The China Lover: A Novel [Bargain Price] [Hardcover]

Ian Buruma (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 18, 2008

A transfixing portrait of a woman and a nation eagerly burying the past to transform the future.

In his enthralling new novel, Ian Buruma uses the life of the starlet Yamaguchi Yoshiko as a lens through which to understand the lure of erotic fantasies in the conquest of nations. The China Lover reveals the catastrophic results when theater and politics blend in a lethal manner.

In her earliest days Ri Koran—a Japanese girl, born in Manchuria, who sang and acted in Japanese and Chinese—was forced to keep her Japanese identity a secret, to become a Manchurian singer and movie star playing Chinese beauties who fell in love with brave Japanese empire builders. In U.S.-occupied Tokyo, she returned to the screen as Yamaguchi Yoshiko, starring in films approved by American censors and designed to promote American-style democracy.

Before long, she decided to reinvent herself yet again by moving to the United States. Three months after Japan and the United States signed a peace treaty in San Francisco, Yamaguchi rededicated herself to pursuing a career in American movies, this time as Shirley Yamaguchi, playing exotic Japanese beauties falling in love with American soldiers. But she was not just the subject of male fantasies on the cinema screen. She married the Japanese American sculptor Isamu Noguchi, who wanted her to be the perfect traditional Japanese woman. When her many roles, in life and in film, proved impossible to reconcile, Shirley left Noguchi, retired as an actress, and married a promising young Japanese diplomat.

At the outset of the 1970’s, the life of Yamaguchi Yoshiko took another dramatic turn. As host of a Japanese television show for housewives, Yoshiko accepted an assignment in the Middle East, where she met Yassir Arafat and a prominent Palestinian terrorist. A member of her crew, affiliated with the Japanese Red Army, would return to commit a terrible crime while Yoshiko became a founding member of the Japanese- Palestinian Friendship Association, and ended her career as a politician in the right-wing ruling party of Japan.

In Buruma’s reimagining of the life of Yamaguchi Yoshiko, a Japanese torn among patriotism for her parents’ homeland, wordly ambition, and sympathy for the Chinese, she would reflect almost exactly the twists and turns in the history of modern Japan.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The second novel (following 1991's Playing the Game) from nonfiction specialist Buruma (Behind the Mask, etc.) is based with biographical diligence on the life of the Japanese actress known variously as Ri Koran, Yoshiko Yamaguchi and (in American films) Shirley Yamaguchi. Narrated by gay cinephile Sidney Vanoven, part one is driven by his cultural and sexual fascination with Japan, fired from the moment he arrives during America's postwar occupation. Buruma's colorful evocation of young Sidney's obsessions, which include Ri Koran, is further enlivened by Sidney's fanciful encounters with clueless visiting Americans (including a libidinous Truman Capote). Part two, set before WWII, is narrated by Sato Daisuke, whose shadowy connection to the film industry intersects over the years with Ri Koran's rise to stardom, but their story gets overwhelmed by Buruma's meticulous attention to Japan's invasion of China. Part three, set in more contemporary times, is narrated by a Japanese scriptwriter caught up in the Palestinian struggle—a story reported by an elderly Yoshiko, now host of a Japanese TV talk show. Less would have been more in this competent but overstuffed story. (Sept.)
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From Booklist

*Starred Review* Given the complexity of his award-winning journalism and penetrating books of cultural analysis, Buruma is bound to write novels of similar gravitas, although he can also be witty and provocative. Drawing on his deep knowledge of Asia and a passion for Japanese cinema, Buruma found his perfect subject in Yoshiko Yamaguchi, the nearly forgotten, once controversial Japanese singer and actress turned journalist and politician. It takes three male narrators in three different eras to convey the full drama of Yoshiko’s life of transformations, from her posing as the Chinese performer Ri Koran to her roles in U.S.-directed Japanese propaganda films, her marriage to the artist Isamu Noguchi, and her courageous reporting in Saigon and Beirut. As Buruma bends the beam of history through the prism of his imagination and spotlights the many contradictory roles Yoshiko played, she becomes our shimmering guide through the shadowy realm where art, eroticism, and politics collide. The dark deeds of Tokyo gangsters, the endless horror of Hiroshima, the deep wounds of occupation, the sensuous power of film, and the strange circumstances that induced three Japanese gunmen to launch a terrorist attack on the Tel Aviv airport––all are facets in Buruma’s magnificent saga of war and prejudice, beauty and tyranny, sacrifice and survival. --Donna Seaman --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 400 pages
• Publisher: Penguin Press HC, The (September 18, 2008)
• ISBN-10: 1594201943
• ASIN: B001U0OGJU
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.4 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,385,504 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars sex, lies and japanese film, September 24, 2008

By 

Seth Faison (Princeton, NJ) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The China Lover: A Novel (Hardcover)

An engrossing, wonderfully-written historical novel. Here's the premise: In 1940, at the height of Japan's military aggression during World War II, a movie called "China Nights" won the hearts of countless Japanese soldiers and patriots who were riveted by the stirring singing voice of the young girl who plays a Chinese orphan rescued by a Japanese officer who both loves and beats her. The singer became enormously popular, a symbol of subservience to Japan's self-image of benevolent but iron rule over Asia.

After Japan lost the war, the singer was accused of treason for helping her wartime captors. To escape execution, she revealed a secret -- that she was actually Japanese and had followed orders to pretend to be Chinese. She escaped to Japan and reinvented herself as a successful film actress, Yoshiko Yamaguchi, though she used the first name Shirley when she made it to Hollywood and Broadway.

Ian Buruma, a film buff and an accomplished writer of nonfiction about Asia, delivers a lushly rendered piece of historical fiction. Buruma conveys the exhilaration and devastation of Japan's military folly and its resulting moral hangover through the lens of the film world at the time. With a sharp yet generous eye, Buruma explores the moods and sensibilities of the movie business in wartime Shanghai and postwar Tokyo.

