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In the Woods of Memory

Shun Medoruma,

Takuma Sminkey (Translation),

Kyle Ikeda (Foreword)

4.31 · Rating details · 67 ratings · 15 reviews

“Generally regarded as Okinawa's most adventurous and promising writer of fiction today.”—Michael S. Molasky, University of Minnesota

In the Woods of Memory is a powerful, thought-provoking novel that focuses on two incidents during the Battle of Okinawa, 1945: the sexual assault on Sayoko, 17, by four US soldiers and her friend Seiji’s attempt at revenge. Narrations throug ...more

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Paperback, 208 pages

Published June 13th 2017 by Stone Bridge Press

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Jun 11, 2017 Kusaimamekirai rated it it was amazing

Shelves: fiction-japan

Before I say anything else about this book, I want to preface my remarks by saying that this is majestic and profoundly moving writing at its very best. I honestly cannot recall the last piece work of fiction that shook me up as much as this one did.
This is the story of a 17 year old girl named Sayoko who lives in a remote fishing village on the Northern Okinawa coast during the waning days of the Battle of Okinawa in 1945. While the fighting has ended in the North by this time, there remains Before I say anything else about this book, I want to preface my remarks by saying that this is majestic and profoundly moving writing at its very best. I honestly cannot recall the last piece work of fiction that shook me up as much as this one did.
This is the story of a 17 year old girl named Sayoko who lives in a remote fishing village on the Northern Okinawa coast during the waning days of the Battle of Okinawa in 1945. While the fighting has ended in the North by this time, there remains a large American military presence left behind who radiate a creeping and sinister sense of dread amongst the villagers. One day, four of them take a short swim over to the shore where Sayoko, her sister, and some other girls are collecting shellfish. The Americans attack Sayoko, pull her into the woods, and rape her.
As the reader, we don't experience what happens through Sayoko's eyes (in this chapter and all subsequent ones she is given no voice) but rather through the eyes of her friends who hear the screams from the woods. It is a truly terrifying and brutal chapter to read.
What follows is how the ramifications of this event reverberate in both the present and distant futures across both gender and generational lines as well as how it even profoundly effects people who had no direct involvement. The author uses different narrative voices such as Sayoko's sisters in past and present, a boy who tried to avenge Sayoko's honour, the village headman who betrays that boy in order to protect himself, as well as a junior high school girl in 2005 who finds herself to be an intricate part of this web of memory.
At its heart this story is indeed about memory. Some choose to not remember, some wish they could forget, however they all are bound up in each other's story.
Finally, I need to say that on a personal level, reading this was like a punch in the stomach. The portrayal of the memories and raw wounds of these characters is so vivid that I found myself feeling almost physically ill at times reading about them. The author doesn't shy away from getting you as close to these people as possible and as hard as that was at times, he seems to be saying that much like with the characters in this story, true healing and understanding cannot begin if we succumb to the temptation to look away. ...more

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Apr 04, 2017 Patrick McCoy rated it it was amazing

Shelves: japanese-literature

Reading Shun Medoruma’s masterwork, In The Woods Of Memory (2017) translated by Takuma Sminkey, was something of a revelation- like a shot from the dark as Stone Bridge Press continues to publish important and relevant Japanese titles that have been overlooked by other publishing houses. Medoruma’s masterwork is about the reverberations of two incidents that took place during the Battle of Okinawa and their ripples through time that affect people’s lives 60 years later. The first incident is the Reading Shun Medoruma’s masterwork, In The Woods Of Memory (2017) translated by Takuma Sminkey, was something of a revelation- like a shot from the dark as Stone Bridge Press continues to publish important and relevant Japanese titles that have been overlooked by other publishing houses. Medoruma’s masterwork is about the reverberations of two incidents that took place during the Battle of Okinawa and their ripples through time that affect people’s lives 60 years later. The first incident is the rape of a young Okinawan woman by four American soldiers and the subsequent act is a young man’s attempt to get revenge on the Americans for the rape. The powerful story that addresses the impact and legacy of WWII in Okinawa, which is still home to a large number of American military bases, is also notable for Medoruma’s experimental narrative style that sets it apart from most contemporary novels.

The story is told through a series of different points of view from eight different characters including two Americans. Two chapters are from characters points of view in 1945, the rest take place 60 years later in 2005. In Sminkey’s informative preface, he discusses the challenges that this novel presented for a translator in terms of the experimental use of narrative techniques such as mixing of voices, lack of pronouns, avoidance of using quotes to denote speech, and use of the Okinawan language. The later issue, use of an Okinawan language, was specifically a difficult issue. The dialect depicted in the novel is a spoken language that Medoruma has rendered in the original with a Japanese gloss so that readers can seemingly “hear” the language even though the average standard Japanese speaker would not understand the language. As a result, Sminkey has chosen to avoid this issue since it was impossible to recreate the complexity of these sections of the novel accurately. This is most notable in the section narrated by Seiji, the young man seeking revenge, which was from 1945. This section has a complex mixed narrative that begins in the present, and moves into the past seemingly along with hallucinations before returning to the present. There is also a section narrated from Seiji in 2005. Notably absent from the novel is a chapter narrated by Sayoko, the girl who was raped and suffered the most in the novel.

