Obasan Characters

Megumi Naomi Nakane. Now, is that Meg-Oo-Mee, or Meg-Gum-Eh? Nah-Cane? Nah-Canny? These are questions that Naomi is so sick of answering.Naomi is a grade school teacher in Cecil, Alberta. She's fiv...

Quick! Tell us Obasan's favorite food. Can't remember? How about her hobbies? Do you even remember what she looks like, besides old? Yeah, we didn't think so.It seems a little weird that we know so...

Aunt Emily talks so much in this novel, we are surprised it's not titled after her. The longest chapter, Chapter 14, is dedicated to her journal. Every couple seconds her voice pops into Naomi's he...

Why can't big brothers ever be nice? No offense to all you nice big brother Shmoopers out there (if you even exist!), but it seems to us that literary big brothers like Stephen should be a little n...

What is it about uncles? They're always kind of funny and goofy. Even though Uncle Sam has his job, his home, and his freedom taken away from him, he never seems sad. Even though he dies a few page...

Imagine every child's dream of a perfect mother. She's beautiful, gentle, and kind. She never gets mad at you. And she protects you from everything. That's Naomi's mom. We don't know if she's that...

Let's face it: Naomi obviously isn't a daddy's girl. Her dad is almost as absent from this text as her mom is, but he didn't sail away to Japan. We guess the strong women in this novel are far more...

Nakayama-sensei is the only person who gets a title in the entire novel, so you just know he's Important McImportantPants.Nakayama-sensei is a character that ends up being way more important than w...

We're lumping these characters together because they go together like salt and pepper; incidentally, salt-and-pepper is the color of their hair. Zing!Grandma Nakane Poor Grandma Nakane. This lady i...

Again, we're sticking these two old geezers together as one character. Even though they didn't exactly stand by each other all their lives, we're certainly not going to tear them apart now.Grandpa...