Tinker Bell 55, March 2010.
Constructing a New Community of Chronotope
in Park’s A Single Shard
Yoshida, Junko
I Introduction
The Korean-American author, Linda Sue Park, has published eight novels, four of which are historical novels set in Korea: Seesaw Girl (1999), The Kite Fighters (2000), A Single Shard (2001), and When My Name Was Keoko (2004). Interestingly, Park’s more recent novels, set in the U.S., continue to depict her protagonists’ Korean ethnic identity1. Therefore, it is possible to say that all of her works are keenly interested in dealing with Korean history and culture. Particularly, the Newbery award-winning novel, A Single Shard, set in twelfth-century Korea during the Koryo Dynasty, depicts how a twelve-year-old orphaned boy, Tree-ear, forms his own community in relation to his quest for identity. The boy’s fascination with celadon ware eventually leads him to establish a relationship with master potter Min and his wife, from whom he gains a new identity as their adopted son and a career as a potter as well. The question now arises: what has made Park deal with Korean material for American readers?
Applying the theoretical framework of displacement to this coming-of-age story, I examine how the Korean-American author, herself the daughter of immigrants, depicts the displaced protagonist who emerges along with twelfth-century Korea and finds his own place. As Angelika Bammer defines, displacement here refers to “the separation of people from their native culture, either through physical dislocation (as refugees, immigrants, migrants, exiles, or expatriates) or the colonizing imposition of a foreign culture” (xi).
In his discussion of Asians in the Americas, Robert G. Lee proposes that we broaden the concept of displacement and apply it even to our understanding of the Asian immigrant experience in the Americas, not just that of refugees. Lee writes:
In addition to considering immigrants, refugees, and exiles as displaced peoples, the displacement framework incorporates existing groups that are usually neglected in diaspora studies: migrant workers; expatriates who, by choice and by occupation, live in a different culture; as well as externally or internally colonized peoples. (11)
Focusing on the displacement of the protagonist in A Single Shard, as well as considering the question of why Park deals with Korean ethnicity in almost all of her works, I examine how the author constructs a new community for the boy and herself in a specific Korean “time-space,” or Mikhail Bakhtin’s chronotope 2.
II Tree-ear’s Displacement and His Han
Let us start with the protagonist’s name, Tree-ear. Park writes that Tree-ear is a good name for an orphan because it “[grows] in wrinkled half-circles on dead or fallen tree trunks, emerging from the rotten wood without benefit of parent seed” (A Single Shard 7). After his parents in Songdo, the capital of Korea during the Koryo Dynasty, die of fever he is taken to his uncle in a far-off seaside pottery village, Ch’ulpo. Unfortunately, the man who takes the boy to the village finds the uncle’s abandoned house but not the uncle. In this sense, the boy at the age of two is completely cut off from his blood relations and his parental heritage including culture and profession. Eventually, Crane-man, a physically handicapped homeless old man who lives under a bridge, takes the boy into custody. Under the care of this surrogate father, Tree-ear learns to “read the world” while surviving on the meager food they scavenge (7).
Like many Korean stories, the novel depicts the protagonist’s han, typical Korean sentiment. In his discussion of Korean culture, Lee O-Young writes:
Han . . . refers to a lump of feelings that has settled and accumulated within oneself. . . . After a failure to achieve something despite her/his own desire or ability, s/he comes to conceive han. It is unfulfilled hope and an unrealized dream. . . . Han is sorrow, whereas spite is rage. . . . One can relinquish or “loosen” han only by realizing his/her hindered dream and starting his/her life in a desirable new world. (267-71, translation is mine)3.
In other words, the novel depicts the protagonist’s regrets about or aspiration for things that are lacking in his present life.
In the novel, Crane-man’s old age and his physical handicap let the reader foresee that Tree-ear’s life will be difficult and unstable. Soon enough, after Crane-man’s death, Tree-ear will have to find or create an alternative place for himself where he can be at ease. Therefore, Tree-ear’s han is to secure a new community of his own. Crane-man, who is concerned about the boy’s future, disciplines and educates him through moral lessons and teachings about how to read the world.
