Pachinko - June CC Book Club Selection

Parent Cafe
61

I thought The American Korean gals’ character was a bit extreme. Her mother doesn’t cook, people of first or second generation married most anyone but Koreans. If she had found a job or spent time with Solomon’s family, perhaps learning Korean heritage or how to cook, I think She could have been a good wife, and the trajectory of his life would be very different. I think the name Solomon was chosen to show divergent paths, e.g. differences between The American gal and Hana, his education and the casinos.

Noa’s Death was just a downer.

62

I liked the book at the beginning and then I feel like the wheels fell of the bus. It just labored on and on. I assume the author wanted to span the history of Koreans in Japan and their plight by covering such a long time frame - what changed over the years but also what really hasn’t.

I did know a decent amount about Japanese/Korean relationships before reading the book but did learn some new stuff. Having Korean friends, I did know some stuff about the culture already. I wish the book had included a section at the end like some books do defining the native words used and cultural things, a glossary of sorts. Perhaps books don’t do that anymore with the internet but it would have been helpful as I don’t like to hop on my laptop when reading.

I didn’t find the pace or style of writing gripping. I felt like I had to trudge through to finish the latter part of the book. I think the weakest part of the book was character development. So many new characters introduced from beginning to end. Some here mentioned they had a hard time remembering the characters - I think that is why. Even when monumental things happened to main characters, the events themselves seemed to be glossed over and just moved past - Nao’s death, Yoseb in the later stages. It didn’t make me feel attached to the characters and really engaged in what happened to them and their stories.

Nao’s death really didn’t move me much. It was too abrupt and then the book just moved on completely. The book didn’t make me feel emotionally invested.

“I was ignorant of the second class citizen status of Koreans living (& born in) Japan.”

It’s probably especially bad for Koreans given the history but it is true for pretty much any people of non-Japanese heritage as far as I know. I know some Americans who have lived in Japan for 3-4 generations. They basically cannot get Japanese citizenship even though they were born in the country. Lacking Japanese blood, it is extremely difficult. Japan has a very insular society. BTW, both Japanese and Koreans are some of the most homogeneous races, in terms of DNA, on the planet.

Koreans are second class status in Japan, and the Korean women seem to have it the worst as portrayed in the book, not that it is too different from women’s status in most of the world.

I agree that the Pachinko book title, connection to and opportunity for wealth creation by Koreans in Japan made for a good title and underlying theme for the book. Pretty genius actually.

Knowing a few young Korean American women, I found the portrayal of Solomon’s girlfriend pretty accurate. Very smart, career driven, little interest in doing the housewife thing. Often throughout history, many 1st generation families really try to assimilate their families which could explain the marrying in her family of non-Koreans plus needing double incomes to get a foothold which means less time focused on cooking and tradition, more time focused on climbing the economic ladder.

I love books where I can learn about a different culture and countries so I had higher hopes for this one. I found myself constantly comparing it to another book I adored while reading it - Cutting For Stone. Now, there is a book that I found far superior - the opportunity to learn about different cultures but with a more gripping storyline and superior character development, IMO.

63

I had one day to read this book(timing of when I got the book in hand) so please excuse me if I missed the nuances. Good thing I’m a fast reader and had the entire day to myself.
I had some trouble starting the book, the first 2 pages were too slow and didn’t grip me. After that, it was easy reading - so good book choice overall. Apologizing for any mistakes with names, I don’t have the book with me to check.

I loved reading about a time and culture I am unfamiliar with. The interesting thing for me personally, were the numerous parallels I could find with what I know of my own family’s rural and poverty-filled beginnings in a different country(several generations back so my grandmother only knew of it as stories passed down).

It was an eye-opening window into Korean history of which I had very little prior knowledge. It was a bit of a surprise that Koreans settled in Japan were still not amalgamated into the mainstream society in the late 80s.

I liked Lee’s writing style — easy and clear. She tells the story well and is economic with words and descriptors. She shapes characters with a phrase or two and I begin to think I understand how they will behave(failed with Noa). I like to read historical sagas and often find that the story gets lost in the description.

