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YAMANAKA, Lois-Ann, Wild Meat and the Bully Burgers. New York, NY: Harcourt Brace and CompanyCompany, (Farrar Straus & Giroux,19 Union Square West, New York, New York 10003), 1996. 276p., ISBN 0-15-600483-6 (pa). $12.00.
Lois-Ann Yamanaka’s first novel, Wild Meat and the Bully Burgers, is a seminal work in the category of local literature and should be on the shelves of every public and high school library if it is not there already. Set in 1970s Hilo, the story is told through a series of connected vignettes by Lovey Nariyoshi. The vignettes cover Lovey’s days at school where she has the occasional triumph, but usually feels humiliated, her hunting trips with her father, her lickens received from her mother, and much more. The tale spans Lovey’s life from approximately eight to twelve years of age and glories in her every neuroticism.
Throughout the book, Lovey wishes she could be someone else. A chapter “I Wanna Marry a Haole So I can Have a Haole Last Name” is devoted to her desire to live like a haole (white): “I want a great name. Beckenhauser. Allen. Geiger. Smith…Live in a house with Dixie cup dispensers, bunk bends with ruffled sheets, bendable straws, rose-shaped soap, Lysol, and Pez” (29). Later, Lovey also obsessively envies and hates the rich Japanese girls that make up the popular clique at school. “They all have straight, long black hair…I hate their beautiful handwriting…The tiny purses…their pink plastic folders…their glossy lips full of Kissing Smackers lipstick…I hate their mother’s convertibles…” (191). Those popular girls also hate Lovey and make fun of her family. “…you and your sista share the same stink shoes. You wear the same stink pants two days in a row or at least in the same week…You got zip gold and your clothes stay faded to the max” (195). But with the help of her best and only friend Jerry, Lovey gradually matures over the course of the novel to value herself and her family. Even though her family eats the meat her father hunts, uses the second-hand, bust-up stereo equipment her father puts together, and wears Singer pattern home-sewn clothes, Lovey realizes her loving family and one friend Jerry are all that she needs.
Yamanaka was first famous for her poetry; she burst into the literary scene with a collection of poems titled Saturday Night at the Pahala Theatre in 1993. However, since then, she has worked on prose, coming out with Wild Meat and the Bully Burgers, Blu’s Hanging (1997), Heads by Harry (1998), Name Me Nobody (2000), Father of the Four Passages (2001), and Behold the Many (2006). This focus on fiction does not mean that she has left behind the both blunt and lyrical poetic language present in Saturday Night. In Wild Meat and the Bully Burgers, Yamanaka masterfully describes detail after detail so that her readers can see and feel what Lovey is going through. Yamanaka also continues to exude the flavor of Hilo through the use of pidgin (or known as Hawaii Creole English in academia) in the dialogue. While some may object to the presence of pidgin in this work, reading just a chapter of Wild Meat would convince anyone that this pidgin is necessary to give the work authenticity.
Another objection to this work might come from the controversial events in Yamanaka’s career. Saturday Night at the Pahala Theater won the Association of Asian American Studies (AAAS) National Book Award and the Pushcart Prize. Wild Meat earned Yamanaka the Rona Jaffe Award for Women Writers. Wild Meat also almost won the AAAS Book Award. However, after the literary committee voted to give Wild Meat the 1996 Book Award, AAAS members protested her depiction of Filipino men in Saturday Night, and the AAAS decided not to give the Book Award that year. The controversy really escalated, though with the publication of Blu’s Hanging in 1997. That year, the AAAS literary committee again awarded Yamanaka the National Book Award. Letters of protest poured in, again due to Yamanaka’s portrayal of Filipino Americans, and many members wore black armbands in protest at the awards ceremony. After the ceremony, the membership voted to rescind the award.
Book buyers do not have to worry about the portrayal of Filipino men and rape in Wild Meat, however. This work, which is a rather innocent coming-of-age tale, is by far the tamest of Yamanaka’s. Saturday Night at the Pahala Theater includes poems from the point of view of a girl who is raped and cuts herself to ease her pain. Animal cruelty, rape, and incest are a few of the sensitive subjects in Blu’s Hanging. While the young adult novel Name Me Nobody contains a scene of an attempted rape. Middle school librarians might want to preview this book before purchasing though because of the presence of sexual content and a suicide towards the end of the book.
