横子的故事 (1986)

《拥子的故事》又名《竹林深处》是由一个日籍美国人川岛拥子所写的半自传体小说.

文中描写了川岛拥子——一个满洲国日本官员的女儿在日本战败后一路从朝鲜半岛回日本的经历。书中提到韩国人对日本人非常残暴。

横子的故事遭到韩国的强烈抗议。川岛拥子一度向韩国国民道歉。

So Far from the Bamboo Grove is an autobiography written by Yoko Kawashima Watkins, a Japanese American writer. It was originally published by Beech Tree in April 1986.

Watkins's book takes place in the last days of 35 years of Korea's annexation by Japan. An eleven-year-old Japanese girl, Yoko Kawashima, whose father works for the Japanese government, must leave her home in Nanam, part of northern Korea, as her family escapes south to Seoul, then to Busan, to return to Japan.

Plot summary

The story begins with Yoko Kawashima (and her mother, brother and sister) living in Nanam. Yoko is 11 years old and living in North Korea during World War II while their father works as a Japanese government official in Manchuria, China. As the war draws towards a close, Yoko and her family realize the danger of their situation and attempts to escape back to Japan as communist troops close in on North Korea.

Her brother, Hideyo, also tries to leave but he is separated from his family because he has to serve at an ammunition factory for six days a week. The women of the family board a train to Seoul using a letter from a family diplomat but their trip is cut short by a bomb 45 miles away from Seoul. Yoko is injured from the bombing and the women are forced to walk the rest of the way. After receiving medical treatment in Seoul, Yoko, her sister, and mother board a train to Busan, and then a ship to Japan.

When Yoko, her sister Ko, and her mother reach Fukuoka, Japan, it is not the beautiful, comforting, welcoming place Yoko dreamed of. Once again, they find themselves living in a train station scrounging in the garbage for food to survive. Eventually, Yoko's mother travels to Kyoto to find her family. She then leaves for Aomori to seek help from their grandparents who she discovers are both dead. Their mother dies on the same day, leaving Yoko and Ko waiting for their brother Hideyo. Their mother's last words were to keep their wrapping cloth where she had hidden money for her children.

Yoko begins to attend a new school where she enters and wins an essay contest with a cash prize. News of her winning the contest is reported in the newspaper. Hideyo and the Korean family who took bid farewell and Hideyo finally reaches Busan where he finds the message left to him by Yoko. After reaching Japan, he sees signs with his name and Yoko and Ko's address. While asking directions from locals, he is spotted by Yoko and they are reunited.

Kawashima also wrote a sequel titled My Brother, My Sister, and I.

Translations

A Korean version of this book titled Yoko iyagi (요코이야기, "Yoko's tale") was published in 2005 and sold 4,000 copies of the first printing. However, it was banned soon after.

A Japanese version of this book, Takebayashi haruka tōku: Nihonjin shōjo Yōko no sensō taikenki (竹林はるか遠く : 日本人少女ヨーコの戦争体験記, "Bamboo grove far distant: Japanese girl Yōko's war experience account") became available in June 2013. In June 2013, the book reached No. 1 on the Amazon Best Sellers in Books in Japan.

Controversy

Response in Boston

The issue came to head after 2006, when 13 parents of Korean-American students in a Greater Boston community urged the book be removed from the English curriculum of Dover-Sherborn Middle School, resulting in the convening of a review committee that included the middle school librarian and two English teachers, which recommended removing the book from school curriculum in November 2006. A hearing in the Dover-Sherborn Regional School Committee was later held which took no action and instead referred the matter to a subcommittee for review. The book was later kept in the curriculum to be used in tandem with other books on Korean history for a more balanced experience.