52 pages • 1 hour read
David GutersonSnow Falling on Cedars
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1994A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
Justice and Truth Seeking
Content Warning: This guide references violence, combat, and racial prejudice.
The mystery over the precise cause of Carl Heine’s death sets the novel’s plot in motion. Because there is ample evidence to support both the claim that Heine was murdered and the defense’s assertion that his death was accidental, the truth is difficult to discern. Several characters become focused on studying the clues on the boat and on the body of Heine, hopeful that an objective truth will be revealed. Obscuring the truth, however, is the prejudice against Japanese Americans that lingers from the war. Some citizens presume Kabuo is guilty of Carl Heine’s death simply because Kabuo is Japanese—this hatred is something jurors must set aside if justice is to prevail in the trial. Indeed, the imprisonment of the Japanese Americans just a few years prior echoes here: Though the US government had little to no cause to imprison the families of Kabuo and Hatsue, it asserted that their ethnicity was just cause, insisting that their Japanese ethnicity would automatically make them loyal to the enemies. In this way, the novel reveals the way human fault and bias can stand in the way of justice.
Justice is at the root of the conflict over the seven acres of land. Etta Heine is certain that it is within her right to sell the strawberry farm to Ole Jurgensen outright. She denies that the Miyamotos have any claim to the land, as the final two payments were not made due to the family being interred. The truth, however, proves less black and white when it is revealed that her husband refused to accept the final payments from Kabuo’s father, assuring him that he would honor the claim after the war. For this reason, Kabuo regards the seven acres as rightfully belonging to him.
Ishmael Chambers plays a vital role in this theme. As a journalist, the foundation of his job is to seek out the truth in order to inform others. He recalls the way in which his father, though it was hugely unpopular, defended the local Japanese Americans who fought for the Allies during the war. Ishmael struggles to do the same, torn by Hatsue’s repeated requests for him to print the truth of Kabuo’s innocence in the newspaper. It is not until Ishmael’s conscience wins out and he presents the Coast Guard report to Hatsue’s family and Judge Fielding that he is then able to fulfill Hatsue’s request by publishing an article that exonerates Kabuo.
Racism and Enemies
Central to the novel’s conflict is the prejudiced feelings and institutional racism that impact the Japanese Americans during World War II. Importantly, with the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the Japanese community of Amity Harbor is instantly aware of the threat posed to their personal liberties. As immigrants, they are harshly judged and immediately presumed to be aligned with the US’s enemy, Japan. Even those who are natural-born citizens—such as Hatsue and Kabuo’s generation—are subject to racial hatred and ill treatment. Indeed, such violations begin swiftly, as the Miyamoto family home is searched and items illegally confiscated in the name of national security. Though Hatsue’s father, Hisao, and other Japanese men have made no threats against the United States—indeed, Hisao voices his loyalty when agents arrive to search his home—they are presumed guilty merely because of their ethnicity. The forced imprisonment of these families at Manzanar is the ultimate evidence of the racism motivating the government’s actions.
That people in Japan—and, by association, Japanese Americans—are the enemies of the United States and the values it stands for is a biased idea that quickly becomes ingrained in some US citizens. This is true for Carl Heine, who fights against Japanese soldiers in active combat. Though he has had friends who are Japanese, he returns from war tainted by prejudices that he did not possess prior to war. The belief that anyone of Japanese descent is an enemy—and therefore dangerous and harmful—becomes deeply instilled in Carl. When Kabuo approaches him to purchase the seven acres of strawberry farm, Carl has difficulty regarding Kabuo as his childhood acquaintance and not an enemy who desires to harm or cheat him. He is aware of these prejudices, yet he cannot overcome them until moments before his death.
It is an institutional prejudice, then, that leads to Kabuo being arrested and then tried for a murder he did not commit. Throughout the trial, many citizens presume Kabuo’s guilt, not because of any physical evidence, but because of the ill beliefs toward Japanese people that have been instilled in them. Such prejudices remain despite the fact that the war is over and that Kabuo and his family have made meaningful contributions to Amity Harbor, always displaying good citizenship. Etta Heine is a strong example of such racism. Her knowledge of Kabuo’s wish to purchase the seven acres—coupled with her deep-seated racism—makes for an unshakeable conviction that Kabuo is solely responsible for her son’s death. Other characters, such as defense attorney Nels Gudmundsson and Ishmael’s mother, recognize the damaging effects of these racial biases.
Parental Expectations and Family Legacy
This theme impacts all of the novel’s key characters, though in different ways. Hatsue, for instance, though she cares for Ishmael, refuses to enter into a relationship with him because she understands the cultural belief that forbids it because Ishmael is white. She knows from a young age that her parents expect her to marry a man of Japanese descent and go on to maintain the cultural practices of their heritage. She fulfills this expectation despite the sadness it may cause her at times.
Kabuo Miyamoto displays this theme in a variety of ways. His dedication to cultural practices, such as learning kendo, displays his commitment to his parents and heritage. He, like Hatsue, has been taught to value hard work and honesty—traits that are displayed to Kabuo by his father’s farming of the strawberry fields. Before his father is interred, he seeks out Mr. Heine to pay off the debt for the land. This demonstrates the importance of commitment and responsibility for the Japanese Americans in the text. Kabuo’s father prides himself on being able to one day hand over the seven acres of farm to his offspring. For this reason, Kabuo views the seven acres as part of his family legacy, maintaining that he must secure its ownership as a sign of respect to his father. The seven acres is not merely a business venture to Kabuo, but representative of the hard work of his father and the contributions of Japanese people to the community at large. It is Kabuo’s sense of duty to his family that contributes to the novel’s central conflict as his presumed motive for murder.
Ishmael Chambers, too, is shaped by his parents’ desires for his life. This is initially evident in the mark that his father, Arthur Chambers, has made on Amity Harbor through his establishment of the newspaper. Arthur grows to be highly respected by the town’s citizens, largely for the way in which he aids in the town’s growth, but also because of his kind and caring personality. Ishmael struggles with this legacy, initially desiring to move away from Amity Harbor, but ending up carrying on his father’s job as a reporter as a last resort. The novel suggests Ishmael feels inadequate, unable to measure up to his father, who was so well loved and well respected by the community. In time, however, Ishmael uses the newspaper much as his father did, to speak truth and promote equality and justice.
