Frank Chin's compelling afterword to the novel No-No Boy highlights the crucial influence of John Okada's literary activities in his life as an artist Asian-American writer. In a world where words once danced on the pages of books to the tune exclusive to white authors, Okada helped create an identity for Chin and other “crime writers.” Unlike Chin, who defines his own career in terms of that of another, the novel's main character denounces his mother's vestigial part of himself and instead seeks an identity that embodies the direct antithesis of everything she represents. Before the war and his fateful decision to refuse the American draft, Ichiro Yamada turns out to be a malleable young man, a victim of the prickly impact of his zealous mother. In his hatred and desperation after a two-year prison sentence, Ichiro expels the parts of himself tainted by his mother's harsh conditioning. Aiming to rebuild his broken identity, he molds his new self against the dull and pessimistic perspective implanted in him by his mother. Ichiro's subsequent optimism and self-completion can therefore only arise from his mother's death. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Ichiro's time in prison continues to haunt him after his release, as the relentless harassment from all aspects of society only propagates his feelings of guilt and shame. As a result, Ichiro evaluates himself and questions his motives for refusing the draft in the first place. The root of the problem, he decides, lies in his mother and her suffocating presence in his life. Her extreme preservation of Japanese ideals and complete rejection of the Americanization of both herself and her family are imprinted on Ichiro from an early age. Eventually, this foreign belief system is accepted and integrated into one's identity. Therefore, the anguish inherent in being a “no-no boy” could be attributed to that part of him that did not belong to him; It was his way of saying that it made him who he was and that the thing in him that made him say no to the judge and go to prison for two years was the growth of a seed planted near the mother tree... ( Okada 11 )Despite finding a scapegoat for his deep shame, Ichiro continues to suffer because of his refusal to go to war. Even if the part of him responsible for his decision was definitely not native, it was still part of him. As a result, Ichiro begins to hate this part of his identity. He expresses this disgust in response to his mother's denial of her own madness, as he states that those who think she is mad instead envy her strength: To the hands that remained forever between them [Ichiro] kept shouting, "Not yours come on, crazy woman, my crazy mother. He grabbed his wrists and pulled them away from his face. “I'm as crazy as you. Seeing in the mirror the madness of the mother which is the madness of the son. See. See! (Okada 43) Ichiro's hatred for his mother poses a serious problem as it also causes hatred for himself. The solution for him is to dispel his mother's values ​​and beliefs and replace them with new components modeled after all the things she is not and refuses to let her son become. Until Ichiro can rebuild himself, however, he will remain with a sterile identity. Not only does he blame his mother for the emotional anguish and psychological torment he endured as a direct result of refusing to enter the draft, buthe also attributes the cavernous holes in his identity: But it's the rock that always hammers, hammers. , beating, in her discreet, determined, fanatical way, until there is nothing left to call herself... It was she who opened my mouth and made my lips move to pronounce the words that got me two years in prison and a void that is emptier and more frightening than the caverns of hell. (Okada 12) Rejecting his mother's values, and thus the source of his own self-hatred, Ichiro proceeds to the next phase of his rebirth, but not without the hardships and struggles that accompany his brashness. For years, the identity designed and imposed by his mother was the primary source of Ichiro's self-concept. After eliminating her from his life, Ichiro falls into a spiral of serious marginalization. He and other second-generation Japanese Americans, or Nisei, feel isolated both from their parents' Issei generation and from the greater American population. Ichiro cannot fill either role; he is neither Japanese nor American. Previously, Ichiro had called himself his mother's son and the mirror image of her ideals. The moment he frees himself is the moment his identity is obscured in infinite nothingness: I am only half of myself and the half that remains is American by law... But it is not enough to be American only in the eyes of the law and it's not enough to be only half American and know that it's an empty half. I am not your son, I am not Japanese and I am not American. (Okada 16) With the eradication of his mother's past influences, Ichiro successfully breaks down the remnants of his old self and prepares for the arduous process of rebuilding. His lack of identity creates emotional trauma and raises the ontological question of his place. It also provides him with a blank canvas on which he will paint his new life. Lost, without a mold in which to find form, Ichiro submits to the ever-present malevolence he feels towards his mother. His previous role as his mother's son - and the embodiment of her ideals - changes to the role of a separatist who represents the exact opposite of his narrow outlook on life. This change in definition comes to the fore when Ichiro first meets Emi and attempts to convey his identity to her in non-contemporary terms. “I ruined my life and I want to know what made me do it,” he tells her. “I'm not sick like them. I'm not crazy like mom is or your dad was. But I must have done it." (Okada 91)The gaps in Ichiro's self-definition arise from the inherent ambiguities found in descriptions of this kind. Due to the oppressive nature of his mother and his inability to develop into his own person during childhood, Ichiro has a keen sense of who he was and who he no longer wants to be. However, he lacks a clear vision of his current self. He appears unable to articulate his own personality, but rather is able to assert those attributes for which he is not. For Ichiro, defining himself in terms of negative statements is a limited and ineffective means of reconstructing his lost identity. Knowing that "he is not sick" and "he is not crazy" says little about Ichiro's character. and also creates a rather incomplete sense of self. Ironically, the death of Ichiro's mother is the only catalytic event that allows him to complete his mother's suicide. Ichiro no longer has a basis from which to ascertain what it is not; it must instead look at the outside world and establish its identity from a much broader point of view. This revelatory new perspective on life and the results of a violent bar fight at the end of the novel leave Ichiro enlightened rather than disillusioned. No longer imagining himself as “not [his mother's] son,” Ichiro seeks comfort in an outside world that has proven unkind. That is.