wife and children after three years, the time when the five-year plan for “managing the natives” would end. Takenaka, Shokuminchi Taiwan no Nihon josei seikatsushi 343–344. Jun’s mother’s name is Tewasu Rudao, while the historical figure’s name is generally listed as Tewasu R ūdao. Igarashi Ishimatsu, Musha jiken jikki (Taichong: Taiwan keisei shimpōsha, 1931), 7. Satō, “Musha,” 21–54. “Musha” originally appeared in Kaiz ō (March 1925) five years after the Saramao Uprising, in which seven Japanese were killed. Satō critically assesses the contradictions of the colonial policies and the attempts at formally educating the Aborigines. Sakaguchi, “Tokeisō,” 161. Ibid., 187–188. In discussions of “mixed marriage,” eugenicist Unno K ōtoku explained that the “inherited physical character of the superior race will overwhelm that of the inferior.” Unno’s perspective worked well with colonial policies that promoted intermarriage and assimilation, but was not, according to Oguma Eiji, a central theory in Japanese eugenics and thus was not embraced in Japan proper. Nevertheless, we can see an academic basis for the kind of eugenics Sakaguchi describes in her story. Oguma, A Genealogy of ‘Japanese’ Self-Images, 204–205. Takenaka, Shokuminchi Taiwan no Nihon josei seikatsushi, 343–344. Wang Xiaoyi and Hoshina Hironobu provide brief discussions of several of Sakaguchi’s stories that address the issue of marriage and bloodline among Japanese. Wang Xiaoyi, “Sakaguchi Reiko no ‘Tokeisō’o chū shin ni—Iminzokutō chi e no kyōryoku,” Tenri Taiwan gakkai nemp ō 10 (2001): 121–130. Hoshina, “Shokuminchi no ‘Konketsuji,’ ” 278–285. Sakaguchi, “Tokeisō,” 191–192. Ibid., 212. For more information on the Aborigine giy ūtai, see chapter 4 of Ching, and Kondō, S ōryokusen to Taiwan, 387–405, among others. Naoki Sakai discusses the interdependence of universalism and particularism, forming a “symmetrical, mutually supporting relationship.” Naoki Sakai, Translation and Subjectivity: On “Japan” and Cultural Nationalism (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997), 163. Numerous Japanese immigrants to colonial Korea, for example, used the phrase nishiki o kazaru in their explication of their motivation for emigrating to the colonies. Okamoto Tatsuaki, and Matsuzaki Tsugio, eds., Kikigaki Minamata minsh ūshi, daigomaki ‘Shokuminchi wa tengoku datta’ (Tokyo: S ōf ū kan, 1990), 192–193.



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86. Takenaka, Shokuminchi Taiwan no Nihon josei seikatsushi, 87–90. Takenaka cites examples of Japanese women who worked in the colonies as nurses, waitresses, telephone operators, midwives, office workers, and factory workers. 87. Sakaguchi herself traveled to Taiwan to teach music at a school for Japanese children. Takenaka Nobuko also cites numerous Japanese women who worked as teachers at colonial schools in Taiwan. Takenaka, Shokuminchi Taiwan no Nihon josei seikatsushi, 89. 88. Yoshiko Miyake, “Doubling Expectations: Motherhood and Women’s Factory Work Under State Management in Japan in the 1930s and 1940s,” in Recreating Japanese Women, 1600–1945, ed. Gail Lee Bernstein (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991), 267–295. 89. Sakaguchi, “Tokeisō,” 219. 90. Albert Memmi, The Colonizer and the Colonized (Boston: Beacon Press, 1965), 150. 91. Ibid., 151.

3 Looking for Legitimacy: Cultural Identity and the Interethnic Family in Colonial Korea 1. Anonymous, “Naisenjin no kekkon,” Ch ōsen jijō (December 1920): 26. 2. Government General of Chosen, Thriving Chosen: A Survey of Twentyfive Years’ Administration (Keijō: Taishō Shashin kogeisho, 1935), 80. 3. Anthropologist Yoshida Tōgo writing in 1913 discussed the “reunification” of Japan and Korea, while in 1910 historian Kita Teikichi used the image of the family to discuss Japan-Korea relations. For more information on the discussions of “common ethnic heritage” among Japanese and Koreans, see Peter Duus’ chapter “Images of Domination” in his The Abacus and the Sword: The Japanese Penetration of Korea, 1895–1910 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), 397–423. Andre Schmid also discusses similar examples of journalism portraying Japan and Koreans having the “same ancestors and (being) of the same country.” Andre Schmid, Korea Between Empires, 1895–1919 (New York: Columbia University Press, 2002), 159. See also Oguma Eiji, A Genealogy of “Japanese” Self-Images, trans. David Askew (Melbourne: Trans Pacific Press, 2002), 64–80. 4. Schmid, Korea Between Empires, 159. 5. Lee Ki-baik, A New History of Korea, trans. Edward W. Wagner (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984), 340–345. 6. For more on assimilation, see David Brudnoy, “Japan’s Experiment in Korea,” in Monumenta Nipponica 25.1/2 (1970): 155–195; and Michael Robinson, Cultural Nationalism in Korea, 1920–25 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1988). 7. Richard Devine, “Japanese Rule in Korea after the March First Uprising: Governor General Hasegawa’s Recommendations,” Monumenta Nipponica 52.4 (Winter 1997): 530.



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8. Representations of interethnic romance and marriage by Korean writers include Yi Kwang-su, “Shinsō furetekoso” (1940), “Karera no koi” (1941); Kim Song-min, “Ryokki renmei” (1940), “Tenjō monogatari” (1941); Chang Hyok-chū, “Yūshū jinsei” (1937), “Fun’iki” (1938), “Shojo no rinri” (1939); Yi Hyo-sok, “Azami no shō” (1941). For detailed discussion of representations of intermarriage in Cho Kakuchū’s work, see Nam Pu-jin, “ ‘Naisen kekkon’ no bungaku: Chō Kakuchū no nihongo sakuhin o chūshin ni,” Jinbun Ronsh ū, Shizuoka Daigaku jinbungakubu Jinbun Gakka kenky ū h ōkoku 55.1 (July 2004): 181–210. For more on Korean literary treatments of colonial romance and intermarriage, see Nam Pu-jin, Kindai bungaku no ‘Ch ōsen’ Taiken (Tokyo: Bensei shuppan 2001), 4–43. 9. Representations of interethnic romance and marriage by Japanese writers include Nakarai Tōsui, Ch ōsen Pusan otogibanashi (1881), and Kosa fuku kaze (1891); Ishikawa Tatsuzō, Hō Seika (1938); and Yuasa Katsue, “Kannani” (1935) and “Natsume” (1937). 10. Nam Pu-jin notes that from the late Taishō and early Shōwa period there was a dramatic increase in literary portrayals of unhappy intermarriages. Nam, Kindai bungaku no ‘Ch ōsen’ Taiken, 10. 11. “Natsume” was initially published in the July 1937 issue of Ch ūō k ōron, 29–52, and later was reprinted in the 1939 collection Hayama Momoko (Hayama Momoko) and the 1946 collection Kannani and Hanada Kiyoteru, Sasaki Kiichi and Sugiura Minpei, ed. Nihon teik ō bungakusen: sens ōka no geijutsu ni okeru teik ōsen (Kyoto: San’ichi shobō, 1955). 12. “Aoba wakaba ni fuku kaze o medetaku Ri Ôseishi gokongi wa kyō,” Yomiuri shimbun, April 28, 1930. 13. “Nissen wagō no ikuhisashiki onchigiri,” Yomiuri Shimbun, April 29, 1920. 14. The framing of the marriage as modern is tinged in irony since arranged marriages were framed as unmodern in contrast with relationships based on romantic love. 15. Recent work on the debates over the legality of the 1910 annexation treaty include Unno Fukujū, Kankoku heig ōshi no kenky ū (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 2000). 16. “Onsharei kōfu,” Ch ōsen shimbun, April 30, 1930. 17. For an in-depth discussion of the development of the “common ancestry” theory, see Oguma, A Genealogy of “Japanese” Self-Images, 64–80. Also, see Duus, The Abacus and the Sword, 419–423. 18. Ch ōsen kah ō, June 1, 1920. Ch ōsen shimbun, April 29, 1930. 19. In fact, Saitō’s statement prefaced an official announcement of pardons and reduced sentences for Koreans in prison, handed out in celebration of the royal wedding. Many of these sentences were related to the protests of March First. The evocation of “family” and “harmony” in this context thus positioned Japan as a benevolent patriarch, forgiving past “transgressions” of resistance. 20. “Nissen wagō no ikuhisashiki onchigiri,” Yomiuri Shimbun, April 29, 1920. 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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21. Honda Setsuko, Ch ōsen ōch ōgo no kotaishihime (Tokyo: Bungei shunjū, 1988), 114. 22. Ibid., 29. La Coree Livre was started by Kim Kyu-sik, who lobbied for Korean independence at the Paris Peace Conference in May 1919 as a representative of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea. 23. “Tanen shukudai no nissen kekkon: Oseishi denka no okeiji de kaiketsu,” Chosen shimbun, April 29, 1930. 24. Moriki Kazumi, “Ijūshatachi no ‘naisen kekkon’—Shokuminchishugi to kafuchōsei,” in Shokuminchishugi to jinruigaku, ed. Yamaji Katsuhiko and Tanaka Masakazu (Nishinomiya-shi: Kansai gakuin daigaku shuppankai, 2005), 287. 25. Ibid. 26. Suzuki Yū ko, Jūgun ianfu, Naisen kekkon: Sei no shinryaku, Sengo sekinin o kangaeru (Tokyo: Miraisha, 1992), 75. 27. Ch ōsen September 1921. As cited in Ibid. 28. Chōsen sōtokufu, Ch ōsen no jink ō mondai (Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, 1935), 111. 29. Moriki, “Ijūshatachi no ‘naisen kekkon,’ ” 287. 30. The government promoted these marriages as a way for young Japanese women to contribute to Japanese empire and specifically to support Japanese communities in the colonies, in this case, Manchuria. Notably, by promoting “brides to the continent,” the Japanese government was also preventing intermarriage between Japanese and Chinese in Manchuria. For more on tairiku no hanayome, see Jinno Morimasa, Mansh ū ni okurareta onnatachi—tairiku no hanayome (Tokyo: Nashi no kasha, 1992); and Izutsu Kikue, Tairiku no hanayome (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 2004). Moriki, “Ijūshatachi no ‘naisen kekkon,’ ” 289. 31. Kim Yon-tal, “Nihongo no chōsen tōji ni okeru tsū kon to konketsu iwayuru naisen kekkon no hōsei, tōkei, seisaku ni tsuite,” Kansai Daigaku jinken mondai kenky ūshitsu kiy ō 39 (1997): 43–44. 32. “Tanen shukudai no nissen kekkon—seishidenka no goseiji de kaiketsu,” Ch ōsen shimbun, April 29, 1930. Interestingly, the preoccupation with adultery in this article is tinged with male anxiety about the specific possibility of women committing “adultery” and possessing multiple spouses. The discussion of men engaging in such behavior does not receive attention. 33. Takasaki S ōji, “Chōsen no Shinnichi-ha,” in Kindai nihon to shokuminchi, Dai-6 maki, ed. Goto Ken’ichi et al. (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1993), 134. 34. During the previous year, the National Citizen’s Korean Federation (Kokumin s ōryoku ch ōsen renmei) surveyed interethnic couples (married or just cohabiting) in Korea, and sent them mementos. Moriki, “Ijūshatachi no ‘naisen kekkon,’ ” 289. 35. Suzuki, Jūgun ianfu, Naisen kekkon, 85. Naisen kekkon o jikk ōshi, kokumins ōryoku und ō ni kanshi naisen ittai no sokushinj ō hoka no mokuhan to nasu.



