Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Obasan, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Race, Identity, and Citizenship
History and Memory
Speech vs. Silence
Selflessness and Decorum
Summary
Analysis
While the Nakanes are at the Barker farm, they receive no word from Mother. Father sends a few letters, informing them that Grandpa Nakane has died and that Father himself has been unable to recover from an operation. They hear from Father for the last time in 1949, and the family sinks into a numb depression. At school, Stephen and Naomi’s white classmates pick on them. They and the other Japanese students shorten and anglicize their names. Stephen gets permission to practice the piano in the auditorium, and his musical skill earns the admiration of all of Granton when he wins a radio show two years in a row. Naomi’s teachers compare her unfavorably to her talented brother.
After years of turmoil, the Nakanes become desensitized to their own suffering, numbly accepting it as the new normal. Stephen’s attempts to distance himself from Japanese culture reach a new level as he successfully ingratiates himself to the white people of Granton. This precarious acceptance demands constant excellence from Stephen, and Naomi can’t live up to the expectations he sets.
Themes