Lois-Ann Yamanaka’s first novel, Wild Meat and the Bully Burgers, is a seminal work in the category of local literature and should be on the shelves of every public and high school library if it is not there already. Set in 1970s Hilo, the story is told through a series of connected vignettes by Lovey Nariyoshi. The vignettes cover Lovey’s days at school where she has the occasional triumph, but usually feels humiliated, her hunting trips with her father, her lickens received from her mother, and much more. The tale spans Lovey’s life from approximately eight to twelve years of age and glories in her every neuroticism.
Throughout the book, Lovey wishes she could be someone else. A chapter “I Wanna Marry a Haole So I can Have a Haole Last Name” is devoted to her desire to live like a haole (white): “I want a great name. Beckenhauser. Allen. Geiger. Smith…Live in a house with Dixie cup dispensers, bunk bends with ruffled sheets, bendable straws, rose-shaped soap, Lysol, and Pez” (29). Later, Lovey also obsessively envies and hates the rich Japanese girls that make up the popular clique at school. “They all have straight, long black hair…I hate their beautiful handwriting…The tiny purses…their pink plastic folders…their glossy lips full of Kissing Smackers lipstick…I hate their mother’s convertibles…” (191). Those popular girls also hate Lovey and make fun of her family. “…you and your sista share the same stink shoes. You wear the same stink pants two days in a row or at least in the same week…You got zip gold and your clothes stay faded to the max” (195). But with the help of her best and only friend Jerry, Lovey gradually matures over the course of the novel to value herself and her family. Even though her family eats the meat her father hunts, uses the second-hand, bust-up stereo equipment her father puts together, and wears Singer pattern home-sewn clothes, Lovey realizes her loving family and one friend Jerry are all that she needs.
Yamanaka was first famous for her poetry; she burst into the literary scene with a collection of poems titled Saturday Night at the Pahala Theatre in 1993. However, since then, she has worked on prose, coming out with Wild Meat and the Bully Burgers, Blu’s Hanging (1997), Heads by Harry (1998), Name Me Nobody (2000), Father of the Four Passages (2001), and Behold the Many (2006). This focus on fiction does not mean that she has left behind the both blunt and lyrical poetic language present in Saturday Night. In Wild Meat and the Bully Burgers, Yamanaka masterfully describes detail after detail so that her readers can see and feel what Lovey is going through. Yamanaka also continues to exude the flavor of Hilo through the use of pidgin (or known as Hawaii Creole English in academia) in the dialogue. While some may object to the presence of pidgin in this work, reading just a chapter of Wild Meat would convince anyone that this pidgin is necessary to give the work authenticity.
Another objection to this work might come from the controversial events in Yamanaka’s career. Saturday Night at the Pahala Theater won the Association of Asian American Studies (AAAS) National Book Award and the Pushcart Prize. Wild Meat earned Yamanaka the Rona Jaffe Award for Women Writers. Wild Meat also almost won the AAAS Book Award. However, after the literary committee voted to give Wild Meat the 1996 Book Award, AAAS members protested her depiction of Filipino men in Saturday Night, and the AAAS decided not to give the Book Award that year. The controversy really escalated, though with the publication of Blu’s Hanging in 1997. That year, the AAAS literary committee again awarded Yamanaka the National Book Award. Letters of protest poured in, again due to Yamanaka’s portrayal of Filipino Americans, and many members wore black armbands in protest at the awards ceremony. After the ceremony, the membership voted to rescind the award.
Book buyers do not have to worry about the portrayal of Filipino men and rape in Wild Meat, however. This work, which is a rather innocent coming-of-age tale, is by far the tamest of Yamanaka’s. Saturday Night at the Pahala Theater includes poems from the point of view of a girl who is raped and cuts herself to ease her pain. Animal cruelty, rape, and incest are a few of the sensitive subjects in Blu’s Hanging. While the young adult novel Name Me Nobody contains a scene of an attempted rape. Middle school librarians might want to preview this book before purchasing though because of the presence of sexual content and a suicide towards the end of the book.
Submitted in May 2007 by Gail Kuroda, LIS student, University of Hawaii at Manoa.