The part about ‘a woman’s lot to suffer’ was dealt with really well. I don’t think it needed mentioning because the suffering was quite clear. Every woman has a trial in her life and she’s left rowing the boat by herself. Yungjiin, Sunja, and Kyunghee, are all developed well and come out as strong characters with some flaws. The one I’m unclear about - Etsuke(if that’s her name). What was her issue, boredom of being a housewife with a husband who’s too busy for her, lack of adult conversation, lack of satisfactory love-life, the sorrow of being a parent to children who needed her? Just not a great character and I don’t think she deserved Mozasu.

Despite disagreeing with the way Noa was presented, I liked how Lee gives closure to Sunja at the cemetery. That was a nice window into the past and helped her(and me) make peace with Noa. A bit.

My issues with the book came later into the book, maybe halfway into it. I think there were a few superfluous characters introduced who muddied the story for me(Hana, Aikiko, even Etsuke).

My personal peeve — I didn’t like the intrusion of religion into the story, like the scene with the pastor before the marriage. I get that it is an intrinsic part of who Isak is, underlines the difficulty of Sunja’s choice and turns the story.

The book went on too long. The story should’ve been wrapped up about 50-75 pages earlier. I found the whole part about Solomon excruciatingly slow. I’m pretty sure I have big gaps because I skimmed this part.

And as for the surprise in the end(unless I missed it because I skipped), I assume it has to do with Noa. I found the way Lee dealt with Noa a huge surprise. I don’t think the way she developed his character led to that being an understandable conclusion. What set him off — the knowledge of that he was part of Aikiko’s rebelling against her culture/her family and their biases and prejudices? Or was it earlier when he was in school and had to face being an outsider, an outcast? I just didn’t see it.

This is a long, rambling, post, sorry. I’m traveling out of town today and will have little time to contribute till I get back. I also have’t had the time to read everyone’s posts. I hope I haven’t spoiled the surprise for nor offended anyone. Hoping to catch up on the posts and discussion on Sunday.

Congratulations on the new job, Mary.

64

OK, let’s talk about Noa. I’m very confused.

He was always a student. Loved to read, to study. When Hansu initially offered to pay for college, before Noa knew that Hansu was his father, Noa originally declined, but then accepted. “Noa had not refused Hansu. He had already accepted the money, because the boy wanted so much to go to this university . . . . the boy, her first child, was happy.”

But when Noa learned Hansu was his father, then he was angry. “I took money for my education from a yakuza, and you thought that was acceptable? I will never be able to wash this dirt from my name.” He already knew Hansu was a yakuza, but it was only when Noa learned Hansu was his father that that became a problem.

Hypocritical, if you ask me. Also, I thought he was cutting his nose to spite his face by not taking the last year’s tuition so he could finish. Then, he could pay back the entire four years once he became established.

According to Yoseb: “Yoseb could understand the boy’s anger, but he wanted another chance to talk to him, to tell Noa that a man must learn to forgive – to know what is important, that to live without forgiveness was a kind of death with breathing and movement.”

65

“I had one day to read this book…Good thing I’m a fast reader”

I’m impressed!

“My issues with the book came later into the book, maybe halfway into it. I think there were a few superfluous characters introduced who muddied the story for me(Hana, Aikiko, even Etsuke).”

Interesting how they were all Japanese women, not Koreans. Not sure if it was intentional or not, or the author’s bias.

“My personal peeve — I didn’t like the intrusion of religion into the story”

It’s interesting to note that a good percentage of South Korea’s population is Christian, estimated at around 30%, very high percentage vs other Asian countries. In Japan, it is just 1%. So, another way many Koreans differ from the Japanese.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_in_Korea

I agree that the storyline with Nao didn’t make a whole lot of sense. It just wasn’t explained well enough to understand what his demons were and how they formed his actions and reactions in life.

