The American Diary of a Japanese Girl

by Yoné Noguchi, Edward Marx (Editor), Laura Franey (Editor)

This was the first American novel by a writer of Japanese ancestry, and as such is a landmark of modern American fiction and Japanese-American transnationalism. Targeting the American fantasy of Madame Butterfly, Noguchi's New Woman heroine freely dispenses her insights on Japanese culture and American lifestyles.

Genres: Fiction, Japan, Japanese Literature

224 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1902

About the author

Yoné Noguchi was an influential Japanese writer of poetry, fiction, essays, and literary criticism in both English and Japanese. He was the father of the sculptor Isamu Noguchi.

Reviews

[Ivana Books Are Magic · Rating 3 out of 5]

Published in 1902, this book was an interesting albeit a bewildering read. What to write about this unusual book expect that I'm not sure what to make of it? I must admit I was often confused while reading this book. Initially, I thought it must be the cultural or historical gap that prevents me from 'getting it'. It was only half way through that I realized that it is a work of fiction written by a man and not a travelling diary of a young girl.

Well, that explains why it felt so odd at times, but it doesn't explain everything. This novel follows miss Morning Glory, a young Japanese girl who (accompanied by her wealthy uncle) embarks on a trip across United States of America. Miss Morning glory, only eighteen of age, seems like a superficial girl at times, worrying mostly about her physical appearance and making fun of people. However, as the story progresses, she reveals herself as anything but an ordinary girl, often taking initiative in things. Miss Morning Glory surprises the reader by doing all kind of extravagant things, like running a tobacco shop for a lady who visits her sick husband or secretly dressing as a man, things that would raise eyebrows if a high society girl did them even today. Miss Morning Glory seems to delight in breaking conventions but at the same time she seems to be criticizing others often enough. Or is she? Perhaps Morning Glory might well as she makes her comparisons between the Japanese and the American society, but often it seems like she's criticizing both of them. Maybe that is the point, but as I said, I had a hard time figuring what is meant to be ruthless satire and what plain description.


What was the author trying to do with this one? Is it mostly satire? Or is it a real commentary? How funny and how serious is it supposed to be? Having finished it, I'm none the wiser. I still cannot say that I understand what it is really about or what kind of book it is. I wasn't able to find much information on it, apart that Yone Noguchi had the editorial assistance of Blanche Partington and Léonie Gilmour in writing it. How influential was that help? Speaking of that, I just read that Léonie was not only his Noguchi's editor but also a lover and mother of his children. Despite the fact they never formally married and that he had relationship with other women, Léonie seems to have had quite an influence on his work. An interesting woman for sure, I wonder in what extent Léonie influenced this strange novel.

The American Diary of a Japanese girl is a first work in English by a Japanese writer. I cannot tell whether the broken English or foreign syntax is intentional or not and if yes to what extent. I'm almost certain that at times it is, because it is meant to make the girl sound authentic (and hence not fully fluent in English). I understand this book was originally marketed as a genuine autobiography. However, the language in this book is hardly consistent. At times miss Morning Glory sounds like quite an intellectual and one wiser than her years, while at other times she sounds a simpleton who doesn't speak English well. The result is a linguistic mess. All in all, the writing is lacking. As miss Morning Glory, jumps from topic to topic, it is easy to get confused. Some of her observations are interesting, but there are so many of them and they aren't organized in some rational way.

I felt like there might be clever jokes in this one, but I was not able to pick them up. Maybe some day I decide to read it again and then it might make more sense to me. It is surely relevant from a historical point of view. As a lover of history, I did enjoy some aspects of this novel. However, I was still baffled with it most of the time. I really don't know what to make of it. I liked it but I'm not sure I understood anything in this novel correctly. Well, at least it is original!

[Meltem Sağlam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yazar, 1875-1947 yılları arasında yaşamış ve aynen eserin kahramanı gibi Amerika seyahati gerçekleştirmiş. Bu eser, aynı zamanda, Japon bir yazar tarafından Amerika Birleşik Devletleri'nde yayımlanan ilk İngilizce roman.

Eser, 23 Eylül 1899-19 Mart 1900 tarihleri arasındaki dönemi içeren bir ‘günlük’ ve varlıklı bir genç kızın Amerika seyahatine ilişkin gözlemlerini ve kültürler arası karşılaştırmaları içeriyor. Akıllı, zeki, hayat dolu, enerjik, naif, çok sevimli, 19 yaşında bir genç kız. Eğlenceli bir anlatım, akıcı ve şiirsel bir metin. Romanı çok sevdim, fakat kahramanı daha çok sevdim.

