“Atom Bomb Disease”
The entire novel revolves around a metaphor. The title character, Sadako, is a young Japanese girl suffering from the long-term collateral damage caused by the bombing of Hiroshima which hastened the end of World War II. Sadako suffers from leukemia, a form of cancer caused by the radiation associated with the bomb. For that reason, leukemia is metaphorically referred to as the “atom bomb disease.”
“like a whirlwind”
The first character trait the reader learns about Sadako is that she always seemed to be in movement. Her mother like to say that her young daughter learned to run before she learned to walk. A few sentences later this element of Sadako’s genetic construction is transformed into metaphor through a very simple but telling simile:
“Rushing like a whirlwind into the kitchen, Sadako cried, “`Oh, Mother! I can hardly wait to go to the carnival.’”
Peace Day
The “carnival” which brings young Sadako rushing into kitchen at such a breathless pace is not really a fair, but the name she has given to the events associated with Peace Day: the annual observation of the anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima. The “carnival” is a festival of sorts; a literary festival of metaphor:
“When the family started out…Sadako ran ahead to the house of her best friend, Chizuko…Sadako was sure that they would always be as close as two pine needles on the same twig.”
“There was the flash of a million suns. Then the heat prickled my eyes like needles.”
“hundreds of white doves were freed from their cages…Sadako thought the doves looked like spirits of the dead flying into the freedom of the sky.”
The Kimono
One of the emotional highlights of the novel is the first appearance of Sadako attired in a traditional hand-stitched kimono which she recognizes as an ironically extravagant gift for a young girl who won’t be around to wear it enough to justify the expense. The single exhibition of Sadako in the finery proves, however, proves metaphorically priceless enough to justify the expense a thousand times over:
“Everyone agreed that she was like a princess in the kimono.”
Read This and Try Not to Think About It
The weaker her body grows, the more obsessively Sadako thinks about death. She wonders about thinkgs like whether the moment of death will be painful and what happens afterward? But she isn’t the gloomy type who seeks the darkness of the thought of death. In fact, she makes every effort to not think about it. She tries to stop the process before it snowballs out of control only to learn what everyone learns eventually about trying not to think about something. That vain effort is
“like trying to stop the rain from falling. As soon as she concentrated on something else, death crept back into her mind.”
