When the Emperor Was Divine

Written by Julie Otsuka

Narrated by Elaina Erika Davis

Julie Otsuka’s commanding debut novel paints a portrait of the Japanese internment camps unlike any we have ever seen. With crystalline intensity and precision, Otsuka uses a single family to evoke the deracination—both physical and emotional—of a generation of Japanese Americans. In five chapters, each flawlessly executed from a different point of view—the mother receiving the order to evacuate; the daughter on the long train ride to the camp; the son in the desert encampment; the family’s return to their home; and the bitter release of the father after more than four years in captivity—she has created a small tour de force, a novel of unrelenting economy and suppressed emotion. Spare, intimate, arrestingly understated, When the Emperor Was Divine is a haunting evocation of a family in wartime and an unmistakably resonant lesson for our times. It heralds the arrival of a singularly gifted new novelist.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Penguin Random House Audio Publishing Group
• Release date: Oct 14, 2003
• ISBN: 9780739307922

Reviews for When the Emperor Was Divine

[word.owl · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This is a well-trod subject for me, but I have fresh tears of anger, sorrow, and bitterness for it every time.

The book, with its numerous hard-hitting details, speaks for itself.

R. I. P., White Dog. We barely knew ye.

[deltaqueen50 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

When the Emperor was Divine by Julie Otsuka tells the story of the internment of a Japanese-American family during World War II. The author based her story on her own family history and has created a small gem of a story, with her careful yet precise prose which highlights the unjust treatment of a people whose only crime was to look different.

When the book opens, the father of the family has already been arrested and sent to a camp in New Mexico. Now it has been decided to round up all Japanese-Americans and we follow the mother, her daughter and son as they are sent to the Topaz Camp in Utah. The author captures the confusion and lack of understanding that the characters experienced. One day they were American citizens, accepted members of the community, but overnight they become aliens that are untrustworthy and dangerous. For almost three years they live in a camp in the desert never knowing when or even if they would ever return to their home in California.

While the topic of When the Emperor was Divine is emotional and heartbreaking, the author chooses to tell the story simply without embellishment resulting in a haunting evocation and, without pointing any fingers, this book becomes a lesson for us all. This subtle, lyrical story shines a light on a difficult period in history and although short packs quite the punch.

[patl_53 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I try to make a point to read from authors who come from a different space than I do in order to learn broadly. Julie Otsuka’s memoir/novel about her San Francisco – based family’s relocation to the Japanese internment camps during World War II was brilliant. It’s told through a few periods of time and from the perspective of an adolescent experiencing this relocation, and told from her family’s history. It’s not in-your-face political challenge, but it’s a powerful story because it is true and real.

[bell7_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

California, 1942 - a woman and her son and daughter are evacuated from their home and brought to an internment camp. Their experiences, in a series of descriptive impressions and memories, follow them through the war years and returning home afterward.

This short novel packs a powerful punch. Otsuka is deliberate in every detail of her craft, from the images she evokes to what she leaves out or only mentions in passing, to the shifts in points of view. The lack of characters' names distances them, yet at the same time, presents an almost universal example of what the experience was like for a family. And that example is so heartbreaking, cringe-inducing, all the more powerful for the spare writing style. It makes for a very uncomfortable reading experience - which is, of course, precisely what it's meant to be. I can't fault Otsuka for flawlessly executing the story she set out to write. I admire it, but I don't like it.

[katiekrug · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A short, beautifully written novella about one Japanese-American family's experience during World War II and the internment camps. The narrative switches between the two children and their mother, and the final segment is in the father's voice. He has been a mostly absent figure in the story, as he was removed from their home right after Pearl Harbor and treated as an enemy alien. His short "confession" at the end is incredibly powerful.

The lovely, spare prose stands in stark contrast to the disgraceful story it tells. Nicely narrated by Elaina Erika Davis.

[rdra1962 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Another short, beautifully written book. The book is narrated by each of the members of this family sent to Japanese interment camps. Very spare writing, a quick but moving read. The author manages to convey so much with few, carefully curated words.

[jimrgill · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

While Otsuka’s book tells a story, has a plot, features complex characters, and evokes universal themes, I’m hesitant to call it a novel. It’s really more of a prose poem. When a mere 144 pages of words can evoke such powerful feelings through imagery and symbolism, the novel rises to the level of poetry.