Bir roman olarak tasarlandığı için, çok keyifli bir okuma sağlıyor.

Gündüzsefası adlı bu güzel kahramanın ilk romanı bu. İkinci kitap, ‘Bir Japon Oda Hizmetçisinin Amerika Mektupları’ başlığını taşıyan bir devam romanı.

“…
Her sabah bin Gül getiriyor, diyorsun,
Peki, ama Dünün Gülü nerede kalıyor?
…”, af; 163.

[Jee Koh · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is imperfectly written but it has the charm, as Charles Simic said of his earlier poetry, of awkwardness. The introduction written by Laura E. Franey outlines the collaborative process between Yone Noguchi and his editors in writing the book, the diary's critique of turn-of-the-century Japonisme, and Morning Glory's performance of authenticity and identity. The Afterword by Edward Marx surveys the book's reception and afterlife in the USA and Japan. It suggests usefully the different genres in which the diary may be placed: women's confessional diaries popular in the late 19th century in Europe and the USA; Japanese diary literature, or nikki bungaku, whose roots reach all the way back to The Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon; the New Japanese Novel; Asian American literature; American trickster tales; and queer literature. The notes to the text are full and enlightening.

My favorite bits:

"Japan teaches nothing but simplicity. Simplicity is the philosophy of art." (62)

"I thought that Americans buy things because they love to buy, not because they have to buy." (62)

"Meriken jin [Americans] has to study the high art of concealing." (62)

"Every book was without finger-marks. Book without finger-mark is like bread without brown crust. Dear finger-mark!" (65)

"[Morning Glory to her uncle] "I'm a poet already. The poet without poem is greater, don't you know?" (91)

"[Morning Glory to Mr. Heine] The best poems are those not published. The very best are those not written." (99)

I think I've discovered in Yone Noguchi yet another of my American predecessors, in addition to Auden and Gunn.

[Karl · Rating 2 out of 5]

Simply awful... Where to even begin? The most aggravating part is the broken English. How could anybody enjoy that? I could not tell if this was done on purpose or if the author simply couldn’t do any better. If on purpose, why? Why would a Japanese woman dedicate her diary to the empress of Japan, but then write it completely in a language she cannot write in? Ok, the real audience was the American public, so perhaps the broken English would help to convey the fact this is a foreigner’s view of the world. But then why inject a bunch of Japanese words into the text without any explanation? Did casual 1900 American readers know what “bikkurishita!” means? I doubt it. Was America called “Amerikey” in 1900? Probably not. So why include this in a written diary for an American audience? (Note: I did not read an annotated version of this book, so maybe this is all explained in other editions.) It was all just completely non-sensical and this nonsense continued throughout.

But even ignoring this, the Japanese girl in question was pretty annoying in general. Or how she writes, I should clarify. She doesn’t write a single interesting thing throughout the story. Or rather, she makes a bunch of individual observations that could be interesting if they were tied together into some sort of coherent whole. On one day she might comment about spittoons, the next about the loss of some personal object, the next about how she wishes she had curly hair, etc. It is just a bunch of thoughts, none of them particularly deep, that ultimately add up to nothing. Perhaps that is the nature of a diary, so not specific to this book, but it’s tiring nonetheless. And although the character is indeed “vivacious” (as other reviews have said), this vivaciousness doesn’t lead anywhere either. There is no growth to the character, for example, just the same voice every day endlessly commenting about X, Y, Z. After 30 pages, it all becomes a bit stale quite quickly. Mercifully it is all over after 126 pages. Perhaps reading just a few pages each day would make it a better read? Then the lack of continuity between the days becomes less of an issue...

[Stephen Kelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm surprised so few people here enjoyed this. I found the prose transportive and the main character's voice absolutely captivating. Her saucy, noncommittal love letters to the almost invisible Oscar Ellis--as part of a romantic subplot that never actually goes anywhere--are some of the most charming things I can remember reading. I wouldn't have imagined myself ever typing such a thing, but here we are.

Oscar San!
I am afraid that you are too amiable.
What you have to do for your next missive is to collect every kind of dreadful adjectives from your dictionary, and throw them in.
You know what to do when I get angry, don't you?
Ellis San!
You are too handsome.
I am fond of a comely face as anybody else.
But I fancy often how it would be if I fell in love with a deformity.
People would laugh at me doubtless. But how dramatic it would be when I proclaimed, "Because I love him!"
What a romantic phrase that is!
Can't you deform yourself?
Sayonara,
With a thousand bows,
M.G.
P.S.--My letter never finishes without a P.S.
Isn't that awful?
My uncle asked me whom I was corresponding with. I mentioned "Olive."
Old man is jealous always.
So you got to counterfeit your sister's penmanship for your envelope.

