Paulos's World Lit Blog

  The most unexpected thing we covered in class was reading Hayy Ibn Yaqzan. I found the story to be unique compared to the other readings we did and quite interesting. Most of the readings we covered in class had topics like racism, sexism, or other types of discrimination/colonization as a pretty big theme, such as in Home Fire discrimination against Muslims, The Secret River discrimination against the Aboriginals, or in There There the impacts of colonization on Native Americans. Hayy Ibn Yaqzan could not have these themes as he is a boy who grew up outside of society. He could not be impacted by societal issues such as racism. I did not expect to read a novel like this, when I joined the course. Something that was unexpected to me specifically in a novel, rather than the plot of a novel in general, was in Pachinko, Noa. I know I talked about Noa a lot in my blog posts and that is because I find him so interesting. Noa’s identity crisis was completely unexpected to me. I never...

I think one of the more important meanings in Pachinko is the effect of oppression against the oppressed. Throughout Pachinko, the Koreans are oppressed by the Japanese, whether it is by being forced in ghettos, in the workplace, or just through their hate. The main characters of the novel continuously get discriminated against by being Korean and we can see the impacts, especially in a character like Noa. Noa was continuously bullied by the Japanese in school to the point of forsaking his identity and hating the fact he was Korean. He did not associate himself with anything Korean and hated his blood. When he finds out his dad is the “worst type of Korean”, he runs away from home and hates himself for his blood. When his parents eventually find him, he kills himself. The discrimination and hate of Koreans that his classmates had impacted him so much that he would rather kill himself than potentially let his new family of his wife and kids know he had a yakuza father. Another impact is...

The relationship I chose to look at was Akiko and Noa’s. Noa, maybe due to his inferiority complex, because he thinks he is being held back by his blood, finds that Akiko is with him because she feels special for lowering herself to his level. This belief could be because he also believes that he is lower than her, so he thinks small signs that can mean nothing such as her saying that her parents would think he is a good Korean means that she thinks he is at a lower level than her.  However, assuming that Noa’s judgment was correct, this shows just how built in the Japanese belief they are superior to Koreans is built into their brain. Akiko doesn't even know that she offended Noah by saying that Noa is not on her level. This relationship is similar to Sunja and Hansu in the sense that Hansu also assumes that he is lowering himself to be with Sunja, so Sunja should just accept to be his mistress. Hansu also could have wanted Sunja just because she was just a “fanciful idea of a for...

  One character I am pretty interested in is Noa. Noa grew up hating Koreans because he wanted to integrate as much as possible into the community. His classmates probably hated Koreans, as did the rest of the Japanese community, so he was probably constantly flooded with comments on how Japanese people were better than Korean people. While many Koreans in the story were treated poorly by the Japanese, Noa’ reaction was the only time we saw someone who completely assimilated into Japanese culture and dropped their entire culture.  Noa was so indoctrinated by his classmates and school that he decided to run away from home when he found out his blood had the blood of a yakuza. Noa dropped all his dreams and desires of going into Waseda just because he found out that he had yakuza blood, that was how deep his hatred of Koreans went. When he found out he was the son of “the worst type of Korean”, he acted like he did not deserve to live life anymore.  Another part of Noa’s ch...

Isak being the biblical version of Isaac stood out to me because of the story of Abraham and Isaac. When God tested Abraham to kill his only son (technically not his only son but the only son he recognized as Ishmeal was born out of wedlock), Abraham attempted to do it. One thing that I did not know though was that Isaac was not tricked, but knew what was happening the entire time and accepted that since God had ordered it he will sacrifice his life. Isaac’s willingness to sacrifice his life simply because God said so is similar to how devout Isak is in the story. Isak marries Sunja because he believes that might be God’s calling for him. Isak chooses to never go against his faith even when it essentially kills him in jail. Both of these things are sacrifices that remind me of Isaac. Another biblical name version I found interesting was Mozasu and Moses. Both Mozasu and Moses seem to be two people who wanted to be with/help the hated. For instance, Moses, while still being a prince of ...

The main role I see of gender playing is to show the cultural norms in Japan/Korea as well as the progression of the societies. Men in Japan such as Yoseb try to carry all of the burden of the family on themselves, mainly financially. The men do not want the woman to work at all because it is against the values they have ingrained into them. Yoseb continuously tells Sunja and Kyunghee not to work because he feels it is disrespectful to him if they do. The woman’s role is like the traditional housewife. They cook and do chores around the house, but they usually should not work. Sunja and Kyunghee did not work during the time they were first in Japan, but eventually started, only to save up money for Noa’s college education. Gender also plays a role in showing how society progresses. For instance, while Sunja was told not to work by Yoseb, Mozasu is fine with his girlfriend Yumi working as much as she wants. Throughout the novel, though, Lee shows hard working women, from Yangjin to Toto...