66

I wasn’t a fan almost from the beginning. Unlike @AnAsmom, I don’t like Lee’s writing style. Sentences seemed short and dry, like I was reading an early draft of her novel and she’d go back and then fill in the details. I shrugged that feeling off, deciding it was my problem and settled in to read. After all Pachinko was a finalist for the National Book Award, so, again, my problem. I got used to the writing style, only to grow bothered by one thing after another.

Male characters started suffering the fate of female characters on the TV show Bonanza - here for an episode and then gone:

Hoonie - anchored the episode of the fishing village in Korea (and then he’s discarded in the narrative).

Isak - moves Sunja from the fishing village in Korea to Japan (and then he’s discarded in the narrative)

Hansu - the benevolent benefactor steps in to keep the family from disappearing under the weight of their troubles (discarded in the narrative only to crop up according to plot needs).

Yoseb - ultimately represents aftereffects of the atomic bomb (but basically he’s discarded in the narrative other than brief interludes from his pallet.)

Goro - for Pachinko, of course (and while he doesn’t completely disappeared, he’s as needed also).

Kim Chango - connects Hansu and Sunja, in one of those times of need and then leaves for N. Korea (and becomes discarded in the narrative.)

Noa - represents a young man’s inexplicable suicide from shame (“Noa had shot himself a few minutes after she’d left his office.” The period at the end of that sentence effectively rids the book of Noa because next: a new chapter, a year later, different city.)

And just for the record Haruki should have been the one to die of AIDS rather than Hana. I claim that to be a misstep on the part of the author. (I just finished reading And the Band Played On: Politics, People, and the AIDS Epidemic - outstanding book.)

Yes, I realize Lee sketches more into each life but still. I also realize that female characters started coming and going with equal ease by the end.

Add to the above complaint, predictability:

Did anyone think Hansu would marry Sunja when he gets her pregnant? No

Did anyone not think that Hansu and Sunja would reconnect once Isak moves her to Hansu’s city? No

Didn’t you know the minute the watch was pawned that Hansu would somehow find out that Sunja was near? Yes

Same for the atomic bomb.

Hana with AIDS surprised me though. However, when I read it I thought, of course - with rolled eyes - AIDS in 1989. Without doubt though Lee missed on the character.

I also agree with @doschicos when she says: I think “I feel like the wheels fell of the bus. It just labored on and on.”

My rant done, I did like this and that about the book and am not sorry I read it. I am confused about the acclaim. I hate to be this out of step with the overwhelming number of readers who seem to love it. I just want to shout: “Didn’t you notice Lee completely lost control of her story?”

67

I’m with ignatius. While I mostly enjoyed the book it felt very didactic to me, like she was ticking off each possible terrible thing that could happen to Koreans in Japan. Most of the characters never came alive for me. I actually liked Hansu the best, in terms of really believing in him. His motives seemed most clear and I think he really did love Sunja and Noa to the extent that he can love anyone.

I lived in Japan from 1960-64 and went to a Japanese kindergarten. Of course I knew nothing about the politics of Japan then, but have kept up a bit since. The guy who does my blueprints is Korean-American and we had an interesting talk today about Japan and Korea. He was saying that even when Koreans are offered Japanese citizenship they don’t necessarily want to take it because of the history and bad blood.

I played a lot of pinball in my day - there’s actually quite a bit of skill involved - my dh’s roommate used to rack up extra games and then dh and I would lose them all! My impression is that Pachinko involves way less skill and is more like a slot machine - but I don’t know.

There’s an interesting interview with the author in the Atlantic where she talks about how she believes that suffering can lead to good things - using the example of the story of Joseph. I think the Christian aspect of the story was very important to her. https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2017/12/min-jin-lee-by-heart/548810/

Another thing she talks about in a number of interviews is the importance of the omniscient narrator, so when I saw this today, I was amused: http://rhymeswithorange.com/ (if you are reading this later you’ll have to figure out how to get to June 1.)

I never really believed in Noa. So while his death was a downer, I also didn’t really care and I was mad at him for being mad at Sunja - what choices did she have? She did what she thought was best for him.