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36. In 1937, Korean subjects were required to worship at Shinto shrines. The following year, in 1938, Korean-language curriculum was banned from secondary schools. Further making this cultural assimilation explicit, the colonial government pressured Koreans to take on Japanese names in 1939. 37. Kim, “Nihongo no chōsen tōji ni okeru tsū kon to konketsu,” 42. 38. See Chapter 1 of Duus, The Abacus and the Sword, 29–65. 39. After receiving the first section of Tōsui’s novel, Ichiyō wrote a poem inspired by what she read. 40. Kosa fuku kaze was originally serialized in the Asahi shimbun in 1891. Kamigaito Kenichi, Aru Meijijin no Ch ōsenkan: Nakarai Tōsui to Nitch ō kankei (Tokyo: Chikuma shobō, 1996), 241–269. 41. Nam Pu-jin, Kindai bungaku no ‘Ch ōsen’ taiken (Tokyo: Bensei shuppan, 2001), 6–9. 42. Yosano Tekkan, Tōzai namboku; Tenchi gen’ō (Tokyo: Meiji shoin, 1971). 43. Nam, Kindai bungaku no ‘Ch ōsen’ taiken, 8. This pattern of inequality is oftentimes exemplified by the depictions of romantic relations between Japanese men and Korean kisaeng prevalent in Japanese travel guides and literary texts of the period. Nam observes that, in contrast with their Japanese counterparts, Korean writers of the early colonial period portrayed the perspectives of colonized subjects in their representations of interethnic romance and marriage. 44. Ishikawa Tatsuz ō, “Hō Seika,” in Wakakai no rinri: Ishikawa Tatsuz ō sakuhinsh ū Vol. 23 (Tokyo: Shinchōsha, 1973), 181–192. The title character openly declares her hatred of the men who have oppressed her in the past—including one of her comrades in the resistance movement who raped her while they were on a secret mission in Vladivostok. 45. Nam, Kindai bungaku no Chosen taiken, 12–16. Nam cites the work of proletarian poet Im Hwa, who worked with Nakano Shigeharu, and Japanese poet Shinato Yoshio. 46. Heather Bowen-Struyk, “W(h)ither the Nation in Japanese Proletarian Literature? Imagining an International Proletariat,” positions: east asia cultures critique 14. 2 (Fall 2006): 373. 47. The population increased from 42,460 in 1905 to 171,543 in 1910. Takasaki Sōji, Shokuminchi Ch ōsen no nihonjin (Tokyo: Iwanami shinshō, 2002), 97. 48. Chōsen sōtokufu, Ch ōsen jink ō mondai (1935), 13. 49. One of the earliest Korean works treating interethnic relations is Yi In-jik’s “Binseonrang ui ilmiin” (1912). 50. Yi Hyo-sok, “Gin no masu,” in Kindai Chosen bungaku nihongo sakuhinsh ū (1939–1941) S ōsakuhen 1 (Tokyo: Ryokuin shobō, 2001), 29–42. The young men view her as a muse for their different creative mediums, with one of them referring to her as Dante’s Beatrice and another likening her to the silver trout that transforms into a beautiful woman in W.B. Yeats’ poem “The Song of Wandering Aengus.”



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51. In 1941, Hinatsu Eitarō directed the film Kimi to boku (You and I), which he cowrote with Iijima Tadashi. The film touched on several key elements of Japanese colonialism in Korea with its portrayal of a marriage between a Korean “volunteer” soldier and a Japanese woman. Literary portrayals of intermarriage increased as well with the publication of four works by Yi Kwang-su, Yi Hyo-sok, and Kim Song-min in 1940. In 1941, the number of such representations increased to seven, and then the following year, 1942, showed nine texts. The majority of these texts were written by Korean writers in Japanese. For a list of the specific texts published after 1940, see Nam Pu-jin, Bungaku no shokuminchishugi: Kindai Ch ōsen no f ūkei to kioku (Tokyo: Sekai shisōsha, 2006), 7–8. 52. Im Jon-hye, Nihon ni okeru Ch ōsenjin no bungaku no rekishi (Tokyo: Hosei daigaku shuppankyoku, 1994), 223. 53. Yuasa, “Natsume,” 170–187. 54. Kurokawa S ō, “Kaisetsu: Hata no nai bungaku,” in ‘Gaichi’ no nihongo bungakusen Ch ōsen (Tokyo: Shinjuku shobō, 1996), 343. 55. “Immigrants” was first published in the July 1936 issue of Kaiz ō. As the title suggests, the story describes the experiences of two Japanese men who emigrate to Korea. Matsumura Matsujirō, a farmer, develops a close relationship with his Korean neighbors and by the end of the story marries his neighbor’s daughter after his first wife Iya dies. 56. His short story, “Kannani” was awarded the literary journal Kaiz ō’s seventh Kansh ō sh ōsetsu award in 1934. However, due to the work’s controversial support of the March First Independence movement in Korea, Kaiz ō did not publish the work and instead simply listed the title as an honorable mention. The following year, the entire work was published in Bungaku hy ōron (Literary Critique), and his short story “Honō no kiroku” (Record of Flames) was awarded the literary journal Kaiz ō’s Eighth Kansh ō s ōsaku (Literary Appreciation) award. In the late 1930s, Yuasa’s work was published in such major Japanese literary journals as Jinmin bunk ō (Popular Library), Kaiz ō (Reconstruction), Ch ūō k ōron (Central Consensus), and Bungakkai (Literary World). In addition, Yuasa actively participated in literary circles in both Japan and the colonies, including the Japan Pen Club and the Tairiku kaitaku bungei konwakai (Continental Development Literary Arts Group). The majority of his prewar and wartime works focused on Japanese and Koreans living in colonial Korea, and include such works as “Imin” (Immigrants, 1936), “R ō/Tabako” (Tobacco, 1936), Jōmon no machi (Streets near the Castle Gate, 1936–1937), “Sakigake imin” (Pioneers, 1938), “Aoi Chokori” (Blue Chokori, 1940), Aozora doko made (Anywhere in the Blue Skies, 1942), “Hatsukoi” (First Love, 1947), and “Rengyō” (Forsythia, 1947). Throughout the prewar and wartime periods, he traveled throughout Manchuria, Northern China and Korea, and made several trips to Brazil. He wrote until the late 1960s, and the majority of his postwar works, both fiction and nonfiction, center around Japanese



176

57.

58. 59.

60. 61. 62. 63. 64.

65.

66.

177

immigrants living in South America and examine shifting concepts of furusato (homeland) emerging from the experience of immigration. For more biographical information on Yuasa Katsue, see the chronology and list of Yuasa’s works compiled by Yan Hye-son in Ikeda Hiroshi’s edited compilation of Yuasa’s works Yan Hye-son, “Yuasa Katsue nenpū,” Kannani: Yuasa Katsue shokuminchi sh ōsetsush ū, ed. Ikeda Hiroshi (Tokyo: Inpakuto shuppankai, 1995), 551–558; “Yuasa Katsue sakuhin nenpyō,” Kannani: Yuasa Katsue shokuminchi sh ōsetsush ū, ed. Ikeda Hiroshi (Tokyo: Inpakuto shuppankai, 1995) 559–576, as well as Kurokawa S ō, ed., Gaichi no nihongo bungakusen 3: Ch ōsen (Tokyo: Shinjuku shobō, 1996), 369. Both Ikeda Hiroshi and Kurokawa Sō discuss Yuasa’s sympathetic views of the plight of Koreans in his work. In addition, both also discuss the correlation between Yuasa’s own life and that of his character Kim Tarō. See Ikeda Hiroshi, “Kaisetsu: Yuasa Katsue no Chōsen to Nihon,” Kannani: Yuasa Katsue shokuminchi sh ōsetsush ū, ed. Ikeda Hiroshi (Tokyo: Inpakuto shuppankai, 1995), 603–610; Kurokawa S ō, “Kaisetsu: Hata no nai bungaku,” Gaichi no nihongo bungakusen 3: Ch ōsen, ed. Kurokawa S ō (Tokyo: Shinjuku Shobō, 1996), 343–344. Kurokawa, “Kaisetsu: Hata no nai bungaku,” 343. Hanada Kiyoteru, Sasaki Kiichi, and Sugiura Minpei, eds. Nihon teik ō bungakusen: sens ōka no geijutsu ni okeru teik ōsen (Kyoto: San’ichi shobō, 1955). Hanada Kiyoteru, “Kaisetsu,” in Nihon teik ō bungakusen: sens ōka no geijutsu ni okeru teik ōsen (Kyoto: San’ichi shobō, 1955), 434. Takasaki Ry ūji, Bungaku no naka no chosenjinz ō (Tokyo: Seikyusha, 1982), 25–26. Ikeda, “Kaisetsu: Yuasa Katsue no Chōsen to Nihon,” 610. Im Jon-hye, “Shokuminchisha Nisei no bungaku: Yuasa Katsue e no gimon,” Kikan sanzenri 5 (Spring 1976): 148–161. Mark Driscoll, “Introduction,” in Yuasa Katsuei, Kannani and Document of Flames: Two Japanese Colonial Novels, trans. Mark Driscoll (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2005), 13–21. Alexis Dudden discusses Japan’s attempts to legitimate its imperial project in Korea through the discourse of international law. Alexis Dudden, Japan’s Colonization of Korea: Discourse and Power (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2005). Examples include Yom Sang-sop’s “Minami Tadao” (1927), Shimamura Risei’s novella “Komabito” (1941), Kim Sa-ryang’s “K ōmei” (1941), and Ch’ae Man-sik’s novel Nyonin senki (1945). For details on these works, see Nam, Bungaku no shokuminchishugi, 59. One of the few examples by a Japanese woman writer is Aoi Itsuko’s “S ōi no hi” (1926), which depicted a Japanese woman’s failed attempt to marry a Korean man. Upon discovering that he is already married, she returns home to Japan only to be met with contempt by other Japanese. In the case of Aoi’s story, this scenario may function as a cautionary tale warning



No t e s

67.

