Nabi T'aryŏng and Other Stories

by Lee Yangji, Cindi Textor (Translator), Lee Soo Mi (Translator)

An Ethnic Korean Woman in Japan Struggles to Find Her Identity When she utters “our country,” which does she mean, Korea or Japan? Lee Yang-ji’s short stories “Yuhi” and “Nabi T’aryǒng” portray the agony and inner conflict of Zainichi (ethnic Koreans residing in Japan) who find themselves considered strangers both in Korea and Japan. “Yuhi” features the eponymous protagonist going to Korea in search of her roots as does Aiko, the main character of “Nabi T’aryǒng.” Both women grow frustrated after realizing that they are considered marginal persons who can be neither Korean nor Japanese. The two works vividly show traces of the writer’s agonizing search for her identity and feelings of ambivalence as a second-generation Zainichi. Through these autobiographical stories, she uses her personal problems to brilliantly explore the realm of ethnic identity and language.

440 pages, Paperback

Published December 26, 2022

Reviews

[Yelyzaveta Zahorodnia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Yuhi’s story didn’t leave me indifferent. The question of self-identity never really bothered me, but the language issue is something that once deeply affected my beliefs. At the moment, I am struggling to ‘own’ my fourth language, Japanese, and adapt to my new life in Japan (it’s already been three years though). That’s why the thoughts and ideas presented in this story truly resonated with me. Since I took the story personally, my only issue was that I couldn’t fully relate to what irritated Yuhi compared to the culture she was raised in, so the only character I could empathize with wasn’t very pleasant to follow. Similarly, her negative experience influenced my own sense of regret and left me frustrated after I finished reading.