68

Love your Bonanza anaolgy @ignatius and so true about the male characters.

“Same for the atomic bomb.”
As soon as Nagasaki was mentioned I assumed something related to the bomb would come into play.

" I am confused about the acclaim. I hate to be this out of step with the overwhelming number of readers who seem to love it. I just want to shout: “Didn’t you notice Lee completely lost control of her story?”"

Ditto. And the lack of character development.

69

I just can’t stop gravitating to this discussion and of course I can’t resist joining in. I’m multitasking between finishing a project, packing and this. The project is almost done but my packing is going to suffer. So I will probably end up with the wrong clothes, shoes, make-up and jewelry. :wink:

I liked Lee’s writing style because it contrasts with my own rather labored and tortuous style. I would take 1500 pages to write this story if I had to. I don’t love the book but it made me step out of my comfort genre and read something new.
From all your posts, I can see that it would good to have more of a balance in the characters, some were developed well and some not at all. Thus the problems we all have with not liking some or forgetting them.
I’m curious to know what happened to Dokhee and Bokhee, would like more than Yangjiin’s conjecture that they were taken to become camp women for the soldiers in China.

@ignatius
Agree with you that she tended to bring her male characters in to enable the twists in her story. Disposable and replaceable characters!
Her characters were predictable but I tot that up to the positive; she explains her characters enough that we can see their next action.
I saw Nagasaki coming early on too and knew she was going to dispose of someone there.
Loved your Bonanza analogy.

@doschicos
“I agree that the Pachinko book title, connection to and opportunity for wealth creation by Koreans in Japan made for a good title and underlying theme for the book. Pretty genius actually.”

Agreed. I like some of your other points but don’t have time to go into it now.

“Interesting how they were all Japanese women, not Koreans. Not sure if it was intentional or not, or the author’s bias.”

I had missed that.

@VeryHappy
“Hypocritical, if you ask me. Also, I thought he was cutting his nose to spite his face by not taking the last year’s tuition so he could finish. Then, he could pay back the entire four years once he became established.”

I’m with you on Noa. Confused about why he did what he did.

@mathmom
I love the ‘omniscient narrator’ cartoon. I guess Lee is one such because her characters seem to be pawns in the field that she moves around somewhat arbitrarily to suit her story. The story doesn’t revolve around the characters as much as around the life-events she decided needed to happen(if that makes any sense).

I really need to be off the computer now and take care of that packing.

70

Great posts, everyone!

I assumed that Sunja, Noa, and the others chose to be blissfully ignorant of the fact Hansu was a yakuza. I thought Noa truly seemed surprised when Phoebe said Hansu was a yakuza.

71

I found Hansu a contradictory character. Everything he did to get money was wrong – he really was a gangster. But everything he did for Sunja (except getting her pregnant in the first place) was loving. Or, was it controlling?

The focus on Christianity was interesting to me. Pastor Shin had Sunja ask for forgiveness before he would marry her and Isak. And Yoseb wanting Noa to learn to forgive, so he could forgive Hansu. According to Yoseb, “to live without forgiveness was a kind of death.”

Kyunghee, Isek and Yoseb were 100% perfect and good. That became a tad annoying.

72

Yes, everyone in that family seemed to be pretty much in denial about how Hansu made his money. It’s interesting that he didn’t try to get any of the kids involved in his business. He really does want Noa to be Noa - and Noa is the one who ends up being least true to himself.

73

I liked the book. When Noa died I literally gasped out loud!
I believe Noa died from “pridefulness” from “embarrassment” of not being the person he thought he was, of Hansu a “yakusa” of shame.

Noa’s tragic death tied together two themes. “Life is suffering” even when a devoted mother does her very best.
And, " Pachinko" because Hansu was involved with this industry.

Noa with Sunja meeting - page 389

Later during the interaction with Sunja

So much of this story dealt with the concept of “belonging” “home” “bloodlines” and “prejudice”. I was shocked at the abruptness of Noa’s death, but understood it.