It is worth referring to potter Min’s han, which resonates with that of Tree-ear. Perfectionist Min’s work is renowned not only for its consummate skill and beauty, but also for the fact that each item is very expensive and takes a long time to make. Thus, his insistence on perfection has lost him many well-paid commissions. Therefore, his last hope is to gain a royal commission. Park writes:
Beyond all else, what Min needed was a royal commission. The everyday vessels for the King’s household. . . . A royal commission was the dream of all potters, but Tree-ear sensed somehow that it was more than a dream for Min. It was his life’s desire. (A Single Shard 46-47)
Although Tree-ear has wanted badly to gain his place for the future, he has no actual knowledge of how to work with his han. Through his encounter with Min and the potter’s aspiration for the royal commission, the boy gains the incentive for the concrete goal of producing his dream vase, as follows:
The flame of hope that burned in him was smaller now, but no less bright or fierce, and he tended it almost daily with visions of the pot he would make. It would be a prunus vase––the most elegant of all the shapes . . . . ––to display a single branch of flowering plum. (52)
In other words, stimulated by Min’s han Tree-ear comes to conceive his own dream of making the most beautiful celadon vase, which eventually helps the boy work off, or “loosen” his han.
III A Matrix of the Boy’s Identity Formation
In the history of Korean Confucianism, there were heated debates about whether the human mind is based on ri (理, principle) or ki (氣, physical force). These debates took place between the two major schools of Confucianism: those who supported Yi Hwan’s (T’oegye’s) philosophy of ri and those who supported Yi I’s (Yulgok’s) philosophy of ki (Kang 284, Chung 32). The contrasting worldviews are reflected in Ogura Kizo’s more simplified explanation of typically Korean human relationships. He maintains, “In the world of ri people are difficult, obstinate, methodical, strict and unpermissive, whereas in the world of ki they are generous, open-minded, irresponsible, careless, warmhearted and permissive” (Kankokuwa ikkono tetsugakudearu 51, translation is mine). Furthermore, according to Ogura, the two types coexist complementarily in Korean society, letting individuals switch from one to the other depending on circumstances (Kankokujinno shikumi 79) 4.
We can see the two types of typically Korean human relationships in the process of Tree-ear’s identity formation. The first type is represented in the relationship between potter Min and Tree-ear. The second type is represented in the relationship between Crane-man and Tree-ear, as well as the one between Min’s wife and Tree-ear.
Tree-ear’s relationship with Min starts when he compensates for the damage he has caused to Min’s work. Min treats Tree-ear mercilessly and forces him to hack up firewood, making him work from daybreak to sunset. Later, even after the compensation period is over, the boy continues to work for the potter without payment or formal training.
In contrast, Tree-ear’s relationship with Crane-man is affectionate and caring. When the boy comes back exhausted and with blisters on his hands, the old man feeds him and tends his wounds with a paste made from herbs he has gathered (A Single Shard 22-23, 26). In addition, he comforts the boy by telling him bed-time-stories: “The stories were a much-needed distraction; after listening to Crane-man’s voice for a while, Tree-ear was able to relax and fall into a dream sleep” (80). As Tree-ear calls the old man “friend,” their friendly father-son relationship is unusual in Confucian Korean society, but would be generally acceptable to today’s American children.
Similarly the relationship between Tree-ear and Min’s wife represents the second type of human relationship. Complementing her stern and gruff husband, she treats the boy kindly and generously, feeding him lunch and providing him with warm clothes. Switching between the first type of human relationship to the second one, Tree-ear advances into the world and constructs his own place.
IV A Journey to Becoming
The highlight of the novel comes when Tree-ear sets out on his long and perilous journey with a mission to deliver Min’s works to the King’s court. Min’s dream of acquiring the royal commission entirely depends upon Tree-ear’s success in handing the works to the court. Halfway to the capital, Tree-ear visits a famous cliff in the old capital of the Paekche Kingdom, the “Rock of the Falling Flowers,” from which, according to legend, all the court women courageously jumped one after another, like falling flowers, escaping from a charging enemy. Unfortunately, bandits attack Tree-ear and throw all of Min’s celadon vases off the cliff. Hearing the crash of pottery, Tree-ear regrets his failure and thinks of leaping off the cliff, but he stops himself when he remembers Crane-man’s words, “Leaping into death is not the only way to show true courage” (126).
At this critical moment, Tree-ear learns the true meaning of courage and responsibility: he must journey on to the King’s court even if with only a single shard of the shattered celadon vase with its glaze still clear and pure enough to prove Min’s fine skill and show it to Emissary Kim who is in charge of the royal commission. Consequently, the emissary recognizes that Min’s skill has produced the “radiance of jade and clarity of water” (138) in the shard, and he assigns Min the commission.
