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    Polite Lies: On Being a Woman Caught Between Cultures
    Unavailable
    Polite Lies: On Being a Woman Caught Between Cultures
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    Polite Lies: On Being a Woman Caught Between Cultures
    Ebook258 pages4 hours

    Polite Lies: On Being a Woman Caught Between Cultures

    By Kyoko Mori

    4/5

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    About this ebook

    Twelve essays by a Japanese-American writer about being caught between past and present, old country and new.

    In this powerful, exquisitely crafted book, Kyoko Mori delves into her dual heritage with a rare honesty that is both graceful and stirring. From her unhappy childhood in Japan, weighted by a troubled family and a constricting culture, to the American Midwest, where she found herself free to speak as a strong-minded independent woman, though still an outsider, Mori explores the different codes of silence, deference, and expression that govern Japanese and American women's lives: the ties that bind us to family and the lies that keep us apart; the rituals of mourning that give us the courage to accept death; the images of the body that make sex seem foreign to Japanese women and second nature to Americans. In the sensitive hands of this compelling writer, one woman's life becomes the mirror of two profoundly different societies.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMacmillan Publishers
    Release dateApr 1, 2011
    ISBN9781429934770
    Unavailable
    Polite Lies: On Being a Woman Caught Between Cultures
    Author

    Kyoko Mori

    Kyoko Mori was born and raised in Kobe, Japan and moved to the United States as a teenager. Now a professor of Creative Writing, she has published her poetry and short stories in leading magazines such as The Kenyon Review, The Apalachee Quarterly, and Beloit Poetry Journal. She is the author of two novels for young readers, One Bird and Shizuko’s Daughter, which was chosen as a Best Young Children’s Book by The New York Times. She has also written two memoirs for adults, Polite Lies and The Dream of Water.

    Read more from Kyoko Mori

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    Reviews for Polite Lies

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    • 4/5

      Oct 26, 2020

      Having escaped the public annihilation of self that she saw for the women in Kobe among whom she grew up, Kyoko Mori examines aspects of her life with contrasts and comparisons of Japanese and Midwest norms and does a complete hatched job on her father and step-mother.
    • 4/5

      Sep 8, 2020

      I found this to be a beautiful and moving, but deeply sad, book. In it, the author compares the two cultures in which she has lived. She was born in Japan and lived there as a child. At age 12, her mother committed suicide in reaction to a husband, the author's father, who had a mistress. Following her mother's death, her dad married his mistress, both of whom were abusive to the author as a teenager. At age 20, the author left for the United States and made Green Bay, Wisconsin, her permanent home. When her father died, years later, she traveled back to Japan to visit family and friends. Then returning to the United States, she felt as if she would never again return to Japan.

      That is only the back story. The author talks about various differences between Japanese and American cultures. Her reflections about both cultures are more negative toward the Japanese culture. I believe all of this is colored by her sad childhood in Japan. She realizes this and explains this in detail.

      The title of this book, Polite Lies, alludes to the situation, mostly of Japanese women, who have to be polite at all costs and never embarrass themselves or their family. This often entails a certain dishonesty to oneself and others. .
    • 3/5

      Jul 5, 2007

      I really loved this book and I am now very interested in reading Mori's fiction works. She has a great voice.