68.

69. 70. 71.

72.

73.

No t e s Japanese women of the possible dangers of getting romantically involved with Korean men. See Nam, Kindai bungaku no ‘Ch ōsen’ taiken, 19. In the first printing of the story, the protagonist’s name was written Kim, Tarō but in subsequent versions his name is written Kim. Tarō. Ikeda Hiroshi, “Kaidai, Chū,” Kannani: Yuasa Katsue shokuminchi sh ōsetsush ū, ed. Ikeda Hiroshi (Tokyo: Inpakuto shuppankai, 1995), 522–523. This character also appears in Yuasa’s short story “Shinta kaihatsu” (1937), with a space between the surname and the personal name, rather than punctuation. It is also possible that even with the punctuation the name could be interpreted as completely Japanese, Kane Tarō, again concealing the Korean reading of the surname and transforming it into a Japanese surname. The rarity of this surname in Japanese, however, seems to diminish this possibility. Oguma, A Genealogy of “Japanese” Self-Images, 65. As cited in Duus, The Abacus and the Sword, 419. Todd Henry, “Sanitizing Empire: Japanese Articulations of Korean Otherness and the Construction of Early Colonial Seoul, 1905–1919,” The Journal of Asian Studies 64 (2005): 639–675. Chulwoo Lee discusses how the Government General justified the practice of flogging in colonial Korea, despite its prohibition in Japan in 1882, because “unenlightened” Koreans required correspondingly base punishment. Chulwoo Lee, “Modernity, Legality, and Power in Korea Under Japanese Rule,” in Colonial Modernity in Korea, ed. Gi-Wook Shin and Michael Robinson (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 1999), 32–33. Chang Hyok-chū, also known as Noguchi Kakuchū, is one of the earliest Resident Korean writers producing work in Japanese. In the postwar period, critics have often labeled him as shinnichi-ha or as a collaborator. He is well-known for his short story “Iwamoto shiganhei” (1944). Kim Saryang was also a Resident Korean writer who initially began writing in both Japanese and Korean in the late 1930s. His most famous work includes “Tenma” (1940), and “Hikari no naka ni” (1939), which was the first story written by a Korean writer to be a candidate for the Akutagawa Literary Prize. For a comparative look at these writers, see Kawamura Minato, “Kim Sa-ryang to Chang Hyok-chū —Shokuminchijin no seishin kōzō,” in Kindai Nihon to Shokuminchi 6 Teik ō to kutsuj ū, ed. Ōe Shinobu et al. (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1993), 205–233. For more on Kim, see Im, Nihon ni okeru Ch ōsenjin no bungaku no rekishi, 225– 232; Takasaki Sōji, “Chōsen no shinnichi-ha: Ryokki renmei de katsudōshita chōsenjintachi,” in Kindai Nihon to Shokuminchi 6 Teik ō to kutsuj ū, ed. Ōe Shinobu et al. (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1993), 123–148. For more on Chang, see Im, Nihon ni okeru Ch ōsenjin no bungaku no rekishi, 202–212. Chang Hyok-chū’s “Yūshū jinsei” appeared in the October 1937 issue of Nihon Hy ōron and was later included in his short story collection



178

74.

75.

76.

77. 78.

79. 80.

81. 82. 83. 84. 85.

86.

179

Shunkaden. “Fun’iki” appeared in the June 1938 issue of Bungei. For an in-depth discussion of Chang Hyok-chū’s literary treatment of intermarriage, see Nam Pu-jin, “ ‘Naisen Kekkon’ no bungaku: Chang Hyok-chū no nihongo sakuhin o chūshin ni,” Jinbun Ronsh ū: Shizuoka Daigaku Jinbungakubu Jinbungakka kenky ū h ōkoku 55.1 (July 2004): 181–210. Im Jon-hye notes that Chang’s descriptions of Korean characters frequently affirm negative stereotypes of Koreans and states that Chang looks at Koreans with the eyes of a “foreigner” (ih ōjin), not of another Korean. Im, Nihon ni okeru Ch ōsenjin no bungaku no rekishi, 208. For discussion of Kim Sa-ryang’s “Hikari no naka ni,” see Jonathan Glade, “Assimilation through Resistance: Language and Ethnicity in Kim Saryang’s ‘Hikari no naka ni,’ ” Southeast Review of Asian Studies 29 (2007): 41–55. Carol J. Singley, “Teaching American Literature: The Centrality of Adoption,” Modern Language Studies 34.1/2 (Spring–Autumn 2004): 76–83. Taimie Bryant, “Sons and Lovers: Adoption in Japan,” American Journal of Comparative Law 38.2 (Spring 1990): 299. E. Patricia Tsurumi, “Colonial Education in Korea and Taiwan,” in The Japanese Colonial Empire, 1895–1945, ed. Ramon H. Myers and Mark R. Peattie (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1984), 294. Ibid., 306. Henry Em discusses how the colonial government constructed Korean identity as a distinctly inferior minority through controls over education, print capitalism, and communication. Henry Em, “Minjok as a Modern and Democratic Construct: Sin Ch’aeho’s Historiography,” in Colonial Modernity in Korea, ed. Gi-Wook Shin and Michael Robinson (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 1999): 352–353. Yuasa, “Natsume,” 173. Sono uchi washi ga ee nihonjin ni sewashiteageru. Ibid., 180. Sandra Wilson, The Manchurian Crisis and Japanese Society, 1931–33 (London and New York: Routledge, 2002), 143. Ibid., 143. This scene reflects upon the process of embodying cultural identity with the body functioning as a site where subjects may express their identities—cultural, gender, national. In Japan, physical activities, such as radio calisthenics, team sports, and physical education in schools, represented a means by which cultural identities were further ingrained in the literal bodies of subjects. These activities were associated with Japanese national identity, in the form of the Yamato spirit, among others, and used to promote this cultural affiliation in Japanese and colonized subjects alike. Identities, whether national, cultural, or gender, are not static and must be repeatedly performed. As we shall see, Japanese subjects as well had to continually enact their Japaneseness. Yet, colonized subjects faced



No t e s

87.

88. 89.

90. 91.

No t e s difficult barriers, both internal and external, in their attempts to perform “Japaneseness.” For more on assimilation, see Chou, Wan-yao, “The K ōminka Movement in Taiwan and Korea: Comparisons and Interpretations,” in The Japanese Wartime Empire, 1931–1945, ed. Peter Duus, Ramon H. Myers, and Mark R. Peattie (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1996), 40–68. The term yobo is a derogatory reference to Koreans. Yuasa, “Natsume,” 184. Hisashigami bangs were a Western-influenced hairstyle popularized by the actress Kawakami Sadayakko in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Ibid., 174. Ibid., 182. Ibid., 170.

4

Marriage, Modernization, and the Imperial Subject

1. Wan-yao Chou, “The K ōminka Movement in Taiwan and Korea: Comparisons and Interpretations,” in The Japanese Wartime Empire, 1931–1945, ed. Peter Duus, Ramon H. Myers, and Mark R. Peattie (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1984), 40–68. 2. Mark Peattie, “Introduction,” in The Japanese Colonial Empire, 1895– 1945, ed. Ramon H. Myers and Mark R. Peattie (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1984), 40. 3. The surname is pronounced Chen in Mandarin Chinese, and Chin in Japanese. Consequently, I refer to the family unit as Chen, but the wife as Chin Yasuko. 4. In 1943 and 1944, the Greater East Asia Literary Award (Dai t ōa bungaku taish ō) was given to eleven writers from East and Southeast Asia whose work contributed to the construction of Greater East Asia. Ozaki Kihachi, Kimura Tsuyoshi, and Zheng Yulin, who suggested the award, described it as the embodiment of Greater East Asian literature. The winners of the First Greater East Asia Literary Award (1943) included two writers each from China, Japan, and Manchukuo: Shōji S ōichi, Chin fujin (Japan); Ōki Atsuo, Unabara ni arite utaeru (I Can Sing on the Sea) (Japan); Shi Jun, Wotu (Fertile Soil) (Manchukuo); Jue Qing, Huangjin de zhai men (Narrow Gate of Gold) (Manchukuo); Yu Qie, Yu Qie duanpian xiaoshuoji (Collection of Short Stories by Yu Qie) and Riben yinxiang (Impressions of Japan) (Republic of China); and Yuan Xi, Beike (Seashells) (Republic of China). The following year, in 1944, the second group of winners of the award included writers from Japan, China, Manchukuo, Thailand, and the Philippines: Yarita Ken’ichi, Mansh ū kenkokuki (Record of Nation-Building in Manchuria) (Japan); Mei Niang, Xie (Crabs) (Republic of China); Gu Ting, Xin Sheng (New Life) (Manchukuo); Dokmai Sot, Korezo jinsei (This is Life) (Thailand); Jose Esperanza Cruz, Tatlong Maria (The Three Marias)



180

5.

6.

7. 8. 9.

10.

181

(Philippines). Separate awards committees were designated for works in Chinese and Japanese, and later for Tagalog and Thai. For the first award, the prize committee members representing Japan included such literati as Kikuchi Kan, Kume Masao, Satō Haruo, Takamura K ōtaro, and Yokomitsu Riichi. Ozaki Hotsuki, Kindai bungaku no sh ōkon: Ky ūshokuminchi bungakuron (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1991), 18–32. Shōji S ōichi was born in 1906 in Yamagata prefecture, but spent the majority of his childhood in Taiwan, where his father worked as a doctor. He studied English literature with Nishiwaki Junzaburō at Keiō University, where his fellow students included atomic bomb writer Hara Tamiki and literary critic Yamamoto Kenkichi. Following graduation, under the pen name Akumi Ken, he translated works by Ernest Hemingway and Aldous Huxley in the journal Bungaku. In the 1930s, he began writing short stories, which appeared in the literary journals Shinsanpa and Mita bungaku. His short story, “Watashi no taiyō” (O Sole Mio—My Sun) published under the pen name Kane Jōji appeared in the journal Shin seinen in 1937, and was subsequently made into a film by the Nikkatsu studio in 1939. In 1949, his short story, “Tsuihōjin” (Exile), which was first published in Mita Bungaku, was a candidate for the prestigious Akutagawa Literary Prize. That same year he also published his famous short story, “Zankokuna kisetsu” (A Cruel Season) in the same journal. His translation of Leo Tolstoy’s 1863 novel The Cossacks appeared in 1950. In addition, he is also known for his 1950 literary criticism on D.H. Lawrence, Rōrensu no sh ōgai (The Life of Lawrence). Shōji Nonomi, Hōōboku: Sakka Sh ōji S ōichi no sh ōgai (Tokyo: Chūō shoin, 1976). The Japan Literary Patriotic Association (JLPA) used literature as a means of promoting and celebrating Japanese nationalism. For example, the JLPA organized several conferences for Japanese women writers to discuss their role in supporting the war effort. The JLPA also produced numerous patriotic publications, including an anthology of the top one hundred most patriotic classical Japanese poems (Aikoku hyakunin issh ū), a collection of essays by famous Japanese literati celebrating the patriotic mothers of Japan, and an anthology of writings on “the South,” Shinsei namp ōki (1944). In 1943, the JLPA sponsored contests for patriotic personal mottos (zay ūnomei). Sakuramoto Tomio, Nihon bungaku h ōkokukai: Dait ōa sens ōka no bungakushatachi (Tokyo: Aoki Shoten, 1995). Murakami Fumiaki, “Shoji Soichi: sono hito to sono jidai,” in Chin fujin (Tokyo: Ozorasha, 2000), 9. As cited in Ibid., 10. Murakami Fumiaki suggests that the postwar shift in Shoji’s literary focus on existentialism and spirituality, and away from romanticism, signified an attempt to escape from this label. Ibid., 11. Togawa Sadao, “Jushō no nisakuhin,” Bungaku h ōkoku 2 (September 1, 1943): 3.