In the preface, Sminkey points out the several parallels of actual events in Okinawa that reverberate throughout the novel which itself is based on a true story. Medoruma has stated that the central incident of the rape was based on a story he heard from his mother that took place on a small island, Yagaji Island, in the north part of Okinawa Island as war raged on fiercely in the south. One significant parallel is the 1995 incident where three American servicemen raped an elementary student. In addition, there is also a parallel with the 1945 Katusyama incident where some villagers killed three US Marines in retaliation for the repeated rapes of women from their village.

The afterword by Kyle Ikeda discuses Medoruma’s literary career and output. It seems that several of his most well-known stories, including the Akutagawa Prize winning story “Droplets”-a short story that was acclaimed for the use of magic realism and literary sophistication, have been translated into English. However, Medoruma has not published a novel since The Woods of Memory, which was published as book in 2009. However, there are two unpublished critically acclaimed novels, Fuon: The Crying Wind (2004) and Niji no tori (Rainbow Bird, 2006) that will hopefully find translation and publication in English in the near future. Ikeda explains that the recent lack of production reflects Medoruma’s current role as a protester to the American presence in Okinawa. Most recently, in April of 2016, he was detained for paddling his canoe into a restricted area near a construction site. ...more

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May 04, 2019 Miriam rated it it was amazing

Shelves: japan, read-in-2019

An extremely important piece of literature that uncovers the truth about the war from the viewpoint of Okinawan people. A very sad truth...

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Apr 07, 2018 Deschain rated it it was amazing

Wow
A really really, well written book.
There havent been many books recently which touched me as much as this book.
The Story is about a rape that happend during the second world war on Okinawa, and stretches about two timelines, one in 1945 and one in 2005. The story is written out of different perspectives and makes the whole situation feel even more real.
All in all an artfull masterwork, which is thought provoking and gets you on a emotional ride inside the heads of war victims.

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Oct 29, 2017 Linda rated it really liked it

Shelves: asian, historical-fiction, japan, world-war-ii, literary

Yes, this book is an emotionally difficult read, but the effects of war and its aftermath are never pretty. History favors the victors, but here we get a look at the other side of the story, that of the enemy’s conquered people. Medoruma begins a series of perspectives with a little girl witnessing the vicious gang rape of a 17-year-old girl by American soldiers (based on a true story and also reminiscent of a little girl’s gang rape in 1995) in northern Okinawa, while southern Okinawa is still ...more

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Nov 30, 2020 Evelīna Romanova rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Apr 11, 2020 Helen B rated it really liked it

THIS. Is a beautiful book. The language is simple in an authentic way, despite the translation. The sentences are exactly what they need to be, though from what I understand a lot is lost concerning the dynamics between Japanese/ English/ Ryukyuan language in the translation. This is important historically and I would argue essential for post-colonial literature. It is also disturbing (t/w sexual violence and war***). The symbols are interesting, creative, and untired. The characters break from ...more

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May 27, 2018 Stephen Douglas Rowland rated it really liked it

Grueling, powerful, and effective. Some chapters brought tears to my eyes.

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Jun 04, 2019 Eric Hinkle rated it it was amazing

Absolutely brilliant, although it's tragic that this book has to exist. Harrowing, heartbreaking novel, but it never becomes manipulative under Medoruma's masterful pen. ...more

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Mar 14, 2017 Ben Arzate rated it it was amazing

Shelves: books-i-own

Full Review

Shun Medoruma's In the Woods of Memory is a powerful, thought-provoking exploration not just of the effects of war, but of how the aftermath of all tragedy ripples from the people it directly affects to the people around them. Even though it loses some things in translation, it remains an engaging story with each chapter having a distinctive voice. I highly recommend this novel and I hope it will bring Medomura to a wider English audience. ...more

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Nov 06, 2017 World Literature Today added it

Shelves: reviewed

"Decades pass by in the novel, but for readers, the century turns in a matter of pages, leaving the event as fresh and tender in their minds as it remains for the characters themselves." - Reid Bartholomew

This book was reviewed in the Nov/Dec 2017 issue of World Literature Today magazine. Read the full review by visiting our website:

https://www.worldliteraturetoday.org/... ...more

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Feb 07, 2018 Charlie rated it it was amazing

Speechless. Best book I’ve read in a long time.

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Apr 11, 2020 Victor Galov rated it really liked it

An excellent novel portraying a complex and nuanced Okinawa and post-war Japan, focused around violence, trauma, memory and recollection of the battle of Okinawa, and how it affected a small Japanese village, and in particular two of the young Okinawan's living there.

This book mixes academia-level discourse around violence and oppression with a cutting narrative with beautiful prose.

I highly recommend this novel to anyone interested in Japanese history, particularly during World War II. It has ...more

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Jan 01, 2019 Teresa Wang rated it it was amazing

Shelves: its-apa-lit

This book was absolutely breathtaking. One of my favorites of 2018. While it does get gruesome and hard to read, Medoruma writes about the painful truth of American military occupation in Okinawa and the damaging effects of colonialism on Okinawans for generations to come.

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