How do you all not love this? Instead of a climax, this book has several pages of her writing in the voice of a scholarly widowed squirrel. I want this girl to be my new best friend.

P.S. Yone Noguchi is also my new dead literary crush. Impossibly handsome.

[Marie-Therese · Rating 3 out of 5]

While Noguchi's little novel is hardly great art, I found this, the first novel written by a Japanese individual living in the United States, surprisingly interesting as both an important historical document and a sprightly chronicle of a most-opinionated and vivacious young woman touring turn-of-the-century San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago and New York. The annotations and editorial content are immensely helpful and informative and added a great deal to my enjoyment.

[Librarian Jessie (BibliophileRoses) · Rating 3 out of 5]

An informative and interesting novel to say the least. I felt as conflicted as others did on how to properly rate this novel. As I both enjoyed it, but found the writing to be difficult (I would argue this is the issue of the editors more so than anyone else).

[Sevda Erdoğan · Rating 5 out of 5]

BİR JAPON KIZININ AMERİKA GÜNLÜĞÜ
Yone NOGUCHİ


“Sonsuz çay ve çörekleriyle, festival fenerleriyle sevgili şehrim, yağmurun gri örtüsünün arasından bana bakıyordu.
Sanki Tokyo bana veda ediyor gibiydi.
Sayanora! Canım şehrim!
İyi geceler memleketim!

Henüz on sekiz yaşında olan Gündüzsefası adlı genç kızın Japonya’dan Amerika’ya gidebilmek için çıktığı kıtalararası yolculuğunu okuyoruz kitabımızda. 1899 yılının Eylül ayının son günlerine doğru, Amerika’ya olan yolculuğunun öncesinde yani okyanusa açılmadan bizde Gündüzsefası’nın günlüğünü okumaya başlıyoruz. 1884 yılında Amerika’daki Yale Üniversitesi’nden mezun olup Nippon Maden Şirketi’nin baş sekreterliğini yapmaya başlayan amcasının bir senelik izninde onunla birlikte Amerika’ya gidiyor Gündüzsefası. Henüz Japonya’dan ayrılmadan önce kaleme aldığı günlüğünde seyahat hazırlıklarından ve ülkesindeki son günlerinden bahsediyor samimi ve içten duygularıyla. Buharlı gemi ile okyanusa açıldıklarında, okyanusta yaşadıklarını, başına gelenleride günlüğüne yazmaya devam ediyor ve San Francisco’ya vardıklarında da bir süre otelde kalıyorlar. Artık Gündüzsefası’nın Amerika’daki günleri ve hayatı başlamıştır. Yeni arkadaşlıklar ve çevre edindikçe onları Japon kültürüylede tanıştırır. Çalışma hayatı, yaşadığı romantik aşk, amcasıyla farklı şehirleri gezmesini bizlerde günlüğünde okudukça Gündüzsefası’nın yolculuğunda ona yol arkadaşı oluyoruz.
O yılların Amerikasını genç bir Japon kızın bakış açısıyla okurken, kendi kültüründen, ülkesinden kıtalararası yolculuk yaparak yabancı bir ülkede yaşadıklarına şahit oluyoruz.
Uzun zaman sonra sayfalar arasındaki resimleri ile renklendirilmiş bir günlük okumuş olmak benim için çok keyifliydi.
İngilizce ve Japonca olarak yazılmış eserleriyle edebiyata yön veren ve yaşadığı dönemde etkili bir yazar olan Yone Noguchi’nin kalemiyle #BirJaponKızınınAmerikaGünlüğü ile tanışmak benim için çok özeldi. Japon edebiyatına ilgi duyanlar ve türü sevenler için kesinlikle TAVSİYEMdir.
Syf: 204

[Isabella · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yone wrote her book to show her travels around America with her Uncle. In this book, she also mentions her encounters with sexism, racism, and beauty standards. I also really liked her take on beauty standards. At first, Yone was constantly comparing herself to others and wishing that she could change herself to fit the American standard of beauty at the time, though after some time she realizes that she is beautiful in a different and equal way. Seeing Yone make this realization was an interesting journey and it really shows how emotionally intelligent that she is. Since coming to a place of self-love and acceptance is a hard thing to do especially at age 18. There are also a bunch of other interesting and fun things in this book. So I recommend checking this out if any of this sounded interesting.

