The Patriot

Wu I-wan, the son of a wealthy Shanghai banker, is drawn into revolutionary politics and imprisoned with the committed dissident En-lan. When his name appears on a death list, his father arranges exile in Japan through the merchant Mr Muraki. I-wan begins again within Muraki's household, learns to admire Japanese discipline and falls in love with his host's daughter, making personal loyalty inseparable from the country that has given him refuge.

News of Japanese aggression in China destroys the possibility of remaining neutral. I-wan must decide whether resistance is a duty strong enough to justify leaving his wife and the family that accepted him, while the Murakis confront what their nation's war means for someone they regard as a son. The novel moves from Republican China's revolutionary unrest to the Sino-Japanese conflict, treating patriotism as a painful division of loyalties rather than an uncomplicated virtue.