His novel seems to revel in and see through the filmmaking and its role in shaping memory and history. It's a cinematic story, in topic and form, made richer by the fertile emotional terrain of its fallible protagonists.

The story begins in Manchuria, narrated by a cultural official named Sato, whose day job is to promote cultural events that win over Chinese hearts and minds and whose nighttime pursuits satisfy a prodigious appetite for bedding Chinese actresses. As a Japanese patriot, Sato sneers at the haughty European colonials and is thrilled by news of Pearl Harbor.

Yet Sato is fascinated by the mysteries and challenges of life in a foreign culture, which fuel and soothe his restless nature. He also observes the realities of war with stark clarity, seeing Japan's military police as sadistic thugs whose real goal is to profit from illicit schemes and lawlessly exercise power over the helpless.

"The China Lover" overflows with intriguing characters, particularly Amakasu, a shadowy official who supervises Japan's propaganda efforts in China. I kept visualizing the oily haired fixer supreme who called the shots in the film "The Last Emperor" and put a pistol to his temple at the end.

Eventually, I put this novel down to look him up and discovered that Amakasu was indeed a true historical figure.

The second part of the book shifts to postwar Tokyo and is narrated by a young American soldier, Sidney, who works in the film censor's office, a perfect vantage point for watching a golden era of filmmaking begin to germinate. Buruma seems to know every nook and cranny of this landscape. Akira Kurosawa, Frank Capra, Truman Capote and others make charming, understated cameo appearances that give the story power.

In Tokyo, Yamaguchi refuses to acknowledge her wartime past and personifies Japan's painful mixture of denial, humility and determination to work her way out of previous moral failings of the war, all under the eye of a MacArthur-led occupation by the Americans. Those swirling pressures seem to get funneled into the creativity of film studios, with palpable results. "It was the natural flow of images, the beautifully timed cuts, and the camera work, which was intimate without being intrusive," Buruma writes. "There were few close-ups, and no false glamour. Here was life itself being discreetly but closely observed."

After a tempestuous marriage to a headstrong architect, Yamaguchi remarries and moves abroad, effectively disappearing from the public eye. Yet she reappears in the 1960s and reinvents herself again, this time as a TV journalist for a daytime program aimed at Japanese housewives, "What a Weird World: Yoshiko Yamaguchi Reports From the Front Line."

She ventures to Vietnam and Beirut to report on war and terrorism and focuses on the moral crimes she sees. The third section of this novel is improbably yet persuasively narrated by a Japanese terrorist who is jailed in Beirut in the 1970s when a band of Japanese radicals gets caught. (Yamaguchi later became a member of parliament for the conservative ruling party. She still lives in Tokyo.)

This novel, while finely drawn and true to the spirit of the history it covers, falls short in a couple of places. The character of Yamaguchi comes across as earnest and sincere, but she is just not as compelling as the narrators, who each see the moral compromises in others and in themselves. She feels flat in comparison. And though the characterization of each narrator is distinct, their voices all sound suspiciously like . . . Buruma's. It's a trade-off: Buruma's sharp insights and historical perspective tumble off the tongues of each narrator, and I was grateful for them, but sometimes they feel too smart for the mouth from which they spring.

Like many historic events, Japan's aggression in Asia during World War II is often remembered by the way we saw it depicted on film, whether in "The Bridge on the River Kwai," "Letters From Iwo Jima" or even in the black-and-white clips of old newsreels. Buruma knows the persuasive pull -- and the misleading simplicity -- that film can have on memory and history. His novel takes us deep into events of the 20th century and shows us with vivid strokes what it felt like.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great characters, history, and culture, January 24, 2009

By 

Mary Reinert (Nevada, MO) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The China Lover: A Novel (Hardcover)

If you like intricate plots, interesting characters, foreign settings, and historical accuracy, this is a book for you. I knew absolutely nothing about Japanese/Chinese relations or Manchuria during the war and I must admit I had to reread chapters in the first part of the book to gather an understanding of the history of the times, but after that I was totally pulled in.

The first chapter is so compelling and demonstrates the effect stories and imagination can have on the human condition. And then as the book unfolds, one begins to see how stories (movies) can have an effect on an entire nation; are they stories for the imagination or propaganda or both.

Although Ri Koran (or Shirley Yamaguchi or whatever her name could be) is the center of the story, the three men that tell her story at three different times in her life are the most interesting. They provide perfect foils to her personality as she evolves from someone who is knowingly manipulated to someone who manipulates those around her. All of this set in three different parts of the world in vastly different circumstances.

I loved this book. I loved the fact that real historical characters play a part (Truman Capote comes to mind), and the authenticity of the historical events as they unfolded in China, Japan, United States, and Lebanon. There are so many characters in this book and so many little unique connections between them, it was a fascinating read.

5.0 out of 5 stars A glimpse at Japan's attempt to be a colonial power, November 23, 2011

By 

z - See all my reviews

This review is from: The China Lover: A Novel (Hardcover)

The previous reviews are detailed (and largely on the mark) so I won't go over the same ground, but I would highly recommend the book if you have a historical interest in Japan. Though heavily fictionalized, you get a feel for a Japan attempting to re-create itself in Manchuria. And if you know anything about Ri Koran and the songs she made famous (put "Ri Koran" into youtube), the book is even more enjoyable. Lastly, you can use this book as a jumping off point for further reading about the legacy of Japan in Manchuria (now Changchun, China) --- Japanese buildings are still part of its downtown, as well as its colonization of Taiwan (which predated the Manchurian misadventure). You have to wonder how things would be today, if Japan had been as successful in its colonial efforts as, say, England had been.