No t e s

No t e s

11. In a roundtable discussion in the November 1941 issue of Mita bungaku, Shōji, Morimoto, Kubota, and Sugimura discuss the positive reception to the play. Murakami 8. 12. Anonymous, “Shōji S ōichi chō, ‘Chin fujin’—Taiwanjin toshite no dokugokan,” Nihon gakugei shimbun 100 (January 10, 1941), as cited in Wang Hsiao-yun, “Shōji S ōichi no ‘Chin fujin’ ni miru haiburiddo bunka no kattō,” Ajia shakai bunka kenky ū 8 (March 2007): 61. Hamada Hayao, “Shōji S ōichi-shi no ‘Chin fujin’ ni tsuite,” Taiwan jih ō 257 (July 1941): 75–78. 13. “Naidai ittaika no jissaiteki kaiketsu o bungaku sakuhin o t ōshite tsuyoku shissashita tokoro no rikisaku de ate . . .” Togawa Sadao, “Jushō no nisakuhin,” Gakugei shimbun (August 26, 1943): 7. 14. Hamada Hayao (1909–1959) grew up in Sendai, Japan. He first traveled to Taiwan in 1926 at the recommendation of his brother-in-law and later went to high school in Taipei. He returned to Japan in 1929 to study Japanese literature at Tohoku Imperial University. An advocate of social realism, Hamada is best known for his novel Nanp ō iminson (Village of Immigrants in the South, 1942), a stark depiction of the lives of Japanese immigrants in rural Taiwan. Biographical information on Hayama is from Hamada Yoshiko and Kawahara Isao, “Hamada Hayao ryakureki,” in Nihon t ōjiki Taiwan bungaku: nihonjin sakka sakuhinsh ū dai-5 maki, ed. Nakajima Toshio and Kawahara Isao (Tokyo: Ryokuin Shobō, 1998), 496–508; and Faye Yuan Kleeman, Under an Imperial Sun: Japanese Colonial Literature of Taiwan and the South (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2003), 77. 15. Hamada, “Shōji S ōichi-shi no ‘Chin fujin’ ni tsuite,” 76. 16. Kleeman, Under an Imperial Sun, 226. 17. Tago Hiroshi, “Chin fujin ni tsuite,” Taiwan bungaku 1.1 (June 1941): 92–105. 18. Lü Heruo, “ ‘Chin fujin’ no kōen (4),” Kōnan shimbun, May 23, 1941. For biographical information and discussion of Lü’s works, see Kleeman, Under an Imperial Sun, 174–195 and Tarumi Chie, “An Author Listening to Voices from the Netherworld: Lü Heruo and the Kuso Realism Debate,” in Taiwan Under Japanese Colonial Rule, 1895–1945: History, Culture, Memory, ed. Liao Ping-Hui and David Der-Wei Wang (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006), 262–276. 19. Chen Shaoxing, “Shōsetsu ‘Chin fujin’ dainibu ni arawareta chi no mondai,” Taiwan jih ō 276 (December 1942): 111–118. 20. Tarumi, “An Author Listening to Voices from the Netherworld,” 266. 21. Nakamura Tetsu and Takemura Takeshi, “Zadankai: Bungaku taidan,” Taiwan bungaku 2.3 (July 1942): 109. As cited in Wang, Hsiao-yun, “Shōji S ōichi no ‘Chin fujin’ ni miru haiburiddo bunka no kattō,” Ajia shakai bunka kenky ū 8 (March 2007): 61. 22. Hamada 77. 23. Hoshina Hironobu, “Dai tōa bungakushō jushōsaku ‘Chin fujin’ o yomu,” Kikan Ch ūgoku 53 (March 1998): 64–72.



182

183

24. Wang, Hsiao-yun, “Shōji S ōichi no ‘Chin fujin’ ni miru haiburiddo bunka no kattō,” 39–66. 25. Huei-chu Chu, “ ‘Fictionalizing’ Indigenous Mourning: Taiwanese Funerals Under Japanese Imperialization,” positions: east asia cultures critique 16.2 (Fall 2008): 279–303. 26. Takenaka Nobuko, Shokuminchi Taiwan no nihon josei seikatsu shi— Sh ōwa-hen (j ō) (Tokyo: Tabata shoten, 2001), 227. 27. Takenaka Nobuko, Shokuminchi Taiwan no nihon josei seikatsu shi— Taish ō-hen (Tokyo: Tabata shoten, 1996), 148. 28. Takenaka, Shokuminchi Taiwan no nihon josei seikatsu shi—Sh ōwa-hen, 226–231. 29. Ibid., 226. 30. Torii Ry ūzō (1870–1953) visited Taiwan in 1896 to observe and document the Atayal tribe and wrote several studies on his field work including his 1903 research work. For more on Torii’s work, see Ka F. Wong, “Entanglements of Ethnographic Images: Torii Ry ūzō’s Photographic Records of Taiwan Aborigines (1896–1900),” Japanese Studies 24.3 (December 2004): 283–299; and David Askew, “Empire and the Anthropologist: Torii Ry ūzō and Early Japanese Anthropology,” Japanese Review of Cultural Anthropology 4 (2003): 133–154. Historian Ino Kanori (1867–1925) wrote a study positing a direct lineage between Aboriginal Taiwanese and early Portuguese colonizers. Literary scholars Leo Ching and Robert Tierney have addressed specific literary treatments of Japanese-Aborigine relations. See Leo T.S. Ching, Becoming “Japanese”: Colonial Taiwan and the Politics of Identity Formation (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001), 89–132; and Robert Tierney, “Ethnography, borders and violence: reading between the lines in Satō Haruo’s Demon Bird,” Japan Forum 19.1 (2007): 89–110. 31. Ōshika Taku, “Yabanjin,” in Nihon t ōjiki Taiwan bungaku: Nihonjin sakka sakuhinsh ū, bekkan ‘naichi sakka,’ ed. Nakajima Toshio (Tokyo: Ryokuin Shobō, 1998), 355–389; Ōshika Taku, “Banpu,” in Yabanjin (Tokyo: Yumani shobō, 2000), 59–90; Nakamura Jihei, “Bankai no onna,” in Nihon t ōjiki Taiwan bungaku: Nihonjin sakka sakuhinsh ū, bekkan ‘naichi sakka,’ ed. Nakajima Toshio (Tokyo: Ryokuin Shobō, 1998), 237–263; Nakamura Jihei, “Kiri no bansha,” in Taiwan sh ōsetsush ū (Tokyo: Bokushui shobō, 1941), 1–66; Nakamura Jihei, “Banjin no musume,” in Taiwan sh ōsetsush ū (Tokyo: Bokushui shobō, 1941), 67–77. 32. Sakaguchi Reiko, “Tokeisō,” in Nihon t ōjiki Taiwan bungaku: nihonjin sakka sakuhinsh ū Daigo-maki, ed. Nakajima Toshio and Kawahara Isao (Tokyo: Ryokuin Shobō, 1998), 149–219. During the postwar period, Sakaguchi also produced a significant number of stories featuring the Aboriginal Taiwanese. 33. Such images continued through the postwar period. For example, Yoshiya Nobuko’s 1960 short story “Bansha no Rakujitsu” depicts a Japanese woman’s developing attraction to a young Aboriginal man,



No t e s

34.

35. 36.

37. 38.

39.

No t e s Hayun, in the days before the Musha uprising. Yoshiya Nobuko, “Bansha no Rakujitsu,” in Seitaiy ū no tsubo (Tokyo: Bungei shunjū shinsha, 1961), 155–184. Niigaki K ōichi’s “Jōmon” (Castle Gates, 1942) appeared in the January 1942 issue of Taiwan bungaku. Sakaguchi Reiko’s “Tei ikka” (The Zheng Family) was first published in the September 1941 issue of Taiwan jih ō and was later reprinted in a collection of the same name published by Kiyomizu shoten in 1943. Sakaguchi’s story was highly praised by such Taiwanese critics as Yang Kui in “Taiwan bungaku montō,” Taiwan bungaku (July 1942), cited in Ozaki 143. Ibid., 143–144. Masugi Shizue (1901–1955) spent her childhood in Taiwan and trained to be a nurse at a hospital in Taichung in 1915–1916. In 1918, her parents forced her into an arranged marriage with the Japanese manager of a train station near Takao city. She later escaped the marriage and fled to Osaka, where she eventually worked as a journalist. She began publishing short stories in 1927, including “Ekichō no wakakizuma” (The Young Wife of the Station Manager), based on her arranged marriage. She returned briefly to Taiwan with her lover Nakamura Jihei in 1939. Biographical information on Masugi from Nakajima Toshio and Kawahara Isao, Nihon t ōjiki Taiwan bungaku: nihonjin sakka sakuhinsh ū Betsumaki, ed. Nakajima Toshio and Kawahara Isao (Tokyo: Ryokuin Shobō, 1998), 587–590. Masugi Shizue, “Nampō no kotoba,” in Kotozuke (Tokyo: Shinchōsha, 1941) 4–20. In addition to its portrayal of the relationship between Kimura Hanako and her husband Li Jinshi, “Nampō no kotoba” (Language of the South) subtly points to the anxiety resulting from Hanako’s assimilation of Taiwanese culture. For a critical reading of “Nampō no kotoba,” see K ōra Rumiko, “Masugi Shizue ‘Nampō no kotoba’ o yomu,” Shokuminchi bunka kenky ū 5 (July 2006): 162–170. Kleeman, Under an Imperial Sun, 197–227. Zhou Jinpo (1920–1996) and Chen Huoquan are the most frequently cited “imperial subject” writers. Zhou’s most famous work, “Shiganhei” (Volunteer Soldier, 1941), focuses on the voluntary conscription system, an integral aspect of the “imperial subject” campaign. Chen Huoquan’s short story “Michi” (The Way, 1943) also touches on voluntary conscription and the links between Japanese language and a “Japanese” identity. In order to obtain this tie to Japan, the protagonist unsuccessfully attempts to marry a Japanese woman. For more on Zhou and Chen, see Ching 113–125; Kleeman, Under an Imperial Sun, 197–227; Tarumi Chie, Taiwan no nihongo bungaku: Nihon t ōji jidai no sakkatachi (Tokyo: Gory ū shoin, 1995), 51–102. Hsin-yi Lu, “Imagining ‘New Women,’ Imagining Modernity: Gender Rhetoric in Colonial Taiwan,” in Women in the New Taiwan: Gender Roles and Gender Consciousness in a Changing Society, ed. Catherine



184

40.