The story of Otsuka’s unnamed Japanese-American family is told from multiple perspectives. The first part is told from the mother’s limited third-person point of view; soon after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the mother, her son, and her daughter are notified that they will be relocated from Berkeley, California to an internment camp. The second section, seen through the daughter’s eyes, relates the family’s train journey to a camp in Utah after their brief stay at Tanforan, a former horse stable that’s now a shopping mall. The son provides the lens for the novel’s third section, which describes the family’s daily life in camp. Upon returning home in the fourth section, a first-person narrator (it’s unclear whether the narrator is the son or the daughter) tells of the family’s permanent sense of unease and the lasting emotional damage their 3+ years in custody has wrought. Even after the father returns (he had been apprehended by authorities before the family’s relocation) and the family is reunited, they are still incomplete—forever marred by their oppression. The father narrates the brief but potent final section of the novel, entitled “Confession.”

Set in the 1940s and written in 2002, Otsuka’s novel is—regrettably—impossibly timely, considering this year’s (2018) separation of immigrant families at the border. Few novels resonate this strongly with the past and with the future, showing us how little progress we have made on the scale of humanity and kindness.

[catzkc · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A deep and haunting account of the Japanese-Americans during WWII and their experiences in the internment camps.

[empress8411 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This story centers on a Japanese-American family and starts the day the notices went up, ordering all Americans of Japanese descent to report for Internment. Told from different points of view, mother, father, brother, sister, each placing a portion of the story into place, giving the reader an all-encompassing view of the emotions, the sorrow, the endurance, the loss, which these people suffered. It’s heartbreaking. Some, like the father, never recover. Some, like the children, have their life irrevocably altered, leaving behind whoever they might have been and becoming someone else. And some, like the mother, simple accept what comes, without complaint, like a rock at the edge of the sea. Otsuka’s prose, simple and evocative, create images that do not easily leave the mind. One can almost taste the dust of the camp, feel the biting wind, and smell the desert. A must-read, particularly in today’s social and political climate.

[joannemonck · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

A wonderfully written account of the Japanese camps during WW II. The boy's father is sent to a different camp. The story is told basically by a young boy who spends three years in a camp with his mother and sister to only come home to a ruined house and people who hated his family. Their ordeal in the camp is harrowing but if they were left in their house is could have been worse because of the hatred around them for the Japanese. You decide which would have been better.

[mirrani_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This story needs to be told more often than it is. Japanese internment is an issue that is close to my family, as my grandfather served in the army during the Korean war and was living in Japan. My mother tells us stories about how she heard of these camps, but how everyone forgot about them, which people should never do. Our knowing what happened to Japanese Americans was very important to her and this book tells the story beautifully. It is short, but it is touching in so many ways. A must read for its beautiful writing style and important historical significance. Readers might even be able to feel a little of what it was like to have lived this experience.

[bnbookgirl · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Love, love, love this book. A sparingly written story about the Japanese internment camps of WWII. This book is very short but it packs a big story with it's brilliant use of words. I was especially touched by the last chapter. The book starts out with the mom reading the evacuation order stapled up all over town. I can't imagine having my life ripped out from under me. How would one endear such circumstances? Each family member tells a part of the story from their point of view. Anyone who is interested in WWII should read this book. This would be a great book club selection, the conversation topics are unlimited.

[olivermagnus · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

It is spring of 1942, in the early days of WWII. Evacuation orders for over 100,000 Japanese Americans living on the West Coast have been posted. Japanese Americans who’ve done nothing wrong, whose only crime is their ancestry, are suddenly enemy aliens and ordered to leave their homes to reside in internment camps far away. The first chapter is told from the mother’s perspective. Her husband was taken away one night for “questioning” and now she is making painful choices and preparations for the rest of the family to leave their home in California. The next chapter is from the perspective of the eleven year old daughter, on the train and then later on a bus toward their destination in Utah. The next two chapters are told by the eight year old boy during the family’s time at camp and are filled with a kids view of the heat, the hunger, the boredom, the cramped quarters, the barbed wire and the armed guards.

