
When the Emperor Was Divine
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
3 months free
Buy for $10.75
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Elaina Erika Davis
-
By:
-
Julie Otsuka
About this listen
In this lean and devastatingly evocative first novel, Julie Otsuka tells their story from five flawlessly realized points of view and conveys the exact emotional texture of their experience: the thin-walled barracks and barbed-wire fences, the omnipresent fear and loneliness, the unheralded feats of heroism.
When the Emperor Was Divine is a work of enormous power that makes a shameful episode of our history as immediate as today's headlines.
©2003 Julie Otsuka (P)2003 Random House, Inc., Random House Audio, A Division of Random House, Inc.Critic reviews
- Alex Award Winner, 2003
"Exceptional...Otsuka skillfully dramatizes a world suddenly foreign...[Her] incantatory, unsentimental prose is the book's greatest strength." (The New Yorker)
"The novel's honesty and matter-of-fact tone in the face of inconceivable injustice are the source of its power." (Publishers Weekly)
"Mesmerizing." (The New York Times)
Featured Article: 10 Audiobooks to Listen to on the Day of Remembrance
In 1942, President Franklin Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, mandating the removal of Japanese Americans from their homes. Nearly 120,000 Japanese immigrants and native born Japanese Americans were imprisoned in concentration camps for the duration of World War II. We need to bear witness to the atrocities committed by the United States government and the pain our leadership caused innocent men, women, and children of Japanese heritage.
People who viewed this also viewed...
-
The Buddha in the Attic
- By: Julie Otsuka
- Narrated by: Samantha Quan, Carrington MacDuffie
- Length: 3 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In eight incantatory sections, The Buddha in the Attic traces the extraordinary lives of young Japanese brides, from their arduous journey by boat, where they exchange photographs of their husbands, imagining uncertain futures in an unknown land; to their arrival in San Francisco and their tremulous first nights as new wives; to their backbreaking work picking fruit in the fields and scrubbing the floors of white women; to their struggles to master a new language and a new culture; to their experiences in childbirth, and then as mothers....
-
-
Fascinating topic, irritating writing style
- By Lydia on 08-26-11
By: Julie Otsuka
-
The Swimmers
- A Novel
- By: Julie Otsuka
- Narrated by: Traci Kato-Kiriyama
- Length: 4 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The swimmers are unknown to one another except through their private routines (slow lane, medium lane, fast lane) and the solace each takes in their morning or afternoon laps. But when a crack appears at the bottom of the pool, they are cast out into an unforgiving world without comfort or relief.
-
-
Life before and during dementia
- By L. S. on 05-26-23
By: Julie Otsuka
-
America Is in the Heart: A Personal History (AmazonClassics Edition)
- By: Carlos Bulosan
- Narrated by: Reuben Uy
- Length: 11 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Carlos Bulosan’s idealism and ambition would seem to position him for certain success in America, even given how young he is when he first makes the journey from the Philippines. However, after arriving in Seattle, employers are far more concerned with his Filipino background than they are with his character. Low-paying jobs - and an uncertain future - remain his daily reality.
By: Carlos Bulosan
-
If I Ever Get Out of Here
- By: Eric Gansworth
- Narrated by: Eric Gansworth
- Length: 10 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Lewis "Shoe" Blake is used to the joys and difficulties of life on the Tuscarora Indian reservation in 1975: the joking, the Fireball games, the snow blowing through his roof. What he's not used to is white people being nice to him - people like George Haddonfield, whose family recently moved to town with the Air Force. As the boys connect through their mutual passion for music, especially the Beatles, Lewis has to lie more and more to hide the reality of his family's poverty from George.
-
-
Eric Gansworth! A must listen
- By K. Stiffler on 06-01-22
By: Eric Gansworth
-
Infamy
- The Shocking Story of the Japanese American Internment in World War II
- By: Richard Reeves
- Narrated by: James Yaegashi
- Length: 10 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Less than three months after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor and inflamed the nation, President Roosevelt signed an executive order declaring parts of four western states to be a war zone operating under military rule. The US Army immediately began rounding up thousands of Japanese-Americans, sometimes giving them less than 24 hours to vacate their houses and farms. For the rest of the war, these victims of war hysteria were imprisoned in primitive camps.