Tree-ear’s success in winning the royal commission for Min eventually enables him to acquire his new home and identity as Min’s adopted son and apprentice potter. He comes back to the village to learn that his surrogate father, Crane-man, has been killed in an accident, but he also learns that Min and his wife have given him a new name, Hyung-pil, which shares a syllable with that of their deceased son, Hyung-gu. Tree-ear thinks, “It was an honor bestowed on siblings. No longer would Tree-ear go by the name of an orphan” (147). Thus, the protagonist as Hyung-pil gains a new community and starts his career as an apprentice potter.
Tree-ear’s journey presents the reader with an image of a person in the process of becoming. Toward the end of the novel, Tree-ear envisages himself as a full-fledged potter working on a plum celadon vase. Park writes: “How long would it be before he had skill enough to create a design worthy of such a vase? One hill, one valley . . . One day at a time, he would journey through the years until he came upon the perfect design” (148).
The novel shows us that the protagonist’s dream or han results in one of the most prized Korean cultural treasures, the “Thousand Cranes Vase,” as Park writes at the end of the novel:
The vase’s most remarkable feature is its intricate inlay work. Each of the forty-six round medallions is formed by a white outer ring and a black inner ring. Within every circle, carved and then inlaid with great skill, there is a crane in graceful flight. Clouds drift between the medallions, with more cranes soaring among the clouds. And the glaze is a delicate shade of grayish green. (148)
Figure 1 is the “Thousand Cranes Vase” that inspired Park’s novel.
Figure 1. The “Thousand Cranes” in the Possession
of the Kansong Museum of Art in Seoul, Korea.
The maker of the vase is in fact unknown, as Park writes in her “Author’s Note,” but the reader is to assume that Tree-ear as Hyung-pil has finally achieved his dream of producing the finest celadon vase, inheriting Min’s intricate inlay technique and portraying Crane-man as the thousand cranes flying in the sky. The vase symbolizes the protagonist’s maturity as a potter. To put it another way, it is a celebration of the displaced Tree-ear’s finally gaining his place in society.
V The Significance of Chronotope in Bildungsroman
In his discussion of Bildungsroman, Bakhtin argues that there is a realistic type of novel that depicts “an image of man in the process of becoming” (Speech Genres 21). He writes: “In it man’s individual emergence is inseparably linked to historical emergence. Man’s emergence is accomplished in real historical time, with all of its necessity, its fullness, its future, and its profoundly chronotopic nature” (23). Since the protagonist’s becoming is depicted in relation to a particular historical time and place, it is no longer his own private matter. As Bakhtin says, “He emerges along with the world and he reflects the historical emergence of the world itself. . . . The image of the emerging man begins to surmount its private nature . . .” (23-24).
Viewed in this light, the single shard and the “Thousand Cranes Vase” in Park’s novel introduces the reader into twelfth-century Korean “time-space,” or Bakhtin’s chronotope, where Tree-ear’s becoming is aesthetically visualized in relation to its temporal and spatial world (Dialogic Imagination 84; Speech Genres 23). Since his emergence is vitally concerned with the production of one of the most prized Korean cultural objects, acquisition of his new community is not only his private affair, but also signifies the historical emergence of the world: creating the color of Korean celadon ceramics as one of the twelve small wonders of the world (A Single Shard 44). In other words, the celadon vase signifies a specific chronotope where the history of producing the Korean treasure was made.
VI In-between Spaces
Let us return to the question of why Park’s works all deal with Korean culture and history. As Park explains in her essay, her parents migrated to the U.S. in the 1950s as part of a small wave of Korean immigrants who were mostly from the elite classes and did their best to assimilate into the American way of life (“Staying on Past Canal Street” 832). According to sociologist Moon H. Jo, the Korean immigrants who migrated to the United States between 1950 and 1965 are referred to as the “second wave” (6) of Korean immigrants, among whom were non-immigrant Koreans who consisted of students, temporary visitors, business men. An estimated 5,000 of the immigrants remained in the U.S. after their graduation from universities, and many of them became professionals in academia or in American corporations. This shows how well they have assimilated into American society, and they are often regarded as the Korean intellectual elite of this period (11-12).