I thought the author did a great job of bringing the reader into the story with her short and matter of fact chapters. The simplicity with which the story is told turned out to be a very moving historical fiction look at one of America's most shameful moments.

[pattymclpn · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is the story of one Japanese family in California after the outbreak of World War II. The father is snatched away one night. Then a couple of days later the mother and the two children are sent to a holding area in a stable and then on to Utah to an internment camp. This is a testament to a shameful period in our U.S. history. I certainly did not learn about this in my history classes. This is something that should be acknowledged and discussed. We are given no character names, but yet we come to know the characters well in the story. We learn of the poor treatment and the poor conditions that these people were forced to endure as Japanese-American citizens. These people were good hard-working every day people who were now held suspect.

I found this to be well written. Since it is short and thought provoking it would be great for book clubs. It is fast paced and moves right along. Great book for a U.S. history class, because it is easy to follow and understand. How would you feel if you were taken away from your family, friends, home and possessions for years to return home to nothing? That had to be devastating and painful both emotionally and financially. Giving them 25 dollars a person does not make up for the shame, loss of respect and poor treatment that they endured!! I give this book a 4 out of 5 stars.

[timbazzett · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

WHEN THE EMPEROR WAS DIVINE, by Julie Otsuka, is a starkly evocative look at the way Japanese-American citizens were treated - or, perhaps more accurately, MIStreated - during the Second World War. Camp Topaz, in the Utah Desert, was just one of many internment, or 'relocation,' centers where whole families were kept locked up behind barbed wire fences with armed watchtowers surrounding them. Such internment camps have often been compared to concentration camps, but I'm not sure that's a fair comparison. Nevertheless, a whole group of Americans were rounded up, dispossessed and imprisoned for 3-4 years simply because of their ethnic heritage.

Otsuka's novel is perhaps even more effective because her protagonists - four members of one family - are never named. They are simply, the mother, the father, the boy and the girl. The unnamed family members could be any Japanese-American family of that time. The father is spirited away in the night; the rest of the family is given only a few days to pack their suitcases and leave their homes, transported first to processing centers - in stables - and then to a desolate desert camp in Utah. The psychological, physical and emotional effects of this callous uprooting are devastating. Otsuka's eye for detail and ear for dialogue are simply superb. Her novel is a microcosmic look at what happened to tens of thousands of families across the western U.S.

I was immediately reminded of the excellent YA classic, FAREWELL TO MANZANAR, which I read many years ago, one of many books about the relocation camps. But Otsuka's WHEN THE EMPEROR WAS DIVINE is especially stunning and unique in its multiple and anonymous points of view. This is an outstanding fictional look at a shameful episode in our country's history. Highly recommended.

[stretch_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The internment of Japanese immigrants and Japanese-American citizens during World War II is a disturbing chapter in American History, that doesn't receive much attention. Thousands of ethnic Japanese citizens and families were stripped of their freedom, homes, businesses, and sense of security overnight. Limited to what they could carry in a single suitcase, they were ushered from homes to temporary living facilities in horse stalls to their final destinations, tent cities in the harsh, remote desert regions of our country. If that wasn't shameful enough the government forced everyone to take loyalty tests, which if answered honestly could result in separation or deportation. They lost everything they had built before the war and during the war they lost their dignity. For their trouble each person was given a train ticket home and $25.00 (the same package given to convicted felons upon release) with which to start their lives over again. And yet their really isn't much written about this period.

When the Emperor was Divine is the story of one family as they struggle to prepare, adjust to live within the camp, and come home from a internment camp in the Utah desert. The story is told from the perspective of members of the family in alternating chapters. The first chapter is told from the mother's point of view as they are forced to prepare for the evacuation. The fear of the unknown and the struggle to maintain their pride is palpable. The second chapter is told by the daughter as they travel to their new home, and dealing with their loss sense of identity. The third chapter is from the young son's perspective as they adjust and learn to live within the camp. The final chapter is told from either a more mature son's perspective or a combination of both the boy and girls voices telling of a once proud father, who is now just a broken paranoid shell and a family struggling to put their life together in a world they are now very unfamiliar to the world they left.

