At times, they receive small bursts of good fortune through some of Ishikawa’s father’s friends had made in Japan before moving, but these blessings are small and limited. In addition to poverty and food shortages, the family is the victim of other aspects of a totalitarian regime including ideological indoctrination, military brutality, and a lack of personal and intellectual freedoms.Īs a young adult, Ishikawa is assigned to work on a farm but he and his father struggle to support his mother and younger sisters. Ishikawa works hard in school but soon learns that his fate is at the mercy of the government. They live in extreme poverty with no chance of bettering their circumstances. As Japanese returnees, they are at the lowest strata of society. Though they had been told that North Korea would be a paradise on earth, the family soon learns that it is just the opposite. Their move is part of a massive repatriation effort conducted by the North Korean and Japanese governments. Born in Japan to a Japanese mother and Korean father, Ishikawa moves to North Korea with his family in 1960 when he is thirteen years old. In the prologue, Masaji Ishikawa remembers the night he escaped from North Korea and the promise he made to his children to help them escape too. (Previously published in Japanese in 2000). A River in Darkness: One Man’s Escape from North Korea. The following version of the book was used to create this study guide: Ishikawa, Masaji.
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