White Chrysanthemum by Mary Lynn Bracht

A narrative that is equally bleak and hopeful

In White Chrysanthemum Mary Lynn Bracht sets herself an epic task; how to convey the overlooked history of women during the Japanese occupation of Korea in the 1940s. Specifically Bracht shines a light on the role of the Korean 'comfort women' who were kidnapped from their homes and families to work as sex slaves during the conflict. This is a subject steeped in politics, gender discrimination and cultural misunderstanding yet in the novel Bracht creates a narrative that explores this forgotten history in a richly human way.

The novel is based on the stories of two women. Hana is a young Haenyeo (diver) girl taken from her home on Jeju island in 1943 by a Japanese officer to work in a brothel. Emi is Hana's younger sister who escaped the same fate thanks to the sacrifice of her older sister. Now an old lady, this story is set in 2011, she reflects on the life she avoided and the sister she lost in 1943.

Hana's story is painful to read, Bracht reveals in detail the life of the Korean girls exploited for sex on a daily basis. They surrender everything in the name of the Emperor and are left with only meagre rations and left-overs and the chance to launder their clothes once a week. When one particular officer, the brutal Morimoto, proposes to escape to Manchuria with Hana she obeys only as she feels she is his captive. Hana imagines how might use her skills as a diver to survive; "She would carve out his heart as if it were a pearl tucked deep inside an oyster's flesh". In Manchuria she is left in the care of a family who are kind but Hana is inevitably unable to trust them living in permanent fear of being raped again.

In 2011, Emi travels to Seoul to stay with her son and daughter who live much removed from her own life on Jeju Island. Emi is compelled to travel in order to see a new memorial statue that has been unveiled to commemorate the sacrifice the comfort women made. In a beautifully written section Emi speaks to her children about Hana and the sacrifice she made.

Telling the story from the perspective of the two women effectively humanises the story. Both Hana and Emi represent an entire generation of women in Korea whose lives were irreparably impacted by their experiences during the occupation and Mary Lynn Bracht very adeptly conveys the story in a narrative that is equally bleak and hopeful. Read more about the significance of the colour white in Korean culture in The White Book by Han Kang.

White Chrysanthemum by Mary Lynn Bracht published by Chatto and Windus, 320 pages.     

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