Post-traumatic stress disorder is a mental health condition that is triggered by a petrifying event that an individual has witnessed or experienced. The most common events that cause an individual to have post-traumatic stress disorder is combat, sexual assault, a natural disaster, and car accidents. In the brilliantly written novel, Snow Falling on Cedars, written by David Guterson, the main characters Kabuo Miyamoto and Ishmael Chambers are haunted by their unspeakable pasts. To briefly summarize, Kabuo Miyamoto is a Japanese-American fisherman who is on trial for the murder of his childhood friend, Carl Heine. Though he is innocent of the gruesome act, he feels as if he should pay for his haunting deeds done in the war. Ishmael Chambers,
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The land that Kabuo’s father purchased was used to grow strawberries, which brought the Miyamoto’s a large profit. When Kabuo was twenty years-old the land was legally passed down to him, thus bringing great importance to his life because it was what kept his family financially stable and himself. Due to the Japaneses’ relocation to internment camps during the early 1940’s, Kabuo lost ownership to the seven acres of land he owned. When Kabuo was informed of the loss of he grieved over the land significantly. Kabuo’s wife, Hatsue, saw how Kabuo’s mind was still stuck in the past and she attempted to help him by having a child. Hatsue stated, “You’re going to be a father soon.. I hope that will make you happy, Kabuo. I hope it will make you bury all of this. I don’t know how else I can help you” (Guterson). Hatsue’s attempt adequately helped Kabuo to stop grieving over the loss of his land but not for too long, it was an incident that will always haunt him. A few years later Kabuo heard a man, with the name of Ole Jurgensen, whom owned the seven acres of strawberry land was selling it so he attempted to regain his lost land but failed because he arrived too late. Kabuo promised to regain back the land he once lost, “...he’d stood in the fields and vowed that one day he would get his family’s land back. The Japanese man had slipped his mind altogether. Nine years has passed” (Guterson 149). When Kabuo realized that he had lost his family’s land forever, it had a great impact on him. He had already grieved over the land when he first lost it but now Kabuo will never forgive himself because he let down his family, he viewed himself as a
The land that Kabuo’s father purchased was used to grow strawberries, which brought the Miyamoto’s a large profit. When Kabuo was twenty years-old the land was legally passed down to him, thus bringing great importance to his life because it was what kept his family financially stable and himself. Due to the Japaneses’ relocation to internment camps during the early 1940’s, Kabuo lost ownership to the seven acres of land he owned. When Kabuo was informed of the loss of he grieved over the land significantly. Kabuo’s wife, Hatsue, saw how Kabuo’s mind was still stuck in the past and she attempted to help him by having a child. Hatsue stated, “You’re going to be a father soon.. I hope that will make you happy, Kabuo. I hope it will make you bury all of this. I don’t know how else I can help you” (Guterson). Hatsue’s attempt adequately helped Kabuo to stop grieving over the loss of his land but not for too long, it was an incident that will always haunt him. A few years later Kabuo heard a man, with the name of Ole Jurgensen, whom owned the seven acres of strawberry land was selling it so he attempted to regain his lost land but failed because he arrived too late. Kabuo promised to regain back the land he once lost, “...he’d stood in the fields and vowed that one day he would get his family’s land back. The Japanese man had slipped his mind altogether. Nine years has passed” (Guterson 149). When Kabuo realized that he had lost his family’s land forever, it had a great impact on him. He had already grieved over the land when he first lost it but now Kabuo will never forgive himself because he let down his family, he viewed himself as a