Possibilities for Recovery and Healing in the Diasporic Novels Chang-rae Lee’s A Gesture Life and Nora Okja Keller’s Comfort Woman

Abstract

This paper analyzes two diasporic novels, A Gesture Life by Chang-rae Lee and Comfort Woman by Nora Okja Keller, focusing on their exploration of historical truth, personal identity, and the possibility of healing. It examines how these novels address the narratives of Korean diaspora immigrants and former Japanese military comfort women in order to rewrite violently erased or silenced truths in history. It argues that both novels depict the struggle of protagonists and authors to overcome trauma and find the true meaning of survival by bearing witness to historical blanks. The article underscores the potency of collective public memory and mourning through reader participation. Finally, this paper highlights the role of re-memory and literary testimonies (or translations thereof) to the historical voids performed by these two Korean diaspora novels, and considers the possibilities for recovery and healing.