41. 42. 43. 44.

45.

46. 47. 48.

185

Farris, Anru Lee, and Murray Rubinstein (New York: M.E. Sharpe, Inc., 2004), 76–92. Initially critiqued as imperial-subject writers, both Wang Changxiong (1916–2000) and Long Yingzong (1910–1999) have been reevaluated by Taiwanese literary critics in recent years. Wang’s short story “Honry ū” (Wild Current, 1943) centers on the identity struggles of a Taiwanese doctor who has returned to Taiwan after spending a decade in Tokyo. The doctor’s internalized discrimination against his Taiwanese identity is juxtaposed with another Taiwanese character who “passes” as Japanese through the use of a Japanese name, Ito, his marriage to a Japanese woman, and his fluency in the Japanese language. “Honry ū” appeared in Taiwan bungaku 3.3 (July 1943): 104–129. Long’s short story “Papaya no aru machi” (The Town with Papayas, 1937) won the Kaizō literary award in 1937. Long Yingzong, “Papaya no aru machi,” Kaiz ō 19.4 (April 1937): 1–58. For a summary and discussion of “Honry ū” and “Papaya no aru machi,” see Angelina C. Yee, “Constructing a Native Consciousness: Taiwan Literature in the 20th Century,” The China Quarterly 2001: 89–92. For critical discussions of “Honry ū,” see Ching 120–122; Kleeman, Under an Imperial Sun, 205–206; and Tarumi, Taiwan no nihongo bungaku,103–124. For discussions of “Papaya no aru machi,” see Ching 128–132. K ō Ikujo, Kindai Taiwan joseishi: Nihon no shokuminchi t ōji to ‘shin josei’ no tanj ō (Tokyo: Keisō shobō, 2001), 188. Paula Harrell, Sowing the Seeds of Change: Chinese Students, Japanese Teachers, 1895–1905 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992), 81. Sakane Keiko, “Ry ūgakusei kyōikushi no shiten kara mita “Taiwanjin naichi ry ūgaku” no jittai,” Tōkai daigaku kiy ō 18 (1998): 60. Other colonized subjects who studied in Japan also experienced this dilemma, as evidenced in Korean writer Hyon Chin-gon’s “A Society That Drives You to Drink” (Sul kwonhanun sahoe, 1921). Hyon Chingon, “A Society That Drives You to Drink,” in A Ready-Made Life: Early Masters of Modern Korean Fiction, trans. and ed. Chong-un Kim and Bruce Fulton (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1988), 7–16. “Suigan,” Zhou Jinpo’s first published work, appeared in the March 1940 issue of Bungei Taiwan. He continued to publish in this journal, with “Shiganhei” appearing in the September 1941 issue and “Kyō shū” appearing in April 1943. For a critique of the treatment of “Suigan,” see Naoki Sakai, “Two Negations: The Fear of Being Excluded and the Logic of Self-Esteem,” in Contemporary Japanese Thought, ed. R ichard Calichman (New York: Columbia University Press, 2005), 159–192. Shōji S ōichi 22. Ibid., 24. K ō 185–238.



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49. For more on the discourse on love marriage in Japan, see Michiko Suzuki, “Progress and Love Marriage: Rereading Tanizaki’s Chijin no ai,” Journal of Japanese Studies 31.2 (2005): 357–384. 50. Ibid., 359. 51. Lu, “Imagining ‘New Women,’ ” 91. 52. The “progress” touted in love marriage discourse usually focused more on the education of young women, who, according to the male intellectuals central to these discussions, required guidance in their path to self-realization. Ironically, in the case of Madame Chen, it is Qingwen who pursues the path of progress, in part through his marriage to Yasuko. 53. Lu, “Imagining ‘New Women,’ ” 76–92. 54. Anne McClintock, Imperial Leather: Race, Gender, and Sexuality in the Colonial Contest (London: Routledge, 1995), 24. 55. Shōji S ōichi 50. 56. Ibid., 50. 57. Lu, “Imagining ‘New Women,’ ” 84–85. 58. Ibid., 83. 59. See, for example, Partha Chatterjee’s discussion of the “woman question” in nationalist discourse, and Lydia Liu’s essay on the female body and nationalist discourse. Partha Chatterjee, The Nation and its Fragments: Colonial and Postcolonial Histories (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993), 116–157. Lydia Liu, “The Female Body and Nationalist Discourse: The Field of Life and Death Revisited,” in Scattered Hegemonies: Postmodernity and Transnational Feminist Practices, ed. Inderpal Grewal and Caren Kaplan (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994), 37–62. 60. Shōji S ōichi 72. 61. Ibid., 95. 62. Ibid., 139. 63. Ming-cheng M. Lo discusses the hybrid identities of Taiwanese doctors educated in Japan and their frustration with their undefinable identities. Ming-Cheng M. Lo, Doctors Within Borders: Profession, Ethnicity, and Modernity in Colonial Taiwan (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002), 136–141. 64. Ching, Becoming “Japanese,” 126. 65. Komagome Takeshi, “Japanese Colonial Rule and Modernity: Successive Layers of Violence,” in “Race” Panic and the Memory of Migration, ed. Meaghan Morris and Brett de Bary (Hong Kong University Press, 2001): 250. 66. Shōji S ōichi 99. 67. Ibid., 185. 68. For more on Ōgai’s “The Dancing Girl,” see Dennis Washburn, “Manly Virtue and the Quest for Self: The Bildungsroman of Mori Ōgai,” Journal of Japanese Studies 21.1 (Winter 1995): 1–32, and Christopher Hill, “Mori Ōgai’s Resentful Narrator: Trauma and the National Subject



186

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in ‘The Dancing Girl,’ ” positions: east asia cultures critique 10.2 (2002): 365–397. 69. Kleeman, Under an Imperial Sun, 13–14. 70. “Kōry ū Nihon nanshin no/Simei wa tsuyoku s ōken ni/Afururu chikara moyuru iki/ wareware no zento ni hikari ari/Yakushin, Taiwan waga Taiwan.” Gotō Ken’ichi, Kindai Nihon to Tōnan Ajia (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1995), 78. 71. Ibid., 94.

5

Colonizing a National Literature: The Debates on Manchurian Literature

1. “Manshū koku” refers to the specific period when it became an “independent nation” between 1932 and 1945. On the other hand, while “Manshū” oftentimes served as a general term for Manchuria throughout the first half of the twentieth century, it was also used to refer to the period before the establishment of the puppet state in 1932. 2. For more on the invention of tradition, see Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger, ed. The Invention of Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), and Stephen Vlastos, “Tradition: Past/Present Culture and Modern Japanese History,” in The Mirror of Modernity: Invented Traditions of Modern Japan, ed. Stephen Vlastos (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), 1–16. In addition, for discussions of the formation of the Japanese literary canon and national identity, see Haruo Shirane and Tomi Suzuki, eds., Inventing the Classics: Modernity, National Identity and Japanese Literature (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001). 3. Japan first developed its economic, industrial, and military presence in Manchuria in the period between 1904 and 1932. These years served as an important precursor in the eventual establishment of a puppet state in Manchuria in 1932. See Yoshihisa Tak Matsusaka, The Making of Japanese Manchuria, 1904–1932 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2001). 4. Joshua A. Fogel, “Yosano Akiko and her China Travelogue of 1928,” in Travels in Manchuria and Mongolia: A Feminist Poet from Japan Encounters Prewar China, trans. Joshua A. Fogel (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001), 136. 5. S ōseki and the Yosanos were not the only writers to receive an invitation from the South Manchurian Railways. Other Japanese writers who traveled to Manchuria under Mantetsu sponsorship include poet and literary scholar Ōmachi Keigetsu, who described his impressions of Manchuria in his essays “Yuki no kitsurin” and “Ryojun no senseki;” Satomi Ton, whose Man-shi ikken portrayed his travels in China and Manchuria (1929–1930); and Shiga Naoya. Joshua A. Fogel, “Japanese Literary



No t e s

6.

7.

8.

9.

10. 11. 12.

13. 14.

15. 16.

No t e s Travelers in Prewar China,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 49.2 (December 1989): 575–602. For more on Natsume Sōseki’s early works, see Van C. Gessel, Three Modern Novelists: S ōseki, Tanizaki, Kawabata (Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1993); Edwin McClellan, Two Japanese Novelists: S ōseki and Tōson (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1969); Angela Yiu, Chaos and Order in the Works of Natsume S ōseki (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1998). For more on Yosano Akiko, see Janine Beichman, Embracing the Firebird: Yosano Akiko and the Birth Of The Female Voice In Modern Japanese Poetry (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2002); and Laurel Rasplica Rodd, “Yosano Akiko and the Taishō Debate over the ‘New Woman,’ ” in Recreating Japanese Women, 1600–1945, ed. Gail Lee Bernstein (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991), 175–198. It is important here to note that numerous Japanese literati traveled to China and Manchuria during this period, and many of them were not affiliated with the railways. These two works are of particular interest because their similar contexts (sponsorship by the Southern Manchurian Railways and similar itineraries) allow for a comparison of the changes in Manchuria during the twenty-year period between these two journeys. Despite the title of the work, S ōseki barely mentions Korea and, in fact, remained in Manchuria throughout his journey. Critics have surmised that this lacuna resulted from persistent stomach ailments or the increasing anti-Japanese sentiment in Korea during that period. Kawamura Minato, “ ‘Teikoku’ no Sōseki,” S ōseki Kenky ū 5 (1995): 28–38. S ōseki 39. Ibid., 38–39. In another example of cultural bias, Sōseki, while riding in a rickshaw, muses on the ineptitude of Korean and Chinese rickshaw drivers. “The rickshaw is a Japanese invention; however, when it is drawn by Chinese or Koreans, one can no longer rest. They regard the rickshaw as a foreign invention and have a way of jerking it about that shows a lack of respect for this mode of transportation.” Natsume Sōseki, Travels in Manchuria and Korea, trans. Inger Sigrun Brodey and Sammy I. Tsunematsu (Kent: Global Oriental, 2000), 123. Fogel, “Japanese Literary Travelers in Prewar China,” 582. Beongcheon Yu, Natsume S ōseki (New York: Twayne Publishers, 1969), 90–91. Inger Sigrun Brodey, “Introduction,” in Rediscovering Natsume S ōseki, trans. Inger Sigrun Brodey and Sammy I. Tsunematsu (Kent: Global Oriental, 2000), 22. Fogel, “Yosano Akiko and her China Travelogue of 1928,” 7. Yoshihisa Tak Matsusaka, The Making of Japanese Manchuria, 1904– 1932 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2001), 414.



