UO journalism professor and narrative nonfiction writer Lauren Kessler spoke Tuesday night at the Salem Public Library about her haunting book Stubborn Twig. You likely know by now, since this is an Oregon Reads selection, that the book tells the true story of Masuo Yasui, a Japanese man who comes to America and settles with his family in the Hood River Valley at the turn of the 19th to 20th century.
Kessler opened her presentation with a short film that sketches the narrative arc of Stubborn Twig — from Yasui’s trip on a stuffed ocean liner across the Pacific, to the raising of his nine (yikes!) children, to his success as an orchardist in the valley, to his internment as a suspected spy during World War II. Along the way, Kessler presents character portraits of his family, and in doing so, jarrs the reader’s idea of what it means to be American.
Kessler spoke extensively about the idea of Americanness in her presentation, hers being a not-so-uncommon but seldom recognized Oregon pioneer story.
But the most powerful moments of the evening came as the program drew to a close. She asked the audience to stand up and questioned how many of them were first-generation immigrants to Oregon (I sat down). Then second, then third, then fourth (at which point my friend Jan sat down). Few people remained. We are all, it would seem, immigrants of some nature.
The author spoke of her reception at a reading in Hood River just a few nights before. Hood River achieves an infamy in the book as a place especially hostile to Japanese-Americans.
“Why were we so bad?” she said one man asked poignantly.
