For many years, Jeanne shares Papa’s deep sense of personal shame, while feeling anger at his eccentric and volatile behavior.

While Papa holds the family together before the war, his breakdown during internment is the strongest manifestation of the family’s dissolution it also shows his inability to maintain his personal dignity in the face of public stigma and suspicion. However, Papa’s dynamic personality makes him the vibrant and exciting center of family life, especially before internment-Jeanne recalls that during her early childhood, he always knew how to throw a party, even when the family had little money. He’s vain and quick to anger, he’s “absurdly proud,” and when the experience of internment drives him to despair, he expresses his feelings by showering abuse on his family. Headstrong and impetuous, Papa immigrated from Japan determined to make his fortune, but he never quite became economically successful in America, constantly changing his career plans and shifting his family from place to place. Named one of the twentieth century's 100 best nonfiction books from west of the Rockies by the San Francisco Chronicle.Ko Wakatsuki, Jeanne’s father. Jeanne delivers a powerful first-person account that reveals her search for the meaning of Manzanar.įarewell to Manzanar has become a staple of curriculum in schools and on campuses across the country. She tells of her fear, confusion, and bewilderment as well as the dignity and great resourcefulness of people in oppressive and demeaning circumstances. In Farewell to Manzanar, Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston recalls life at Manzanar through the eyes of the child she was. For her father it was essentially the end of his life. For Jeanne Wakatsuki, a seven-year-old child, Manzanar became a way of life in which she struggled and adapted, observed and grew. One of the first families to arrive was the Wakatsukis, who were ordered to leave their fishing business in Long Beach and take with them only the belongings they could carry. Its purpose was to house thousands of Japanese American internees. The powerful true story of life in a Japanese American internment camp.ĭuring World War II the community called Manzanar was hastily created in the high mountain desert country of California, east of the Sierras.

Farewell to manzanar jeanne