David Guterson depicts in Snow Falling on Cedars a piece of history of World War II. It's a story of how the World War II has changed the lives of the people in the quiet island of San Piedro, a west coast community swarmed with Japanese immigrants at the dawn of the 20th century. These immigrants came to San Piedro from their homeland to become fishermen and as farmers planting in the vast strawberry fields.
On the onset, it is a trial of a Japanese-American war veteran for a murder of also a war veteran turned gill-net fisher. But throughout the story, the main plot became a back-drop of a story of a love found and a love lost driven by the circumstances by the still shocking treatment of the Japanese-Americans community in the Island of San Piedro during the World War II.
In February 1942, President Franklin Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 on flyers entitled "Instructions to Citizens of Japanese Ancestry". With this, the US Relocation Authority mobilized over 120,000 Japanese immigrants, who left their homes to relocation camps at different parts of the country. The tar paper-covered-barracks were scarcely furnished and barely livable ---- not so far to be described as a prison camp by the Japanese interned on them where they were subjected to tight security and curfew hours. But for the US government, it was a military necessity to protect the Japanese Immigrants from citizens who have anti-Japanese sentiments resulting from the bombing of the Pearl Harbour. On the other hand, it is also a precaution against espionage and from those who have sentiments for their Asian homeland. In 1988, in a public law, the US Government apologized and paid for what was ruled as injustice to the Japanese-Americans.
In the story, Hatsue Miyamoto, a young, beautiful but often rebellious Japanese-American left behind a love for a Caucasian male, Ishmael Chambers during the troubled times when Japanese-Americans where treated with hostility. A rapturous love that they both kept a secret at a time when such a love was unacceptable.
After the war, they met again in San Piedro. But this time, Hatsue is already married to the accused man on trial, Kabuo, whom she met in Manzanar, one of the relocation camps. Ishmael, on the other hand, having lost an arm in the war continued her father's legacy of running a newspaper and officially became a reporter on Kabuo's trial. But even so, Ishmael still feels regret over how his childhood love with Hatsue has ended. For a small community like San Piedro, to be brought again in a way that divides color and beliefs was heartbreaking reminder of tainted history of the discrimination of the Japanese Immigrants who surprisingly gave no visible protest and silently followed the directive as they were hauled and uprooted from their homes to the camps. Ishmael on the other hand felt a different kind of misery and longing for his one true love, especially knowing that Hatsue has moved on with her life and considers their love as a distant past and a foolish notion of a naive girl.
And because I have read this over and over again, on this review I have come to understand a part of the reason why it is titled Snow Falling on Cedars. Inside the hollow of the cedar tree, where Hatsue and Ishmael always secretly meet and where their love blossomed, is a secret world apart from the world outside in which the falling snow is a blanket on their passion hindered by strict traditions. Inside, it was easy to forget divisions and obstacles. It appears as though that everything seems possible.
At the end,by some twist of fate, Ishmael, the forgotten lover, was the one who proved Kabuo's innocence for the murder. The whole trial has enabled him to understand and accept the things in the past that cannot be undone and to live with the decisions made at the moment when it was necessary to make them.
On the onset, it is a trial of a Japanese-American war veteran for a murder of also a war veteran turned gill-net fisher. But throughout the story, the main plot became a back-drop of a story of a love found and a love lost driven by the circumstances by the still shocking treatment of the Japanese-Americans community in the Island of San Piedro during the World War II.
In February 1942, President Franklin Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 on flyers entitled "Instructions to Citizens of Japanese Ancestry". With this, the US Relocation Authority mobilized over 120,000 Japanese immigrants, who left their homes to relocation camps at different parts of the country. The tar paper-covered-barracks were scarcely furnished and barely livable ---- not so far to be described as a prison camp by the Japanese interned on them where they were subjected to tight security and curfew hours. But for the US government, it was a military necessity to protect the Japanese Immigrants from citizens who have anti-Japanese sentiments resulting from the bombing of the Pearl Harbour. On the other hand, it is also a precaution against espionage and from those who have sentiments for their Asian homeland. In 1988, in a public law, the US Government apologized and paid for what was ruled as injustice to the Japanese-Americans.
In the story, Hatsue Miyamoto, a young, beautiful but often rebellious Japanese-American left behind a love for a Caucasian male, Ishmael Chambers during the troubled times when Japanese-Americans where treated with hostility. A rapturous love that they both kept a secret at a time when such a love was unacceptable.
After the war, they met again in San Piedro. But this time, Hatsue is already married to the accused man on trial, Kabuo, whom she met in Manzanar, one of the relocation camps. Ishmael, on the other hand, having lost an arm in the war continued her father's legacy of running a newspaper and officially became a reporter on Kabuo's trial. But even so, Ishmael still feels regret over how his childhood love with Hatsue has ended. For a small community like San Piedro, to be brought again in a way that divides color and beliefs was heartbreaking reminder of tainted history of the discrimination of the Japanese Immigrants who surprisingly gave no visible protest and silently followed the directive as they were hauled and uprooted from their homes to the camps. Ishmael on the other hand felt a different kind of misery and longing for his one true love, especially knowing that Hatsue has moved on with her life and considers their love as a distant past and a foolish notion of a naive girl.
And because I have read this over and over again, on this review I have come to understand a part of the reason why it is titled Snow Falling on Cedars. Inside the hollow of the cedar tree, where Hatsue and Ishmael always secretly meet and where their love blossomed, is a secret world apart from the world outside in which the falling snow is a blanket on their passion hindered by strict traditions. Inside, it was easy to forget divisions and obstacles. It appears as though that everything seems possible.
At the end,by some twist of fate, Ishmael, the forgotten lover, was the one who proved Kabuo's innocence for the murder. The whole trial has enabled him to understand and accept the things in the past that cannot be undone and to live with the decisions made at the moment when it was necessary to make them.
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