Each chapter is unique and distinct. Normally a story told like this can be choppy, but here they flow together with no harsh transitions. This book is unrelentingly depressing and dark. The family makes the best of their situation, but they are clearly broken and they are never too far from crumbling under the stress. The only thing holding them together are their bonds. Hope is in short supply.

The only real problem with this book is that it is far too short. The four chapters only cover the first few months of the war and the aftermath for this one family. It's not enough to explore the entirity of the effects of forced relocation on the family. This book calls for a much more in depth exploration of internment. But really this is only a minor defect of a well written book, that I'm glad I was able to snipe off the wishlist.

[honkcronk · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This book is so short is can be easily read on a long car ride. If you take it, plan to not want to be interrupted by stops or scenery.

It is a book that is "historical fiction" but mirrors what happened to thousands (? not sure of the numbers) of Japanese Americans in US and Canada. Yes, Canada has internment camps for the possible traitors.

I loved this story and would like to reread this another time.

[jmoncton_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Incredibly powerful story about the interment of Japanese citizens in the US during WW II.

[marzia22_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This spare novel is emotionally charged and brought me to tears at the end.

[samchan_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This was my introduction to Julie Otsuka and it was amazing. As your average reader, I can’t figure out how Otsuka was able to tell such an evocative story in such a slim novel, using such (deceptively) simple language. I usually fall hard for novels that are maximalist to the hilt—crammed full of characters, sights, sounds, tangential stories, postmodern tricks and winks. The more flowery and complex the sentences are, the more likely I’ll love it. When the Emperor was Divine is a far cry from that kind of book.

It’s a quiet story that nonetheless packs an emotional punch. I didn’t realize that I was holding my breath (figuratively speaking) until the last chapter, when we heard from the father. In a NYTimes review, Michiko Kakutani said that this last chapter marred what was an excellent novel, but I totally disagree. All the throughout the book, but most poignantly after they return to their house, the protagonists have to walk on eggshells, keep their heads lowered, don’t cause trouble, don’t make eye contact. That last chapter is the opposite of the preceding chapters—it’s not quiet at all. Yet this change wasn’t jarring; it actually provided a cathartic release.

I didn’t even actively seek out this book even though I was aware that Otsuka was well-respected. It was on sale for a ridiculous price at the bookstore, so I just picked it up on a whim and then let it sit on my shelf. The story of that disturbing period in American history when Japanese Americans were held in internment camps didn’t hold any allure for me. I ended up reading it because I needed a quick read as a palate cleanser to a huge chunkster that I’d just finished. I’m so glad I did, because finding five-star reads is so hard for this picky reader.

[occassionalread · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A short novel told mostly from the perspective of a young boy of 8 but also his older sister and mother. All remain nameless (perhaps reflecting the anonymity with which they were regarded by the U.S. government - just a number). The story chronicles the last days of freedom of a Japanese-American family, the mother's and children's internment in a camp in Utah for 3 years during work War II (the father was taken away by the FBI the day Pearl Harbor was bombed and sent to a prison in Texas) and the eventual reunification of the family at war's end. All of this unfolds gently, sadly, indirectly, through childlike perceptions and observations and dialogue. The final chapter, Confessions, is an angry and poignant denouement told from the father's point of view that stands in stark contrast to the mother's resignation and the book's overall tone. This book covers a shameful chapter of American history in which fear and ignorance caused the State to strip its citizens of rights, property and dignity. Published a year after 911 it's a stark and timely warning to us all of the continuing poison of prejudice (now directed more at Muslim-Americans) and the precariousness of the freedoms we hold dear.

[bonnieconnelly · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

wonderful writing - simple, but moving story

[yarkan_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Interesting how she doesn't name the characters. The woman, the girl, the boy, the man. Perhaps because it refers to so many. Theirs is not a unique story. So disturbing. Interesting how they came back. I wonder if that is harder in a way. But it must be better to at least have a house. But let's not compare. They had armed guards and someone got shot. And the desert rather than the mountains. And the complexity of Japan being involved.

[jolleyg_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

One of the best books about the internment of the Japanese in the US during World War II.

