“Pachinko” - Min Jin Lee

⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️

Historical fiction lovers, this one is a must-read!

Lee is a masterful story teller, spinning a compelling saga about four generations of a family first under Japanese colonial rule in Korea,  and their later emigration to Japan. She covers the time period from 1910-1989 and we see the seismic influence of WWII, and the chaos of the Korean War.

When I had the opportunity to travel in Korea and Japan, I was struck by several things. In Japan, the surface tension of a people still grappling with their past, was ever present. The Japanese national culture is deeply committed to respect of ancestors. There is a palpable conflict in how to honor ancestors who participated in atrocities connected to Japanese imperialism and WWII. In South Korea, once I looked beyond the propaganda parade put on by North and South, the stories of families stranded permanently on opposite sides of the DMZ, were heartbreaking. At the Korean War memorial (more of an extravagant homage to South Korean military might than a museum), there was an interesting infographic that outlined wars and conquests of the peninsula since well before the European medieval period. It gave a sense of how much conflict has swept through the Korean peninsula over time.

“Pachinko” is not a story about Koreans who remained in Korea, suffering the effects of the Korean War. Lee focuses on “Zainichi” - Koreans who emigrated to Japan during the colonial era, and their descendants. In Japan, ethnic Koreans were relegated to a permanent second-class status enforced by legal and social/cultural discrimination. Later, many Korean Japanese felt disconnected from both North and South Korea, either uncertain as to what the distinction between the Koreas meant for them as citizens, or having never lived there at all. Reeling from the loss of a Korean homeland, the Korean Japanese could never consider Japan as home either, due to their permanent foreigner status. Lee carefully traces the impact of being othered by peers and unrooted without a homeland, on Korean Japanese identity. [Side bar: from a purely academic angle, the broad international law and narrower immigration law implications are mind boggling here!]

I thoroughly enjoyed this novel. Lee illuminates the “Zainichi” experience with its despair, without being cloying. Somehow, despite it all, her characters exude a hopeful, indomitable spirit.