In the past week of our Arts Studies class, we read and studied Japanese-Canadian author Joy Kogawa’s Obasan. This book tells the story of a young Japanese-Canadian girl who is taken from her home as part of the Japanese internment policy committed by the British Columbian government in the midst of the Second World War. Upon analyzing the book, I began to notice some similarities between it and a book we read at the beginning of the semester, Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis.
A common theme in all publications concerned with raising awareness of the plight of a minority group is the humanization of the group. In terms of a book, this involves expressing characters in a way that makes them understandable to a modern, Western audience. The main characters especially are often crafted to draw sympathy and allow the reader to put themselves “in the character’s shoes.” The effect of humanization is created through the detail that the authors use to describe the characters, and the use of mundanity and behaviour the reader would consider ordinary.
Using seemingly extreme and unnecessary detail when describing the life of a character is one way of humanizing them. The main character in Obasan, Naomi, reads handwriting on a letter that is “as even as waves along a beach, row on row of neat curls and dots, perfect pebbles and shells on an ordered shore.” (Kogawa, 147) This level of detail allows the reader to experience the letter in the same way she would in real life, enabling her to better connect with the characters and by extent, better understand the subject of Japanese internment. Satrapi uses a similar method to make Persepolis’ main character Marji more relatable. 4 whole pages are dedicated to Marji’s childhood fantasies about being a prophet and her religiousity. Great detail is given to the specifics of her religion, such as the fact that she had a “holy book,” in which “the first three rules came from Zarathustra,” and the rituals, such as the “fire ceremony” (Satrapi, 12). While Marji’s religion does not play a remarkably important part of the book’s plot, it shows the reader that she is a child with a powerful imagination that is just as complex and human as the reader. This is not the only technique that authors frequently employ to humanize their characters, however.
Authors can also humanize characters by adding ordinary and everyday aspects to their characters. This allows the reader to better understand both the character and the struggles that they face. Marji goofs off at school (8), argues with her parents (21), plays with her family (33) and friends (49). All of these activities are typical childhood actions that a reader can relate to and might even be able to remember themselves doing at some point in their lives. In similarity, Naomi states that “inside the house in Vancouver there is music and mealtimes, laughter and storytelling.” (Kogawa, 62) In doing so, Kogawa eliminates any other-ness a reader might be feeling towards Naomi, and instead invites the reader to envision their own experiences and Naomis as similar.