Clay Walls

Clay Walls is a novel by Korean-American author Ronyoung Kim. Set in Los Angeles from the 1910s through World War II, it follows produce salesman Chun and his wife, Haesu, a former Korean aristocrat. After fleeing to America in the 1920s, in the wake of Korea’s annexation by Japan, Chun and Haesu start a new life together, giving birth to a daughter, Faye. The couple struggles to assimilate in America given the predominance of white nationalism and anti-Asian rhetoric. At the same time, they learn to love each other despite the overwhelming class differences that conditioned them in their birth country. The novel humanizes the experience of immigrants during one of the most uncertain, dynamic, and divided periods in American history. It has been celebrated for providing a Korean-American perspective on the movement for Korean Independence, as well as on its communist resonances, during the early to mid-twentieth century.

The novel is split into three parts, each told in a different character’s voice. The first follows Haesu, who was born into the traditional ruling class in Korea during the period known as the Joseon Dynasty. The second follows Chun, who hails from a farming family in Korea. Though their backgrounds are starkly different, they were united in their endeavor to escape Korea for a safer life. The third section is told by Faye, who was born in America. Haesu and Chun’s relationship is an unlikely one, and their differences are palpable in their marriage. While Chun grew up poor in the Korean countryside, Haesu’s family is “yangban,” meaning that it is made up of wealthy military administrators and diplomats empowered by Korea’s dynastic tradition. She is accustomed to scholarship and political power, while Chun’s identity is based on a backbone of industry and efficiency.

Both Chun and Haesu subscribe to the popular defeatist sentiment that “Korea is dead,” believing that they will never again have a homeland that is not under the control of Japan. Indeed, before they move to America, Korea is hit with a handful of unprecedented atrocities. In the spring of 1919, the Japanese regime murders thousands of peaceful Koreans who gather to protest the annexation and promote a Declaration of Korean Independence. In its aftermath, Japan sends an explicit message that dissidents all over the world will not remain safe. One day, someone jokingly points out Chun for his slight resemblance to a leading dissident. Chun is humorless about this comparison, having lived his entire life in the sobering conditions of economic and political insecurity. Based on that moment alone, he decides to flee Korea and settle in America. His travel is facilitated by his friend, the American missionary Reverend McNeil. Haesu leaves because, as a member of the Yi Dynasty, she is a favored political target of the Japanese regime.



Though their situations bind them together, the marriage of Chun and Haesu is rather loveless. Haesu immerses herself in the local immigrant community, speaking out in support of the Korean Independence Movement. This causes friction with Chun, who is more conservative and old-fashioned. Conversely, Chun thinks that Haesu is naive and overly optimistic about their future freedom and that she neglects her family and imperative to find a secure job. Later in the novel, the family business that Chun works so hard to build dissolves. Consumed by his despair, he tragically develops a gambling addiction and leaves his family. He ultimately dies in Nevada, the cause uncertain. Now a single mother to Faye, Haesu gets a job and is forced to liquidate a landholding she had hoped to save in Korea in case it ever gained independence. Faye comes of age without ever visiting Korea. When she is a teenager, many of the young men close to her serve in the U.S. Army after Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor. At the end of the novel, she falls in love with a Korean man studying at Yale Medical School. Though Haesu and Chun’s stories do not end in a happy return to their lost homeland, Faye’s embrace of her Korean identity suggests that a family’s reconnection with its homeland can manifest in different forms and across time.