Park says in an interview with Sharon M. Cindrich, “Like many immigrants of that time period, the mentality was to be more American than the Americans. . . . I grew up feeling very much all-American and yet knowing that others didn’t see me that way” (“Finding Her Roots” 24). And from her experience of living in European countries as an adult, she learned “people there have difficulty with the idea of Asians as Americans” (“Staying on Past Canal Street” 832). Thus, she came to tackle the problem of ethnic identity as though it were “a beast with two heads.” First, Asians are not generally recognized as Americans. Second, the images of Asian-Americans are sadly limited, and different ethnic backgrounds are not distinguished (832).
In order to make up for her own lack of Korean heritage, she did a great deal of research on Korean history and culture before writing the novel. She says in another interview, “I came across several references to the fact that in the 11th and 12th centuries, Korean pottery was considered the finest in the world. I liked that––the idea of a little tiny country being the best at something” (Writer’s Digest 11 Feb. 2008). Generally speaking, culture forms the core of one’s ethnic identity, especially when it includes ethnic pride.
In his book Location of Culture, Homi K. Bhabha maintains that in today’s postcolonial new world order, the concept of human community in the western metropole is radically revisioned because postcolonial history told by its influx of immigrants and refugees is internalized into its national identity as a native narrative (6). As a consequence, by writing their history/story hyphenated Americans such as Korean-Americans contribute to revisioning the concept of community. In other words, hyphenated American writers more often than not survive their displaced situations by creating the “in-between” spaces. Bhabha further writes:
It is the trope of our times to locate the question of culture in the realm of the beyond. . . . These “in-between” spaces provide the terrain for elaborating strategies of selfhood –singular or communal –that initiate new signs of identity, and innovative sites of collaboration, and contestation, in the act of defining the idea of society itself. (1-2)
As a Korean-American writer, Park creates the “in-between” and chronotopic community of medieval Korea where the protagonist establishes his identity. She refers to this action as “making connection”:
Making connections has always been the most important element of story to me. Connections to another time and place and to my own ethnic background in historical fiction; connections to a character within the text; connections to people around us because of a text. (“Newbery Medal Acceptance” 381)
Thus, Park’s creation of the “in-between place” in her novel connects the reader, the protagonist, and herself.
VII Conclusion
I have examined how Park, as the daughter of Korean immigrants, creates a new place for the displaced protagonist, Tree-ear, in her coming-of-age novel. First, he acquires his new community propelled by his han, or characteristically Korean sentiment about the ideal that one lacks in one’s present life. Second, he establishes his subjectivity through the discourse of two types of typically Confucian human relationships: the relationship of principle and that of physical force. Then, Park invites the reader to join this Korean community through the metaphor of the celadon vase that symbolizes her ethnic pride. In this sense, the protagonist’s acquisition of his own place and his maturity is no longer his own private affair but signifies the historical emergence of the world itself. In other words, Korean-American Park has adeptly created the “in-between place” where American readers can find connections between the protagonist and themselves, and thus Park succeeds in expanding the boundaries of the American Young Adult novel.
[This article is based on the presentation given at the 19th Biennial Congress of International Research Society for Children’s Literature held in Frankfurt, Germany, on August 9th, 2009.]
Notes
1. Park explains about her novels set in the U.S.: “Our ethnicity is assumed to be our only valid subject, when like all writers, we have countless interests. At the same time, it is impossible to write a story about an Asian character set in the contemporary U.S. without addressing the question of ethnicity” ( “Staying on Past Canal Street” 833).
2. Bakhtin explains about chronotope as follows: “We will give the name chronotope (literally, “time space”) to the intrinsic connectedness of temporal and spatial relationships that are artistically expressed in literature. . . . In the literary artistic chronotope, spatial and temporal indicators are fused into one carefully thought-out, concrete whole. Time, as it were, thickens, takes on flesh, becomes artistically visible; likewise, space becomes charged and responsive to the movements of time, plot and history. This intersection of axes and fusion of indicators characterizes the artistic chronotope” (The Dialogic Imagination 84).
3. Ogura Kizo also writes, “[Han] refers to aspiration for embodying
ideals or norms called “ri.” . . . And han is not only aspiration for ascent but also sadness, regret, pain, grudge, and resentment that the aspiration is thwarted by some disturbances” (Kankokuwa ikkono tetsugakudearu 45, translation is mine).
4. Though Ogra’s two books are written for Japanese general readers,
I consider them useful because his thoughts on Korean people and their culture are applicable to the analysis of A Single Shard.
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