Background of the Story
The Strangeness of Beauty begins as a quietly self-reflective 'autobiography' of an Japanese
expatriate living in 1920s Seattle, and quickly expands its scope to three generations of a
Japanese matriarchy living in Kobe under the shadow of World War II.
What makes the novel so scintillating is Minatoya's exquisite, intelligent voice. By viewing
Japan through the prism of an aging samurai grandmother, her estranged yet buoyant widow
daughter, and the haughty American-born grandchild, Minatoya ushers in an unforgettable world
of resilient characters trodding along rough personal paths toward self-definition and growth.
Minatoya's skill at unveiling minute details simultaneously evokes a tangible sense of place and
elevates the story into symbolic dimensions. Granddaughter Hanae's dead mother has sewn her
countless kimonos; every year her father in Seattle sends the same Western garments in larger
sizes. “But each morning as she puts on layer after layer of her parents' providence . . . Hanae
develops a vague but certain knowledge of love. That it's excessive and insensible. That it's
inconvenient and imperiling. That it wraps around you. As essential as skin.”
Minatoya resorts to rather straightforward explanations of Japanese culture when describing the
transformatory forces of a society in flux. These observations, however skillful, impart the novel
with a tour-guide quality. This cross-cultural self-consciousness so prevalent in Asian-American
fiction is entirely absent in say, Japanese author Banana Yoshimoto's Kitchen. Thankfully, the
primary cast is far too well-rendered to be effected by Minatoya's sociological bent.
Humor, insight, and a vivid characterizations prevent The Strangeness of Beauty from cultural
cliches and make the book a pleasure to read, a portrait of surprising beauty in a foreign place
made deliciously real.
Background of the Author
LYDIA MINATOYA was born In Albany, New York in 1950. She re¬ceived her
PhD in psychology from the University of Maryland in 1981 and is currently a
college professor. She has written about her experiences growing up as an Asian
American and her travels of self-discovery in Asia in Talking to Monks in High
Snow: An Asian-¬American Odyssey (1993). She has also published a novel, The
Strangeness of Beauty (1999), about several generations of Japanese Americans
who return to Japan just before World War II and view the conflict from the
perspective of insiders who are also outsiders.
Summary of the Story
Minatoya (the memoir Talking to High Monks in the Snow, 1992) debuts in fiction with a
pleasantly told, highly detailed, risk-free, and autobiographical “I-story” of Etsuko in the years
between the world wars. The story opens in 1921 in Seattle, where the widowed Etsuko lives
with her sister Naomi and Naomi’s husband Akira. Naomi dies during childbirth, and after a few
years Akira decides that the child, Hanae, must return to Japan to relearn her native culture.
Accompanying Hanae to Kobe, Etsuko faces an uncomfortable reunion with her own cold and
distant mother, Chie, who abandoned her soon after her birth. Hanae haltingly enters Japanese
culture; the nationalist fervor in Japan swells; and Etsuko participates in antiwar activities. As
the war fever grows, Etsuko and Chie achieve a modest peace and join various pacifist groups,
while Hanae studies her way to the head of her graduating class of 1939. Each of these phases of
the plot is authoritatively embellished with fine re-creations of Japanese culture of the era, but
aside from the light pressure Akira exerts on Etsuko to return Hanae to the US, the story could
just as well have occurred in contemporary Japan without impeding its general intent. Etsuko,
who guides the reader through the autobiography-novel, is strangely missing from the meat of
the tale: her antipathies are lukewarm, her loyalties only gently divided, and her anxieties
exclusively domestic in focus. Minatoya also begins many sections with Etsuko describing the
pitfalls and challenges of writing autobiographical fiction, a device that intrudes unnecessarily
upon the flow of the story. Well written, nevertheless, and thoroughly researched. Minatoya
evokes the nature of Japanese culture and offers explanations for many of its beliefs and habits—
without which her slim storyline would never have reached such excessive length. They don—t
propel the reader forward, but they are informative.
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