No-No Boy by John Okada - Literature review Example

 No-No Boy by John Okada Through out the novel No-No boy the central theme that holds the entire narrative together is the Ichiro’s search for identity; this journey that comprises of a variety of experiences and a multitude of cultural dimensions, the protagonist undertakes successfully by batting his inter and outer self until he finds what he is desperately searching for – himself. It is at the very beginning of No-No Boy, that the protagonist Ichiro Yamada, a young Japanese-American man is found in the midst of an identity crises as his efforts to put back his life together following his release from a two year sentence in prison. His family is scattered and their harmony shattered irreparably, and he does not know where he belongs, his emotional stance on the situation provoking him into feelings that he was “born not soon enough or late enough” which places him in a complicated situation of being “neither Japanese nor American.” His lost sense of wholeness and identity is depicted by Okada and one can really appreciate the gravity of his situation and the magnitude of the weight that holds him down by viewing the structural rhythm that alternates between Ichiro’s encounters with a number of Japanese Americans and white Americans and his intense reflections about his own situation. This is where one fully glimpses at the explanation of the phrase ‘No-No Boy’ as one that depicts the numerous complications in terms of acceptance and a sticky situation in terms of how the Japanese American were relocated during the second world war. There are lessons for Ichiro everywhere he goes and from everyone he meets which contribute to the dilemma he faces regarding his self identity but also depict his American multicultural experience. Not all of these experiences are helpful to him, however, especially at the beginning of the novel, when everything that happens seems to fuel his self-doubt and his fear that he has forever lost his chance to be fully accepted as an American. It is easy to understand his predicament. Along with thousands of other Japanese Americans, the U.S. government put him in a camp, as he tells Mr. Carrick, “to prove to us that we weren’t American enough to be trusted” and then imprisoned him for refusing to swear allegiance to the nation of his birth, so he has every reason to fear white America will never accept him, whatever he does to redeem himself. “Being American is a terribly incomplete thing if one’s face is not white and one’s parents are Japanese of the country Japan which attacked America,” he says. He is unfortunate in that so soon after his return to Seattle he encounters second-generation Japanese Americans such as Eto and Bull, who identify strongly with being American and have no time for a man who in their eyes chose to ally himself with the enemy. Hence highlight his self conscious nature pertaining to being Japanese and adding on to his basic foundation of an identity already in crises. But it is interesting to note that these men are, like Ichiro, Japanese Americans. The hostility Ichiro anticipates from white Americans simply never materializes showing a discrepancy between what he expects to find, given his own fear and self-hatred, and what he does find, although it is a long time before he is able to fully recognize this. In his heart he knows all along that his future has not been destroyed and that the United States, even for him, is still a land of opportunity. This can be seen by his thoughts when he walks down the street after his first meeting with Freddie Akimoto, another “no-no” boy, who acts as a foil for Ichiro. But as soon as he conceives a vision of hope and a second chance, he denies it. “Swallowed up by the darkness of his soul,” he cannot overcome his negative frame of mind. Even then, however, he knows that “the trouble is inside of him”; the enemy he faces is more internal than external. It is he, no one else, who finds himself “guilty of treason.” The conflict that he internalizes is that which is between his Japanese and American counterparts. These points are clearly demonstrated in Ichiro’s three encounters with white Americans. The first is with Baxter Brown, his former engineering professor at the university. Brown makes it clear from the outset that he is sympathetic to Japanese Americans and is aware of the injustice of the internment: “Families uprooted, businesses smashed, educations disrupted. You’ve got a right to be sore.” This meeting embarks on a level of cultural acceptance that Ichiro realizes in the sense that White America was prepared to open its doors to him. The same point is made when Ichiro goes for a job interview at Carrick and Sons in Portland and the third white American Mr. Morrison. They greet Ichiro with phrases in Japanese and like Brown, express regret about the internment and apologize for it as “a big black mark in the annals of American history.” Also they both offer Ichiro a job on the spot. When Ichiro confesses he refused the draft, he is shown great sympathy and understanding. Ichiro is not judged and he therefore realizes that Mr. Carrick, and others like him, “offered a way back into the great compassionate stream of life that is America,” and this marks an important milestone in Ichiro’s journey toward recovering his sense of belonging. The reader may feel that the close similarities between these two characters and how they interact with Ichiro, coming so close together in the narrative, detract from the literary merits of the novel. It seems that Okada the author may have been, at least in this instance, more concerned with making a didactic point than in creating realistic characters. His treatment of Mr. Carrick and Mr. Morrison seems to reflect the predominant belief in the 1950s, that white America was now successfully extending the hand of friendship to the Japanese Americans whom it had once regarded as a subversive influence underlining the cultural intensity of that time. Certainly, Ichiro’s external problems, as opposed to his internal doubts, lie not with white America but with the Japanese American community, which is divided not only between the Issei (first-generation immigrants, born in Japan) and the Nisei (second-generation, American born), but also between the Nisei themselves. But Ichiro is fortunate in that not all the Nisei are like Eto, or Bull, or those who tormented Gary, the third “no-no” boy in the novel, when he worked at the foundry. Ichiro also has Kenji and Emi to show him a better path, as well as Freddie to show him the way not to live and guide his path to self discovery. In Kenji, Ichiro finds true friendship. As he lies dying in his hospital bed, he tells Ichiro to return to Seattle where things will work out well for him in the long run. “The kind of trouble you’ve got, you can’t run from it,” he tells his friend. In this rediscovery of hope and a journey towards formulating a base of self identity he has much to thank Emi for. She reminds Ichiro of the greatness of the country of which he is a citizen and also helps him to get beyond his constant negative self-talk and identity crises. A key incident occurs in chapter 9, when Ichiro takes Emi to a dance, where a man they do not know insists on buying them both a drink. Ichiro is suspicious, until Emi coaxes out of him the comment, “I want to think . . . that he saw a young couple and liked their looks and felt he wanted to buy them a drink and did.” Emi is quietly encouraging Ichiro not to read into situations things that are not there but to have a simple, more accepting attitude. In silencing the negative, fear-based workings of his mind, which only impose a veil over what is really happening, he gives himself a better chance of finding that “elusive insinuation of promise” that will enable him to make his way once more in the land of his birth and find in his heart who he really is. References Okada, John. “No-No Boy.” University of Washington Press. 1997. Read More