I liked the last scene, which brought Noa and Sunja together again, at the cemetery, and we learn of his kindness to the Landcaper. Forgiveness. It was a happy conclusion.

@mathmom great link to the Atlantic article, about Min Jin Lee’s Presbyterian perspective, and inspiration.

Enjoyable you tube - Martha Vineyard Production Min Jin Lee: Pachinko
Caroline Kennedy former ambassador to Japan introduces the author who is very funny and charming, once she relaxes into the presentation !!!

Factoid- pachinko is a 200 BILLION dollar industry in Japan! Who Knew, not me.

As I write this I’m watching the North Korean delegate visiting Washington, and thankful I’ve read this book and now know more than I did about Korea.

74

I am not well-read enough to answer my own question:

What was the significance of Noa’s loving all the books by Dickens and other English authors?

75

I think the main significance is that they are also the authors Min Jin Lee loves, but if I were writing an English essay I’d say it has something to do with his feeling neither Korean nor Japanese, so he gravitates toward a studying something from a completely different culture. It’s part of his not fitting in, and being ashamed of his background.

76

Quote at the beginning of book

. Charles Dickens

Agree with @mathmom the author’s preference. In many you tube interviews she mentions her goal to write a 19th Century novel, but with a modern stylistic sentence.
Also, she states English is not her first language, her family immigrated to Queens when she was 7, and was influenced by the English novels.

This info from :
You tube - Min Jin Lee with Ken Chen - aawwtv
Asian American writers workshop- taped at the Tenements Museum NYC

77

BTW, if you have have the opportunity to go to the Tenement Museum, I highly recommend it.

78

^ I took the Irish Immigrant tour. Enlightening and relevant to the book and to America today.

79

So many wonderful posts! Here’s my first stab at responding, with more to come.

I had exactly the same response to both scenes. I tried very hard to view Yangiin’s words as coming from physical pain, and to view Noa’s from the “cultural shame” perspective. But I just kept coming back to the idea that the behavior was out of character for both. Yangiin had been a loving, devoted mother, and Noa was Isak’s son (in spirit) and would have forgiven Sunja. (It also makes me mad that Sunja has to be “forgiven” for being seduced by Hansu, but such is the way of the world.)

The transformation is dramatic if you compare Sunja’s virginal innocence with Hana’s promiscuity and cynicism. And yet it’s also a case of “the more things change, the more they stay the same.” Both become pregnant as teens and must deal with that crisis alone (with some support from their mothers). Sunja is guilt-ridden; Hana has no self-esteem (“I ruin everything” [p. 455]).

I think the lack of character development is a by-product of the multi-generational saga. You have to be an amazingly gifted writer to make each character stand out vividly when there are so many (John Steinbeck manages it in the beautiful East of Eden.)

When I began the book, I was deeply invested – Isak’s return from prison and subsequent death was tough to read—but then I became inured to tragedy when there were so many characters experiencing so much trauma.

@doschicos, Cutting for Stone is one of my favorite books. It was an early book club choice for us: http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parent-cafe/983235-cutting-for-stone-october-cc-book-club-selection-p1.html

80

I would add to the list Haruki’s wife, Ayame, who endured a different sort of suffering being married to a gay man. But please…tell me: What was with the park behind the cemetery? Is the outdoor orgy a cultural thing or have I just led a sheltered existence?

Controlling, in my opinion. He wanted what he couldn’t have and did what he could to insert himself into Sunja’s life. He fancied himself in love with her, but I don’t buy it. Can you imagine if Sunja had actually married him after his wife died, as he had hoped? He would have tired of her quickly.

I had a certain amount of interest in and empathy for Hansu until the scene where he beat his girlfriend to a pulp in the car. Then I was completely done with him.

I liked Isak a lot. Yoseb had his moments of wisdom, but on the whole, I thought he was a know-it-all hothead. Kuynghee was too good for him.

@SouthJerseyChessMom, thanks for the reminder about the opening quote – perfect link to Noa’s love of Dickens.

@ignatius…still laughing at your Bonanza analogy. :slight_smile: