Anti-Japan or Becoming-Japanese: Li Yongping’s Writing on Japan in Postcolonial Taiwan

Abstract

Since the mid-1990s, Taiwanese society has gradually moved away from a nationalist critique of Japanese colonialism to positive recognition of the contribution of Japanese colonial rule to the transformation of Taiwan into a modernized society. This view is also seen in many Taiwanese literary works in the twenty-first century. To demonstrate the complexities of “Japan” found in Taiwanese society, this chapter focuses on the literary works of the Borneo writer Li Yongping (Li Yung-ping 李永平), who lived in Taiwan for more than half a century, as well as examination of the changes represented in his writing on Japan. Li Yongping was born and grew up in Borneo and moved to Taiwan in the 1960s. Due to Borneo’s history of Japanese occupation, a strong anti-Japanism sentiment can be observed in Li’s early works. However, it is intriguing that Li’s writing on Japan has transitioned into a new phase in the twenty-first century after Li settled and lived in Taiwan for more than half a century. Hence, this chapter approaches Li Yongping’s writing on Japan by applying dual perspectives of “anti-Japanism” and “becoming-Japanese” and examines the translocal intersection of colonial consciousness between Taiwan and Borneo.