Miss Nume of Japan : A Japanese-American Romance

by Watanna, Onoto; Oishi, Eve

• ISBN13: 9780801861086
• ISBN10: 080186108X
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1999-02-01
• Publisher: Johns Hopkins Univ Pr

Summary

The first known novel by an Asian-American, Miss Nume of Japan charts the romantic adventures of two couples, one Japanese and one American. The Japanese couple, though not really in love, has been betrothed since childhood. The relationship of the second couple, a beautiful American and her fiancee, is equally troubled. Through a series of coincidental encounters, the couples find opportunities to escape these loveless relationships. Although tragic events unfold, the spirit of the title character triumphs as she finds liberation and true happiness with the American man. Revealing both the tenuousness of racial identity and the resiliency of social boundaries, the book employs typically exotic, inscrutable caricatures of Japanese people. But it also includes coded arguments for the autonomy of the "new woman," a creature living between worlds and between the choices of career and domesticity. The Japanese women in Watanna's fiction are remarkable for their dissatisfaction with the narrow strictures of their culture. Watanna's men generally find these women attractive not only for their Oriental charm and innocence, but also for their outspokenness and difference from more traditional Japanese women. Now available in paperback, Miss Nume of Japan is a work of critical importance to the Asian-American canon and a milestone in the complex history of ethnic formation and literary production.

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION, 1999	XI
EVE OISHI
INTRODUCTION	3	(2)
I -- Parental Ambitions	5	(5)
II -- Cleo	10	(5)
III -- Who Can Analyze a Coquette?	15	(5)
IV -- The Dance on Deck	20	(4)
V -- Her Gentle Enemy	24	(3)
VI -- A Veiled Hint	27	(3)
VII -- Jealousy without Love	30	(7)
VIII -- The Man She Did Love	37	(6)
IX -- Merely a Woman	43	(4)
X -- Watching the Night	47	(5)
XI -- At the Journey's End	52	(2)
XII -- Those Queer Japanese!	54	(5)
XIII -- Takashima's Home-Coming	59	(1)
XIV -- After Eight Years	60	(4)
XV -- Nume	64	(4)
XVI -- An American Classic	68	(5)
XVII -- "Still a Child"	73	(3)
XVIII -- The Meeting	76	(3)
XIX -- Confindences	79	(4)
XX -- Sinclair's Indifference	83	(3)
XXI -- "Me? I Lig You"	86	(6)
XXII -- Advice	92	(3)
XXIII -- Afraid to Answer	95	(4)
XXIV -- Visiting the Tea Houses	99	(5)
XXV -- Shattered Hopes	104	(4)
XXVI -- Conscience	108	(2)
XXVII -- Confession	110	(5)
XXVIII -- Japanese Pride	115	(2)
XXIX -- Seclusion	117	(4)
XXX -- Feminine Diplomacy	121	(3)
XXXI -- A Barbarian Dinner	124	(2)
XXXII -- The Philosophy of Love	126	(4)
XXXIII -- What Can That "Luf" Be?	130	(3)
XXXIV -- Conspirators	133	(3)
XXXV -- A Respite for Sinclair	136	(3)
XXXVI -- Those Bad Jinrikisha Men	139	(2)
XXXVII -- Those Good Jinrikisha Men	141	(3)
XXXVIII -- Disproving a Proverb	144	(4)
XXXIX -- Love!	148	(4)
XL -- A Passionate Declaration	152	(4)
XLI -- A Hard Subject to Handle	156	(4)
XLII -- A Story	160	(3)
XLIII -- The Truth of the Proverb	163	(4)
XLIV -- Nume Breaks Down	167	(4)
XLV -- Trying to Forget	171	(2)
XLVI -- An Observant Husband	173	(3)
XLVII -- Matsushima Bay	176	(4)
XLVIII -- A Rejected Lover	180	(4)
XLIX -- The Answer	184	(3)
L -- The Ball	187	(3)
LI -- The Fearful News	190	(2)
LII -- The Tragedy	192	(2)
LIII -- A Little Heroine	194	(4)
LIV -- Sinclair Learns the Truth at Last	198	(4)
LV -- Lovers Again	202	(4)
LVI -- The Penalty	206	(5)
LVII -- The Pity of It All	211	(3)
LVIII -- Mrs. Davis's Nerves	214	(3)
LIX -- Cleo and Nume	217