The Enemy

The theme of racial prejudice is prevalent throughout “The Enemy” and inseparable from the act of its creation. “The Enemy” was published in 1942 at the peak of military tension between the United States and Japan. By writing a story from the perspective of Japanese characters, Buck offered her American readers a viewpoint they had not encountered before, showing a group that many Americans viewed as cruel—the Japanese—to be capable of great kindness, even toward an American. Moreover, by depicting Sadao and Hana as rounded individuals with familiar concerns (e.g., the safety of their children), Buck humanized her characters for a Western audience. Implicitly, the story aimed to show readers that what they had learned about Japan is not true (or at least not the entire truth).

The story itself touches on Americans’ attitudes toward Japan in its portrayal of Tom, who consistently expresses surprise at the kindness Sadao and Hana show him. It does not mesh with what he thinks he knows of Japanese people broadly, to the extent that he thinks of them as outliers; the war could have been avoided, he says, “if all the [Japanese] were like [Sadao]” (55).