[Brett Swanson · Rating 1 out of 5]

I really couldn't get into this book. The main character was almost completely unrelatable to me. She was extremely superficial, flighty, and at times just outright annoying. If not for this being required reading, I likely would have stopped reading after the first few pages. Some may find worth in this book (my professor obviously did), but I felt no connection to it whatsoever.

[Tim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting in some ways, e.g., word choice and clever phrases here and there. But not that good of a read

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don’t fully know what to make of this one. On the one hand, it was an interesting look at the world of America at the turn of the century but at the same time I didn’t enjoy it as much as I thought I would do, or at least I wasn’t as interested in it as I thought I would be.

I understand that the “diary” is meant to be an observation of this new country through the eyes of a foreigner but there were many instances of almost casual racism, that surprised me, they seemed so modern and out of place but at the same time, I know that those sentiments have existed for a very long time.

It was also painfully obvious in places that this was written by a man. I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone, either American or Japanese, that’s as obsessed with their looks as Miss Morning Glory is.

[Jannice Newson · Rating 2 out of 5]

Unfortunately, I did not like this book. It was often confusing to follow and left my mind drifting while reading. Her life was not interesting enough to warrant turning this diary into a book. Also, (yes I am aware of the time period), but I was still thrown off when she casual injected being disgusted by encountering Black people in the US. I did find it funny to see how much she hated Chicago even with only being there for a few days.

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

Marx and Franey do their best in good intros and annotations to the best that Noguchi could do at cross-dressing in prose less purple than what followed.

[Konfuza · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting but not enjoyable.

[Karen Hensley · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am crushed to find out this is fiction! 4 stars when I read it thinking it was true, like Anne Frank's diary. Still a lovely stroll to read.

[Chiaramoodreads · Rating 3 out of 5]

🇮🇹/🇬🇧

Diario Americano di una Ragazza Giapponese aveva attirato la mia attenzione perché è il primo libro scritto in inglese da un autore giapponese, nonché da alcuni considerato anche il primo libro queer asioamericano. Ringrazio perciò elliotedizioni per avermi dato la possibilità di leggerlo inviandomi una copia.

In questo romanzo, l’autore Yone Noguchi si cala nei panni della protagonista femminile Asagao e dà voce alla sua reale esperienza da emigrato giapponese negli USA attraverso i pensieri che la giovane scrive nel suo diario.

Il personaggio di Asagao, detta anche Miss Morning Glory, ci da modo di dare uno sguardo alla sua esperienza in America, durante la quale ci vengono mostrate alcune differenze tra la cultura americana e quella giapponese, sia nel modo di pensare sia nei valori e nei comportamenti. Nel corso della sua visita negli Stati Uniti, la protagonista si trova ad affrontare stereotipi e pregiudizi nei confronti delle persone asiatiche; allo stesso tempo però, lei stessa sembra perpetuare pregiudizi e stereotipi nei confronti di altre persone, e spesso si dimostra un po’ troppo frivola e superficiale.

La lettura di questo libro si è rivelata meno accattivante di quanto mi aspettassi, nonostante abbia apprezzato gli spunti di riflessione interessanti provocati dalle considerazioni irriverenti di Morning Glory.
Rimane però indiscusso il valore di questa opera che, dopo essere stata pubblicata anche nel paese natale di Noguchi, di fatto fece da ponte tra la cultura americana e quella giapponese.
…
American Diary of a Japanese Girl had caught my attention because it is the first book written in English by a Japanese author and is considered by some to be the first queer Asian-american book.

In this novel, the author Yone Noguchi steps into the shoes of Asagao, the female protagonist, and through the young woman’s diary he gives voice to his life experience as a Japanese who immigrated to the US.

Asagao’s character, also called Miss Morning Glory, let us take a look at her stay in the United States and shows us the differences between American and Japanese culture, in the ways of thinking, in their values and behaviours. During her visit in the US, the protagonist has to face stereotypes and prejudices towards Asian people; at the same time though, she herself seems to do the same thing to others and often proves to be a little too frivolous and shallow.

This book has turned out to be less captivating than what I had imagined, despite Morning Glory’s irreverent remarks providing some food for thought. The value of this work remains undeniable because, after being published in Noguchi’s native country, it basically bridged the gap between American and Japanese cultures.

[Stephen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I seriously have no idea what do with this book. Maybe someone out there on good reads can enlighten me!

[didi · Rating 3 out of 5]

If my picture is so precious, I advise you to alter it to ashes. You will take two spoonfuls of the ashes every morning. I am sure, then, your soul will be saved.