-
-
Disjointed, disconnected narrative
- By Triple A on 05-22-15
By: Richard Reeves
-
Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet
- A Novel
- By: Jamie Ford
- Narrated by: Feodor Chin
- Length: 10 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the opening pages of Jamie Ford's stunning debut, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, Henry Lee comes upon a crowd gathered outside the Panama Hotel, once the gateway to Seattle's Japantown. It has been boarded up for decades, but now the new owner has made an incredible discovery: the belongings of Japanese families, left when they were rounded up and sent to internment camps during World War II. As Henry looks on, the owner opens a Japanese parasol.
-
-
Engaging and Lovely. Highly recommend.
- By Robert on 02-06-09
By: Jamie Ford
-
The Buddha in the Attic
- By: Julie Otsuka
- Narrated by: Samantha Quan, Carrington MacDuffie
- Length: 3 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In eight incantatory sections, The Buddha in the Attic traces the extraordinary lives of young Japanese brides, from their arduous journey by boat, where they exchange photographs of their husbands, imagining uncertain futures in an unknown land; to their arrival in San Francisco and their tremulous first nights as new wives; to their backbreaking work picking fruit in the fields and scrubbing the floors of white women; to their struggles to master a new language and a new culture; to their experiences in childbirth, and then as mothers....
-
-
Fascinating topic, irritating writing style
- By Lydia on 08-26-11
By: Julie Otsuka
-
The Swimmers
- A Novel
- By: Julie Otsuka
- Narrated by: Traci Kato-Kiriyama
- Length: 4 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The swimmers are unknown to one another except through their private routines (slow lane, medium lane, fast lane) and the solace each takes in their morning or afternoon laps. But when a crack appears at the bottom of the pool, they are cast out into an unforgiving world without comfort or relief.
-
-
Life before and during dementia
- By L. S. on 05-26-23
By: Julie Otsuka
-
America Is in the Heart: A Personal History (AmazonClassics Edition)
- By: Carlos Bulosan
- Narrated by: Reuben Uy
- Length: 11 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Carlos Bulosan’s idealism and ambition would seem to position him for certain success in America, even given how young he is when he first makes the journey from the Philippines. However, after arriving in Seattle, employers are far more concerned with his Filipino background than they are with his character. Low-paying jobs - and an uncertain future - remain his daily reality.
By: Carlos Bulosan
-
If I Ever Get Out of Here
- By: Eric Gansworth
- Narrated by: Eric Gansworth
- Length: 10 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Lewis "Shoe" Blake is used to the joys and difficulties of life on the Tuscarora Indian reservation in 1975: the joking, the Fireball games, the snow blowing through his roof. What he's not used to is white people being nice to him - people like George Haddonfield, whose family recently moved to town with the Air Force. As the boys connect through their mutual passion for music, especially the Beatles, Lewis has to lie more and more to hide the reality of his family's poverty from George.
-
-
Eric Gansworth! A must listen
- By K. Stiffler on 06-01-22
By: Eric Gansworth
-
Infamy
- The Shocking Story of the Japanese American Internment in World War II
- By: Richard Reeves
- Narrated by: James Yaegashi
- Length: 10 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Less than three months after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor and inflamed the nation, President Roosevelt signed an executive order declaring parts of four western states to be a war zone operating under military rule. The US Army immediately began rounding up thousands of Japanese-Americans, sometimes giving them less than 24 hours to vacate their houses and farms. For the rest of the war, these victims of war hysteria were imprisoned in primitive camps.
-
-
Disjointed, disconnected narrative
- By Triple A on 05-22-15
By: Richard Reeves
-
Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet
- A Novel
- By: Jamie Ford
- Narrated by: Feodor Chin
- Length: 10 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the opening pages of Jamie Ford's stunning debut, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, Henry Lee comes upon a crowd gathered outside the Panama Hotel, once the gateway to Seattle's Japantown. It has been boarded up for decades, but now the new owner has made an incredible discovery: the belongings of Japanese families, left when they were rounded up and sent to internment camps during World War II. As Henry looks on, the owner opens a Japanese parasol.
-
-
Engaging and Lovely. Highly recommend.
- By Robert on 02-06-09
By: Jamie Ford
Unspoken history that is relevant today
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Beautiful, lyrical, haunting
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
A classic
Excellent
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Great audio. Word for word from book. Sad story.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I do not say this to offend anyone, it could be said of any of us that someone of our race or country has done unthinkable things.
I think high school students would benefit from reading this book. Thank you
Human nature is to stereotype
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Moving
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Japanese internment from viewpoint of young person
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Amazing 😉 wow 😳
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Sad but Good
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Great book
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.