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17. Louise Young, Japan’s Total Empire: Manchuria and the Culture of Wartime Imperialism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), 314. 18. Fogel notes that the abundance of references reflect that Akiko must have done a great deal of research either before or after her journey. Fogel, “Yosano Akiko and her China Travelogue of 1928,” 3–4. 19. Yosano Akiko, 15. 20. Ibid., 43. 21. Steve Rabson, “Yosano Akiko on War: To Give One’s Life or Not: A Question of Which War,” Journal of the Association of Teachers of Japanese 25.1 (April 1991): 45–74. 22. Ibid., 59. 23. In other poetry of the time, Akiko juxtaposed the sage Chinese leaders of the past with the “foolish” contemporary counterparts. Rabson 58. 24. Stefan Tanaka, Japan’s Orient: Rendering Pasts into History (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995). 25. Ibid., 151. 26. David Spurr, The Rhetoric of Empire: Colonial Discourse in Journalism, Travel Writing, and Imperial Administration (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1993), 16–17. 27. Ibid., 20. (my emphasis) 28. One might guess that works on Manchuria written by the Japanese military might also impose a dominant gaze upon Manchuria and its inhabitants. 29. In referring to the Qing period writer Zhang Wenzhen’s Qianshan youji (Travelogue of Qianshan), Akiko showcases her knowledge of classical Chinese travel writing. Yosano 35. 30. Ibid., 24. Ōmachi Keigetsu (1869–1925) was a poet and literary critic who also traveled to Manchuria under the sponsorship of the SMR. For more on Ōmachi’s visit, see Fogel, “Japanese Literary Travelers in Prewar China,” 584. 31. Author Tayama Katai (1871–1930) is best known for his novel Futon (The Quilt, 1907). Yosano 24. 32. Spurr 21. 33. Elleke Boehmer, Colonial and Postcolonial Literature (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995), 44. 34. See Kawamura Minato, Iky ō no sh ōwa bungaku: ‘Mansh ū’ to kindai nihon (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1990), 61–98; William O. Gardner, Advertising Tower: Japanese Modernism and Modernity in the 1920s (Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Asia Center, 2006), and Higuchi Satoru, Sh ōwashi no hassei (Tokyo: Shichosha, 1990). 35. For an in-depth history and analysis of the journal A and its contributors, see Gardner. 36. Despite these affiliations, their feelings toward South Manchurian Railways were at the very least ambivalent. William O. Gardner discusses



No t e s

37. 38.

39. 40. 41. 42.

43.

44. 45. 46.

47. 48.

49. 50. 51. 52.

No t e s Kitagawa’s criticism of Mantetsu in his 1929 poem “Railway of Annihilation.” Gardner 215–224. Ozaki 223. For an in-depth discussion of the Manchurian Crisis, see Sandra Wilson, The Manchurian Crisis and Japanese Society, 1931–33 (London and New York: Routledge, 2002), especially 1–29. Young , Japan’s Total Empire, 55–114. Ibid., 268. Boehmer 44. Other travel writings on Manchukuo from this period include Shimaki Kensaku’s Mansh ū kik ō (Tokyo: S ōgensha, 1940) and Aru sakka no shuki (Tokyo: Sogensha, 1940); Haruyama Yukio, Mansh ū f ūbutsushi (Tokyo: Seikatsusha, 1940) and Mansh ū no bunka (Tokyo: Osakayago shoten, 1943). Kawamura Minato, “ ‘Manshū bungaku’ kenky ū no genjō,” in Shokuminchi to bungaku, ed. Nihon shakai bungakkai (Tokyo: Orijin shuppan sentaa, 1993), 129–130. For specific background on Shimaki’s travel writing, see Ozaki Hotsuki, Kindai bungaku no sh ōkon: Ky ūshokuminchi bungakuron (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1991), 274–277. In a discussion of continental literature (tairiku bungaku), Itagaki Naoko identified the specific genre of development literature (kaitaku bungaku), which addressed the promotion of Japanese emigration to Manchuria for agricultural purposes. Itagaki Naoko, Jihenka no bungaku (Tokyo: Daiichi shoin, 1941), 91–94. Ozaki 226. Furukawa Tetsujirō, “1937-nen Manshū bundan no kaiko,” Mansh ū bungei nenkan 2 (1938): 75. Kōry ō was started by Oku Hajime in Xinjiang in 1932. Lu states that the journal did not develop a strong coterie, and upon Oku’s transfer for work the journal collapsed. Lu Yuanming, “ ‘Manshū rōman’ no zentaizō,” in Mansh ū Rōman betsumaki ‘Mansh ū Rōman’ Kenkyu, ed. Lu Yuanming, Suzuki Sadami, and Ry ū Ken Ki (Tokyo: Yumani shobō, 2003), 6. “Bunka dantai ichiran,” Mansh ū Bungei nenkan 3 (1939): 458. Ozaki Hotsuki also notes the centrality of Chinese writers who published Geibunshi, and the representatives in the Continental Development Literary Arts Group (Tairiku kaitaku bungei konwakai). Ozaki 212–294. Readership figures reached 2000 by the final issue. Ozaki 224. Furukawa, “1937-nen Manshū bundan no kaiko,” 74. Quoted in Ozaki 224. Also cited in Asami Fukashi, “Batsu,” Miyaohoi, ed. Asami Fukashi (Tokyo: Yumani Shobō), 259. Yamada Seizaburō moved to Manchukuo after committing political conversion (tenk ō) in Japan. He was the cultural editor for the Mansh ū shimbun and the head of Mansh ū bungeika kyokai and was also the representative for Manchukuo



190

53. 54.

55.

56. 57. 58.

59. 60.

61.

62. 63. 64.

65. 66. 67. 68. 69. 70.

191

at the Greater East Asian Writer’s Conference in 1942. He edited the literary journal Geibun, which lasted sixteen volumes from January 1944 to May 1945. The G-shi literary award was named after poet Jō Ōzu, who donated the funds to establish the award. All three volumes of Mansh ū Bungei Nenkan were edited by Aoki Minoru and published in Dalian by the G-shi bungakusho iinkai between 1937 and 1939. Nishihara Kazumi, “Kaidai: Manshū bungaku no taidōki,” Mansh ū bungei nenkan—bessatsu (Fukuoka: Ashi shobō, 1993), 17. The first three volumes followed the model of many s ōgo zasshi with separate sections for fiction, poetry, essays, and criticism. With the fourth volume, a special issue in 1939 that contained ten short stories and two critical essays, Mansh ū rōman shifted away from the s ōgo zasshi format. Subsequent issues took on an anthology-like format, collecting literary criticism (Volume 5, 1940) and short fiction (Volumes 6 and 7). The seventh volume was originally listed as the first in a series of Manshū rōman gyōsho. However, in the version reprinted by Yumani shobō in 2003, that issue was denoted as the seventh volume of Mansh ū rōman. Four of these works were published by Koa bunka shuppansha in Shinkyō in 1941. Lu, “ ‘Manshū rōman’ no zentaizō,” 11. In the afterword to the first issue of Mansh ū rōman, the editors describe their hopes for Mansh ū rōman and applaud the journal’s invoking an expansive Manchurian renaissance. Cited in Lu 6. Ozaki 233. For more on the Japan Romantic School, see Kevin M. Doak, Dreams of Difference: The Japan Romantic School and the Crisis of Modernity (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1994). Okada Hideki, Bungaku ni miru ‘Mansh ūkoku’ no is ō (Tokyo: Kenbun shuppan, 2000). Nishimura Shin’ichirō, “Bungei hyōronkai no gaiken,” Mansh ū Bungei Nenkan 2 (1938): 1–4. During that same period, the population of Dalian doubled (192,059) and that of Fengtian tripled (163,591). Young 253–255. Ibid., 249–250. Nishimura Shin’ichirō, “Zaimansakka ni tōzen okorubeki mondai: saikin no Manshū bungakkai,” Mansh ū nichi nichi shimbun, April 10, 1937. Furukawa Tetsujirō, “Manshū bungaku zakkō,” Mansh ū bungei nenkan 3 (1939): 75. Ibid., 74–75. Okada 55. Nishimura, “Bungei hyōronkai no gaiken,” 2. The Mr. G in the name of the award referred to Jō. Ozaki 224. Jō Ōsu, “Manshū bungaku no seishin,” Mansh ū Bungei Nenkan 2 (1938): 25–29.



