Taiwan the betrayed lover, Taiwan the neglected son, Taiwan the objectified sex toy these are among the literary identities explored in this engaging and original study by Wu Chia-rong (吳家榮).
Perhaps the most resonant metaphor is the hearing-impaired mechanic Saburo, from Wu Ming-yi’s (吳明益) novel Routes in the Dream. Having served in the Japanese navy in World War II, Saburo suffers partial hearing loss in a bombing raid, after which his life is “plagued by miscommunication with his own family and the outside world.” Saburo can thus be seen to represent Taiwan itself riven by internal social division