The Literature of Japanese American Incarceration Edited
by Frank Abe and Floyd Cheung
By Pamela Okano
NAP Contributor
they never asked
suspicious or not—
just put us away
Sen Taro
This senryu (a 3-line Japanese poem typically about human nature and its foibles) sums up the Japanese American experience on the West Coast after the bombing of Pearl Harbor in Hawaii during World War II in 1942. The senryu is contained in a new anthology, The Literature of Japanese American Incarceration, edited by Frank Abe and Floyd Cheung. Consisting of a compilation of poems, short stories, essays, and excerpts from memoirs, announcements, and official documents, this volume should be part of any library about Japanese American history.
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/570029/the-literature-of-japanese-american-incarceration-by-edited-with-an-introduction-by-frank-abe-and-floyd-cheung/
Arranged chronologically, from before the bombing of Pearl Harbor through more recent protests against the Muslim ban and the incarceration of immigrants at the border, each section of the book — before the incarceration camp, the camps, and after camp — starts with a historical explanation to set the scene for what follows. Some of the contents have never been published before or if they have, not in English. There are also short biographies of most of the authors as well as a list of resources to delve more into Japanese American incarceration.
I found it particularly valuable that the anthology presents different points of view. Here you will find Mike Masaoka’s explanation of the Japanese American Citizens League’s decision to collaborate with the U.S. government next to Gordon Hirabayashi’s essay about why he decided to resist. Articles about a Nisei (second generation Japanese American) who decided to become part of the U.S. Army 442nd Regimental Combat Team is followed by articles about the Fair Play Committee and its adherents, who advocated restoration of civil rights as a condition to the military draft. Although the editors have stated that “[t]he selections favor writing that is pointed rather than poignant,” there is much that is poignant. For example, Nao Akutsu, was an Issei (first generation Japanese immigrant) who ran a Seattle shoe repair store with her husband. She wrote a letter in Japanese to Eleanor Roosevelt, begging her to get the U.S. government to release her husband. The White House appears to have translated it but the book does not indicate that Mrs. Roosevelt replied. Sadly, after the war Mrs. Akutsu committed suicide because the women in her church ostracized her for having two sons who resisted being drafted.
Gordon Hirabayashi, a Quaker, was grilled by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation officials upon turning himself in. One of the officers wrote in his report, “It is the principle of the Society of Friends [the Quakers] that each person should follow the will of God according to his own convictions….[Mr. Hirabayashi] could not reconcile the will of God, a part of which was expressed in the Bill of Rights and the U.S. Constitution, with the order discriminating against Japanese aliens and American citizens of Japanese ancestry.”
Discussing more recent injustices perpetrated by the U.S. government, Brandon Shimoda writes, “I am led to believe that Japanese American incarceration, as one example, one blueprint, in an unremitting and interminable system, has not ended. It has entered a new phase.”
The book contains expressions of despair yet it contains expressions of hope. It has expressions of anger, sadness, and defiance. Occasionally, there are expressions of joy. Regardless of whether the reader agrees with some of the authors’ sentiments, they are definitely thought-provoking. This anthology will be a valuable resource for years to come.