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71. Prasenjit Duara discusses the Japanese use of the “natural frontier” to locate Manchuria within the national imaginary. Prasenjit Duara, Sovereignty and Authenticity: Manchukuo and the East Asian Modern (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2003), 179–208. 72. Ibid., 25. 73. Ibid., 27. 74. Curiously, Jō also cites American literature as another potential model for the literature of Manchuria because they are both relatively young nations and have ethnically diverse populations. Jō 27. 75. Ōtani Takeo, “Tochi to bungaku,” Mansh ū bungei nenkan 1 (1937): 18–19. 76. Jō 27. 77. Ibid., 19. 78. Ibid., 29. 79. Ibid. 80. Nishimura, “Bungei hyōronkai no gaiken,” 3–4. 81. Lu Yuanming, Suzuki Sadami, and Liu Jianhui, “ ‘Manshū rōman’ shippitsusha ryakureki,” in Mansh ū rōman betsumaki: Mansh ū rōman kenky ū, ed. Lu Yuanming, Suzuki Sadami and Liu Jianhui (Tokyo: Yumani shobō, 2003), 154. 82. Ibid., 149. 83. Kizaki Ry ū, “Kensetsu no bungaku,” Manshū bungei nenkan 2 (1938): 38. 84. Nishimura Shin’ichirō, “Manshū bungaku riron no seiri,” Mansh ū bungei nenkan 3 (1939): 81. 85. Kizaki, “Kensetsu no bungaku,” 38. 86. Nishimura Shin’ichirō, “Sekaikan no gakumonteki taikei kiritsu,” Mansh ū rōman 1 (1937): 232. 87. Nishimura, “Sekaikan no gakumonteki taikei kiritsu,” 232. 88. Kanō Saburō, “Gensō no bungaku: Manshū bungaku no shuppatsu no tame ni,” Mansh ū bungei nenkan 2 (1938): 45. 89. Ibid., 43. Sono taish ō wa mansh ū no shakaiteki genjitsu dewanakute, “kagayakashii zento de” aru. 90. Ibid., 43–44. 91. Ibid., 53. 92. Aoki Minoru, “Manjin mono ni tsuite,” Mansh ū bungei nenkan 3 (1939): 53. 93. Kanō 56. 94. Shan Yuanchao (Tan Enchō), “Zaiman nihonjin bungakusha no ‘Manshū bungakuron’: ‘Manshū bungeinenkan’ shoshū no hyōron o chūshin ni,” Ajia y ūgaku 44 (October 2002): 69–80. 95. Kanō 46. Numerous Japanese writers and critics in the colonies cite Buck’s novel as inspiration for their own colonial writing. The earliest Japanese translation of Pearl Buck’s The Good Earth was Daichi, trans. Nii Itaru (Tokyo: Daiichi shobō, 1935). 96. Nishimura Shin’ichirō, “Shokuminchi bungaku no saihakken: shokuminchi bungaku no ippanron toshite,” Mansh ū bungein nenkan 1 (1937): 21. 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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97. Nishimura, “Shokuminchi bungaku no saihakken,” 20. 98. Wang Ze, “Man-nichi bungaku kōry ū zatsudan,” trans. Ōuchi Takao, in Mansh ū rōman, dai-5 maki (Tokyo: Yumani shobo, 2002), 87–93. 99. Wang notes the existence of literary journals like Meimei, Shinseinen, and Geibunshi. Ozaki 234. 100. Ibid., 236. 101. Bungakusha no shakai wa kanry ōshakai dewanainodakara. Wang 90. 102. Ōuchi Takao was one of the few Japanese literati in Manchuria who actively engaged with Chinese writers by translating works into Japanese and writing literary criticism on these works. Ōuchi wrote such essays as “Manjin no sakkatachi ni tsuite” (About Chinese Writers), Mansh ū bungei nenkan 1 (1937): 14–16; “Saikin no manjin bungaku,” (Recent Literature by Chinese Writers) Mansh ū bungei nenkan 3 (1939): 40–43. He also translated the work of Gu Ding and Lin Shimin. 103. Wang 90. 104. Furukawa, “1937-nen: Manshū bundan no kaiko,” 75. 105. W.G. Beasley, Japanese Imperialism, 1894–1945 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987), 203. 106. Asami Fukashi, ed., Miyaohoi (Tokyo: Yumani shoten, 2000) 2. 107. Asami Fukashi, “Batsu,” Miyaohoi, ed. Asami Fukashi (Tokyo: Yumani shoten, 2000), 261. 108. Ibid., 259–260. 109. Kikuchi Kaoru, “Miyaohoi kaisetsu,” in Miyaohoi (Tokyo: Yumani shoten, 2000), 1. 110. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities (London: Verso, 1983), 6. 111. Homi Bhabha, Nation and Narration (London and New York: Routledge, 1990).

Conclusion: Significant Others in Japanese Colonial Literature 1. Oguma Eiji, A Genealogy of ‘Japanese’ Self-Images (Melbourne: Trans Pacific Press, 2002), 64–80. 2. Edward W. Said, The World, the Text and the Critic (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1983), 20. 3. Ibid., 19–21. 4. Rosemary George makes a similar observation about the naturalization of filiative relations in her work on the notion of “home” in contemporary English-language postcolonial narratives. Rosemary Marangoly George, The Politics of Home: Postcolonial Relocations and Twentieth Century Fiction (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 17. 5. Kawamura Minato, Ikyō no Sh ōwa bungaku (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1990). Although Ozaki Hotsuki’s research on literature of colonial Taiwan, Ky ū shokuminchi bungaku no kenky ū, originally appeared in 1971, it did not receive as much attention until the 1990s, at which time it was reprinted under a different title. Ozaki Hotsuki, Kindai bungaku no sh ōkon: Ky ūshokuminchi bungakuron (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1991). 10.1057/9780230105782 - Romance, Family, and Nation in Japanese Colonial Literature, Kimberly Kono


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No t e s

6. T. Fujitani, Geoffrey M. White, and Lisa Yoneyama, eds., Perilous Memories: The Asia-Pacific War(s) (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2001), 4. 7. James A. Fujii, Complicit Fictions: The Subject in the Modern Japanese Prose Narrative (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), 128. 8. Lori Watt, “Imperial Remnants: The Repatriates in Postwar Japan,” in Settler Colonialism in the Twentieth Century: Projects, Practices and Legacies, ed. Caroline Elkins and Susan Pedersen (New York: Taylor and Francis, 2005): 243–255. 9. Yokota Fumiko’s absence from postwar Japanese literary circles was a result of personal circumstances rather than overt political censure. After repatriating from Manchuria in 1946, Yokota along with her husband Sakai Tsuyashi and their three children struggled to survive in impoverished postwar Japan. She worked for several years as a journalist and later as an editor, but produced only a few pieces of fiction with limited success. Literary critic Higashi Eizō suggests that the responsibilities of caring for three young children amidst challenging economic conditions undoubtedly took invaluable time and energy away from her literary activity. Higashi Eizō, “Yokota Fumiko no bungaku no tokushitsu: sono shiron to sakuhin kaisetsu,” in Yokota Fumiko: Hito to sakuhin (Nagano: Shinano mainichi shimbunsha, 1993), 90. 10. Murakami Fumiaki, “Shoji Soichi: sono hito to sono jidai,” in Chin fujin (Tokyo: Ozorasha, 2000), 11. 11. Akihara Shōzō contributed an essay on his colonial period colleague, Korean writer Imamura Eiji. Akihara Shōzō, “Imamura Eiji no omokage,” Shokuminchi bunka kenky ū: shiry ō to bunseki 4 (2005): 187–190. 12. Ikeda Hiroshi, “Kaisetsu: Yuasa Katsue no Chōsen to Nihon,” in Kannani, Yuasa Katsue shokuminchi sh ōsetsush ū (Tokyo: Inpakuto shuppankai, 1995), 609–610. 13. Cape No. 7, DVD, directed by Wei Desheng (2008; Taipei, Taiwan: Deltamac, 2008). Tomoko . . . d ōshiy ōmonai gurai, kimi ni koi o shiteshimatta. Dakedo, kimi ga yatto sotsugy ōshitatoki, bokutachi wa sens ō ni yabureta. Boku wa haisenkoku no kokuminda. Kizoku no y ōni g ōman datta bokutachi wa isshun ni shite, zainin no kubikase o kakerareta. Mazushii ichi ky ōshi no boku ga d ōshite minzoku no tsumi o seoey ō. Jidai no shukumei wa jidai no tsumi. S ōshite, boku wa mazushii ky ōshi ni suginu. Kimi o aishiteitemo, akiramenakerebanaranakatta.



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208

Abe K ōbō, 6, 154n20 Aboriginal Taiwanese, 9, 12, 44, 46–48, 52 campaign to manage (riban jigy ō), 46–48, 62, 64–65 and identity, 50–51 nature and, 52–56 popular images of, 48–50, 61, 103 in postwar literature, 149 Takasago, 46, 48 Achebe, Chinua, 26 adoption, 90 as path to cultural legitimacy, 90–91 Akihara Shōzō, 127, 140, 148 Altman, Janet Gurkin, 21 Amino Kiku, 34 Anzai Fuyue, 126 Aoki Minoru, 127, 136–137, 139, 140 Aoki Yayoi, 3 Asami Fukashi, 140 assimilation (d ōka), 8, 9, 27–28, 55, 102 in Korea, 102 and language, 24–25 in Taiwan, 57 bloodline, 52, 54, 55, 56, 65–67, 80, 112 Boehmer, Elleke, 10, 125–126, 127 Bourdaghs, Michael, 3 Brodey, Inger Sigrun, 123 Brooks, Barbara, 31 Budan seiji; see Korea, military rule

Bungei Taiwan (Literary Arts Taiwan), 7, 44, 61, 164n5 Bunka seiji; see Korea, cultural rule Byakuran no uta (Song of the White Orchid), 15, 16, 27 Cape No. 7, 149–151 Censorship, 165n13, 170n64 Chang Hyok-chū, 7, 77, 89, 155n23 “Fun’iki,” 89 “Yūshū jinsei,” 89 Chen Huoquan, 106, 184n38 Chinese subjects representations in Manchurian literature, 136, 137, 138 representations in travel writing, 122, 123 Ching, Leo, 111 Ch’oe Cheseo, 8 Chu, Huei-chu, 104 clothing as signifier of modernity, 109 colonial ambivalence, 44, 107–108 colonial fantasy, 2, 38 colonial gaze, 22, 37–38, 125, 140 colonial identity, 12–13 colonial lineage, 43, 45, 67–70 colonial literature, 6, 146–148 colonial project, multiple visions of, 14 colonies as exotic setting, 6 confucianism and the family, 3, 4, 5, 78 constructionist writers in Manchuria, kensetsu-ha, 131, 134–135



I n de x

I n de x

continental brides (tairiku no hanayome), 81, 174n30 continental literature, 8, 140 continental Trilogy (tairiku sanbusaku), 12, 15–17, 27, 30, 31, 39

Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, 13, 116–118 Greater East Asia Literary Award, 13, 100, 101, 102–103, 180–181n4 Grewal, Inderpal, 36

Dalian, literary activity in, 126, 128, 130–131 debates on Manchurian literature, 126–139 decolonization, 26, 73 Den Kenjirō, 1, 104 Derrida, Jacques, 112 discourse, definition of, 18 Driscoll, Mark, 86

Hamada Hayao, 7, 103–104, 182n14 Hasegawa Yoshimichi, 76 Hayashi Fumiko, 34, 163n55 Hayashi Kyōko, 6 Hinata Nobuo, 128 homeland, 11, 148 Manchuria as, 140 Hoshina Hironobu, 104 household novels (katei sh ōsetsu), 3 Huang Deshi, 44 hybridity, in identity, 50, 58–59, 144–145, 147

education in Korea, 90 in Manchuria, 24 as path to cultural legitimacy, 90 epistolary form, 20, 21, 22, 23 erotics of politics, 2, 16 ethnic harmony (gozoku ky ōwa), 15, 26, 40,134, 139 ethnicity in colonial context, 22, 28, 29, 34, 40–41 familial imagery, 1 and Korea, 75–76 and Manchuria, 1 and Taiwan, 12, 13, 44 family-empire, 4 family-state (Kazoku kokka), 3–4 Fanon, Frantz, 25, 33 Fogel, Joshua A., 123 Foucault, Michel, 18 Fujii, James, 147 Fujitani, T., 147 Furukawa Tetsujirō, 127, 131, 139 gender in colonial context, 22–23, 34–36, 40–41 Girard, Rene, 18 gozoku ky ōwa, see ethnic harmony

identity formation, colonized subjects, 145 identity, instability of, 96–97, 144–145 Ikeda Hiroshi, 86 illegitimate child, 87–88 imagined community, 2, 120, 141–142, 153n6 Imamura Eiji, 7, 130, 155n23 “Dōkōsha,” 33, 38 Im Jon-hye, 84, 86 imperialization or imperial subject movement (k ōminka), 10, 13, 48, 90, 99, 106, 107, 111, 117 changing names, 10, 89 and marriage, 92 and military conscription, 90 and Shinto, 92 imperial subject literature, 106 interethnic marriage, 59–60 and acculturation, 1 and assimilation policy, 1–2 between Japanese and aborigines, 60–61