[lmhtwb · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

When the Emperor was Divine traces the experiences of a fictional Japanese American family through their relocation in internment camps during World War 2. The father had already been taken away for questioning when the story begins. The mother, son, and daughter then are sent to a camp in Utah and held for the duration of the war. After the war ends, they are then allowed to return home and wait for the father's return.

The writing in this novel is superb. In some areas, the details are minimal yet the feelings are strongly evoked. This book is like a Japanese rock garden -- minimum is maximum.

I did not like the very end and it would be hard to explain without ruining the story for others. Let me just say, I didn't think the tone fit with the story.

Overall, this is a powerful and disturbing book about prejudice and hate. The emotions evoked are not easy to deal with, but being challenged is a wonderful thing at times.

[clara53_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I was prompted to read this debut novel by Julie Otsuka after reading her second book "Buddha in the Attic" which had amazed me by its boldness and honesty. The two books are of the similar theme, that of the treatment of people of Japanese origin in US during the Second World War. "When the Emperor was Divine" is a fine novel as well, and touched me by its profound sadness, disappointment, and helplessness on the part of the main characters, but was less of a triumph, as far as writing, in my view, compared to "Buddha in the Attic" - except, I would say, for the last chapter called "Confession", which caused goose bums on my skin, as I was reading it. We need to know these things - thanks to the writer for bringing it to our attention with such clarity and skill.

[chrystal_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I read this immediately following Unbroken. This short, vivid story tells of a American Japanese family that was moved to the camps. An interesting point of view after reading about the Americans living in the Japanese POW camps.

[cameling_2 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

After Pearl Harbor was attacked by the Japanese in WWII, thousands of American Japanese were arrested and held for questioning or made to board up their businesses and homes, taking only what they can carry and put on trains which took them to internment camps set up around the country.

The author concentrates on the lives of 1 American Japanese family during this period. The father, a successful businessman, was taken away in his bathrobe and slippers one night after men knocked on the door of their family home. He writes cheerful letters to his children and wife, not letting on what tortures and questionings he was subjected to. Months later, his family are made to board a train that would take them to an internment camp in the desert with other American Japanese.

This slim volume is told through separate narratives by the wife, their teenage daughter and their young son. The stark narratives provide intense poignancy into their physical and emotional stress, not only during the period leading up to and during their 4 year confinement, but also to what they had to endure when they returned to their home without so much as an apology from the government and with merely $25 with which to restart their abruptly disrupted lives.

Some lives were irretrievably damaged while others found hidden strengths to overcome the trials in their paths.

[julie10reads · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Several years ago I enjoyed reading Obasan by Joy Kogawa, a novel about the wartime internment of Japanese-Canadians living on the West coast. I was shocked to read how well-educated and refined people were robbed of their rights, livelihoods and independence and assigned hard manual labour in rough places such as beet farms and abandoned mining towns. Poetic and political, Obasan is imbued with Japanese culture.
As short as Obasan is long, When the Emperor Was Divine, tells a similar tale, this time about Japanese-Americans in California. A family of four is irrevocably harmed by government acts which send the father to prison (he is arrested in his robe and slippers, a detail the son can never forget) and mother, son and daughter to an internment camp in Nevada where they freeze in the winter,roast in the summer and starve year round for three years. Ms Otsuka writes sparely, staccato dialogue bare of inflection, almost like a short story where less is more and you find scant exposition. Yet it sounded to me as poetic as the long lines of Ms Kogawa.

I think Julie Otsuka’s purpose was not to expose the racist/xenophobic soul of the average American. I think she meant to show how, given the right circumstances, the average person could turn on/turn in their neighbour. The family in this book could be any family; Otsuka describes little about them that would brand them as Japanese. The father, in particular, speaks in slang and clichés that make him sound like Bob Hope. Their neighbours watch from front windows or porches as the father is pushed into a car and taken away, and later watch the rest of the family lock up their home and walk to the train station where they will be escorted by military personnel to their internment camp.

I’ll be honest: I don’t understand the significance of the title. This family was like any American family. If they could be betrayed by the government (their government) and by the people around them, Ms Otsuka seems to be saying that it could happen to any of us.

[jcmontgomery · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Eloquent novelization of a tragic time in history. At times I felt I was reading not a narrative, but a poem. Yet it doesn't detract from the power of the story. If you loved Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, you'll love this.