Under an Imperial Sun: Japanese Colonial Literature of Taiwan and the South

1. The Genealogy of the “South”

11 1 The Genealogy of the “South” The South, referring to lands and islands to the south of Japan, was the focus of much interest in the decades following the Meiji Restoration and during the establishment of the Japanese colonial empire. The South was a land of untouched, natural beauty and untamed savages, an area where the Japanese imagination could be given free rein, a region into which the burgeoning population of Japan could expand in an Asian version of colonial empires then maintained by all the major European powers. This chapter explores this concept of the South (expressed in Japanese as nanpô 南方, nantô 南島 , nanyô 南洋, and in more literary, romanticized variants, nankoku 南国 and nankai 南海) and the role it played in Japanese colonialism in general and colonial literature in particular.1 After examining the portrayal of the South Paci¤c in early political novels and later popular media, I look at the South close to hand, in Taiwan, analyzing the portrayal of the Taiwanese aborigines in a variety of novels, short stories, popular songs, and ¤lms—especially representations of the primitive and the mission of Japanese colonialism to civilize and ultimately assimilate these “savages.” Finally, I consider two modern classics that have never been explored from the perspective of colonialism: Nakajima Atsushi’s Light, Wind, and Dreams (Hikari to kaze to yume 光と風と夢, 1942) and Hayashi Fumiko’s nostalgic Drifting Clouds (Ukigumo 浮雲, 1949); both will be shown to illuminate the symbolic meaning and impact of the South in the colonial context. 12 Writing the Empire Japan’s encounter with the (barbaric) Other can be traced in early records such as the Fudoki. With the sinocentric worldview of the Middle Kingdom as their model, the Japanese developed their own cosmology that placed Japan at the center of the civilized universe and adopted Chinese terms like “fan” 蕃 or “yi” 夷 thatcharacterized ethnic others on the margins as barbaric. In Japan’s earliest poetry collection, the Manyôshû, we already read of warriors dispatched to the distant borders to guard against the encroaching barbarians who always hover at the margins of a secure Japan. At this early stage, the barbaric was found within the borders of modern Japan, even on the main island itself. Japanese colonialism did not begin with Taiwan or Korea. Though the Ainu and Okinawans are often omitted from examinations of Japanese colonialism, Japan as a nation began its modern colonial expansion as early as the mid-nineteenth century by encroaching upon the areas inhabited by these peoples to the north and the south at approximately the same time.2 With the installation of the expansion envoy (kaitakushi 開拓使) in 1869 and the establishment of the Hokkaido Administration 北海道庁 in 1886, Hokkaido was gradually incorporated into the modern nation-state of Japan. The pace accelerated swiftly in subsequent years: full conscription of the islanders into the military (Zendô Chôheirei 全道徴兵令 ) came in 1898, the Hokkaido Indigenous People Protection Bill (Hokkaidô Dojin Hogohô 北海道土人保護 法) was passed the following year, the application of the election bill for the lower house (Shûgiin Senkyohô 衆議院選挙法) came in 1900, and in 1901 the Hokkaido Bill (Hokkaidô Kaihô 北海道会法) regularized the administration of Hokkaido on the model of other prefectural governments . By the turn of the century, Hokkaido had been fully incorporated into the territory of Japan. Natural resources were plundered and the indigenous Ainu people were forced to forsake their own language and customs under policies of forced assimilation. Meanwhile, on the southern front, the kingdom of Okinawa, though under the indirect control of the Satsuma domain since 1609, was nevertheless able to navigate a course between the Chinese and the Satsuma , surviving as a small trading kingdom. In 1871, the new Meiji government placed Okinawa under the administrative rule of Kagoshima prefecture. In the same year an Okinawan ship ran aground in Taiwan and its crew was murdered by the indigenous people. The next year, Japan granted the king of Okinawa aristocratic status and moved the royal family to Tokyo. In 1874, using the previous incident in Taiwan as an excuse, Japan sent an army to Taiwan, claiming that the inter- The Genealogy of the “South” 13 ests of Okinawa, its subject state (Nihon zokumin 日本国属民 ), had been trampled on. The con¶ict is commonly known in the West as the Taiwan Incident. (The Japanese term “Taiwan shuppei” 台湾出兵, or “Taiwan invasion,” more accurately re¶ects the military nature of the event.) Japan demanded that Okinawa sever all ties with China...