210

between Japanese and Korean royalty, 1, 5, 13, 76–77, 78–80 between Japanese and Taiwanese (Naidai kekkon), 104–105 in Korea, 80–82 as symbol of colonial union, 1 as symbol of national consolidation, 2 Ishikawa Tatsuz ō, 77 “Hō Seika,” 83 Ito, Ken K., 2 Japanese identity, 28, 92–93 anxiety about, 10, 147 as heterogeneous, 94–95, 147 Japanese language education, 9, 24 Japanese literature, definitions of, 146–147 Japanese-Taiwanese Marriage Law (naidai ky ōkonh ō), 105 Japanese women, in Taiwan, 69–70, 71 Japan Literary Patriotic Association (Nihon Hōkokukai or JLPA), 101, 181n6 Japan Romantic School (Nihon rōman-ha), 130 Jō Ôsu, 127, 132–134, 147 Kajiyama Toshiyuki, 6 Kanō Saburō, 136–137, 139 Kaplan, Caren, 36 Katei sh ōsetsu, see household novels Kawabata Yasunari, 7–8 Kawahara Isao, 59 Kawamura Minato, 6, 21, 126, 146 Kazoku kokka, see Family-State Kim Sa-ryang, 77, 89 “Hikari no nakani,” 89 Kim Seong-min, 8 Kim Yon-tal, 81 Kitagawa Fuyuhiko, 125 Kitamura Kenjirō, 129 Kizaki Ry ū, 129, 131, 134–135

211

Kleeman, Faye, 7, 103 Kobayashi Seizō, 48, 99, 116 Kojong (Emperor of Korea), 76 Komagome Takeshi, 112 Korea colonial literary circles in, 7 cultural rule (bunka seiji), 76 and Japan as “one body,” (naisen ittai), 1, 81, 84 and Japan sharing ethnic origins (nissen d ōsoron) 75, 78–79, 88, 143 military rule (budan seiji), 76 as site of cultural otherness, 6 Kukmin munhak (National Literature), 8, 84 Kume Masao, 15 Kurokawa S ō, 86 La Coree Livre, 80 legitimacy, 10–11, 12–13, 75, 78–80, Liao Ping-hui, 9 linguistic fluency, and identity, 23–27, 39 literary canon, 120 literary lineage, 45–46, 72–73 Li Xianglan, see Yamaguchi Yoshiko Long Yingzong, 106, 185n40 love, traditional forms of, 31–32 Lu, Hsin-yi, 108 Lü Heruo, 7, 44, 103 Lu Yuanming, 129 Machiwara K ōji, 137, 140 mainstream writers in Manchuria, 131, 132–134 Manchuria, 1 landscape of, 133 literary circles in, 8, 13, 119–120 Manchurian Incident, 126 Manchurian Literary Association (Mansh ū bunwakai), 127 Manchurian literature (Mansh ū bungaku), 119, 120, 128–138



I n de x

I n de x

Manchurian Motion Picture Company (Manshu eiga kyokai or Man’ei), 15, 18 Mansh ū bungei nenkan (Manchuria Literary Arts Annual), 119, 127, 128 Mansh ū rōman (Manchurian Novel), 8, 119, 121, 129, 130 March First Movement, 5, 76 marriage, see interethnic marriage Masugi Shizue, 59, 184n36 “Nampō no kotoba,” 105 McClintock, Anne, 4, 109 mediation, 17, 18, 21 melodrama and the family, 13 Memmi, Albert, 73 Minami Jirō, 1, 81, 84 Miyake Toyoko, 127, 140 Miyaohoi: Mansh ū sakka kyuninsh ū, 129, 140–141 modern identity, 27–29, 40–41 Moriki Kazumi, 81 Mori Ōgai “Maihime,” 113 Mr. G literary award, 129 Multiethnic subjects, 51, 88 liminal position of, 96 Muramatsu Shōfu, 127 Musha incident (Mushajiken), 9, 44, 47–48, 63, 64 colonial government response to, 47–48 Nagai Kaf ū, 113 naichi, colonial definitions of, 93 Nakamura Jihei “Banjin no musume,” 59–60 “Bankai no onna,” 59–60 “Kiri no bansha, 59 Nakamura Tetsu, 7, 103 Nakarai Tōsui, 77 Kosa fuku kaze, 82 Nakayama Susumu, 7, 44 Nam Pu-jin, 83–84 Nashimoto Masako, 76, 77, 78 national identity, 2, 120, 141–142

national literature, 141, 142 definition of, 119–120 nation-building (kenkoku) discourse in Manchuria, 134–135, 137, 142 Natsume Sōseki, 6 Kokoro, 122 Mankan tokoro dokoro, 121–123 Nihon Hōkokukai, see Japan Literary Patriotic Association Nihon rōman-ha, see Japan Romantic School Niigaki K ōichi, “Jōmon,” 105 Nishikawa Mitsuru, 7 Nishimura Shin’ichirō, 130, 131, 132, 134, 135 Niwa Fumio, 101 Nogami Yaeko, 59 nostalgia, 6 Oguma Eiji, 145 Okada Hideki, 130, 131 orientalist attitudes toward China, 123–124 Ōshika Taku, 59 “Banpu,” 59 “Yabanjin,” 654, 59 Ō tani Takeo, 127, 133–134 Ō uchi Takao, 129, 139, 193n102 passing as Japanese, 33–34, 162n52 Peng Hua-ying, 110 Performativity of ethnic identity, 31–33, 38–39 of gender identity, 31 of Japanese identity, 91–92 police (junsa), in Taiwan, 46–47, 61–62 Pratt, Mary Louise, 58 pro-Japanese literature, (shin-nichi bungaku), 8 Pu Yi, 127, 160n31 Rabson, Steve, 124 realists or genjitsu-ha, 131, 136–137



212

I n de x

Said, Edward on filiation and affiliation, 147 Saitō Makoto, 79 Sakaguchi Reiko, 7, 12, 44–45, 105, 144, 149 “Banpuropō no hanashi,” 149 “Shunjū,” 10, 44 “Teiikka,” 44–45, 106 Tokeis ō, 5, 12, 43–73 Sakai Tsuyashi, 127 Sakubun (Composition), 8, 119, 121, 127, 129 Sakuma Samata, 46 Satō Haruo, 7, 59 Schmid, Andre, 75 settler identity, 10–11 Shimaki Kensaku, 127 Shimazaki Tōson, 3 Shina no yoru (China Nights), 17, 27 Shinkyō, literary activity in, 129, 130, 131 Shiratori Kurakichi,124 ShōjiS ōichi, 7, 124, 144, 148, 181n5 Chin Fujin, 5, 13, 49, 99–118 Sommer, Doris, 2 S ō San-han, 79–80 South Manchurian Railway Company, 16, 17, 27, 28, 121, 122, 123, 125, 127 South (nanp ō or nan’y ō) movement to advance southward (nanshin), 114 Spurr, David, 125

Stoler, Ann Laura, 51 strategy of innocence, 58 Taiwan colonial literary circles in, 7, 43–44 family in, 1 interethnic marriage 1, 2 Taiwan Bungaku (Taiwanese Literature), 7, 12, 44, 45, 61, 72, 164n5 Taiwanese students in Japan, 107 Takasaki Ry ūji, 86 Takeuchi Shōichi, 127, 140 Tanizaki Jun’ichirō, Tade kuu mushi, 6 Tarumi Chie, 103 Tayama Katai, 125 Togawa Sadao, 101, 103 Tokutomi R ōka, 3 translation, 138 travel, and the modern subject, 112–113 travel writing on Manchuria, 121–126 Ugaki Kazushige, Ukai Satoshi, 112 universalist humanism,68–69 Uno Chiyo, Irozange, 6 Uno K ōji, “Yurikago no uta no omoide,” 49 Ushijima Haruko, 7, 129, 154n21, 163n56 Wang Changxiong, 106, 185n40 Wang Hsiao-yun, 104 Wang Ze, 138 White, Geoffrey M.,147 Wilson, Sandra, 91 women as symbols of nation, 109–110 as signifiers of modernity, 110–111 Wu Yongfu, 103 Wu Zholiu, 7



ren’ai kekkon, see love marriage, 108, 161n41 rhetoric of inclusion, 31 romance, in film, 15 romantic love, as modern, 29–30 romantic narratives: as encounter fictions or conquest fantasies, 16 Ryokki (Green Flag), 8, 156n27

213

Yamada Seizaburō, 127 Yamaguchi Yoshiko, 157n2, 157n3 Yamato spirit, 91, 92, 93 Yang Kui, 7, 8, 43, 155n23 Yi Hyo-sok, 77 “Gin no masu,” 84 Yi Kwangsu, 8 Yi Un, 76, 77, 78 Yokota Fumiko, 12, 19, 129, 144, 158n6, 159n14, 160n22, 194n9 “Koibumi,” 12, 16, 17–41, 158n5 Yoneyama, Lisa, 147 Yosano Akiko, Manm ō y ūki 6, 121, 122, 123–126 preoccupation with landscape, 125 references to classical Chinese literature, 125

I n de x Yosano Tekkan, Manm ō y ūki, 121, 123–126 Tōzai namboku, 83 Yoshino Nobuo, 127 Yoshiya Nobuko, 34, 59 Young, Louise, 4 Young, Robert, 10 Yu, Beongcheon, 123 Yuasa Katsue, 7, 77, 85–86, 144, 145, 149, 176–177n56 “Imin,” 85 “Kannani,” 84–85 “Natsume,” 5, 12, 77–97 Yuzurihara Masako, “Chōsenyaki,” 33 Zantop, Susanne, 5, 16 Zhang Wenhuan, 7, 44 Zhang Wenzhen, 125 Zhou Jinpo, 7, 106, 184n38 “Kyōshū,” 107 “Shiganhei,” 107 “Suigan,” 107, 185n45



214

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