Taiwan Travelogue by Yáng Shuāng-zǐMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
"Even though I cannot open my heart, the feelings that I hold within this shuttered heart are, nonetheless, real."
Sometimes we meet people and possible futures open up, giving joy at imagining despite knowing it could never be.
This theme of longing for the unreachable sang through my first read from this year's International Booker Prize long list. It really should come with a warning on the cover: Only read while eating.
Our protagonist is a Japanese writer on a year-long visit to Taiwan in 1938, back when it was still Formosa and under Japanese colonial rule, as part of Nihon's Southern Expansion Policy.
She finds more than friendship in her female translator, and forms an attachment so strong and yet, on paper, so pure. Their affinity, however, is marred by a nameless tension hinted at in early chapters, then culminates in a reveal that shows how powerful historical/cultural forces can be in both shaping identities and tearing kindred spirits apart.
What I initially thought would be a food-filled travelogue turned out to be a meaty investigation of colonialism's many layers.
Not only will this whet your appetite for Taiwan's cuisine (there is a banquet scene that will linger in memory, filling the reader with phantom sensations of dining on crispy duck, bamboo shoots and pork belly, and dumplings filled with everything from diced winter melon to fried shallots and cilantro) and her many temples and trains, but it will also remind you of people who cross your path for a very short time, yet forever change your soul.
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