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
Naomi dreams that she and a man meet another couple in a hazy, otherworldly forest. The other couple are pruning the trees, and Naomi and the man with her join the work. The man of the other couple resembles a British soldier, and he leads the group. They seem to labor endlessly, working in harmony despite lacking communication or any clear goal. A beast appears that is loyal to the man in charge, and Naomi sees that the beast is mechanical. The other woman approaches Naomi, speaking in an ancient language about a “mythical contract” between herself and the man. Uncle appears in the forest, performing a ritual dance of the dead with a red rose in his mouth. Naomi hears someone trying in vain to speak, and the man in charge, now wearing an army uniform, disappears.
Naomi’s dream is an attempt to reckon with her Canadian identity. Canada is a Commonwealth country (a former territory of the British Empire), and it retained legal ties to Great Britain even after gaining its independence. As such, the British soldier is a symbol of an imperialist governmental authority that presses Naomi into its service. The man exerts his will on the native Canadian landscape, and his mechanical beast echoes the way colonial powers forced industrialization on their colonies. Uncle’s dance of the dead brings Japanese tradition into the colonized land, and with him comes a silenced voice. The silence represents both Naomi’s gaps in understanding of her own life and the omnipresence of silence throughout that life.
Themes
Naomi wakes slowly, blurring the transition from dreaming to waking. Disoriented, she remembers that Uncle died yesterday, though it feels as if much more time has passed. She goes to the kitchen, where Obasan reveals the parcel she was looking for in the attic. Obasan is embarrassed and explains that she forgot that the parcel was already downstairs, because “everything is forgetfulness.” Naomi sees that the package is from Aunt Emily.
Obasan’s forgetfulness highlights the fragility of memory, which she emphasizes with her claim that “everything is forgetfulness.” As she grows older, she loses her connection to the past. This is a personal tragedy, but it also a societal risk: if histories are not documented, then communities lose access to those histories as they lose those who remember them.
Themes
