Taiwan Travelogue is set in 1938, during the latter half of Japan’s colonial rule over Taiwan (1895-1945). Following Japan’s victory in the First Sino-Japanese War, the Qing dynasty ceded the territory of Taiwan, among others, to the Empire of Japan. This period was marked by intensifying imperial ambitions, including the Southern Expansion Doctrine (Nanshin-ron), which positioned Taiwan as a strategic base for expansion into Southeast Asia, and the kōminka movement, a policy of forced cultural assimilation. The Japanese Empire monopolized many of Taiwan’s key economic industries, including camphor, a commodity for which Taiwan possessed a global monopoly (“Explainer: Japan’s 50-year colonial rule over Taiwan.” CGTN, 17 Nov. 2025). This devastated the Taiwanese economy, forcing many local farmers and producers to struggle through famine and poverty. Moreover, the empire’s cultural assimilation policies restricted local education opportunities, the practice of local religion, and the use of Chinese languages, which extended to the adoption of Japanese names. Throughout the 50 years of Japan’s occupation of Taiwan, there was a consistent armed resistance against colonial rule, resulting in over 600,000 Taiwanese casualties throughout the period. By 1945, Japan’s defeat in World War II forced them to revoke their claims to Taiwan, ending their violent reign over the island nation.

The novel vividly portrays the rigid social hierarchy of this era, which placed Japanese “Mainlanders” at the top and Taiwanese “Islanders” as second-class subjects in their own country. This power dynamic is intricately expressed through food. The narrative establishes a clear divide between the refined, safe cuisine prepared for Japanese colonizers and the “authentic” but potentially unsanitary street food of the colonized Islanders. For instance, the government official Mishima is reluctant to let the Japanese narrator Aoyama try local delicacies, citing a past incident where Mainlanders fell ill after eating kiâm-lâ-á, or salted river clams (20). The first “Taiwanese” meal Aoyama is served is at a restaurant that “catered toward Mainlander guests,” with recipes “tailored or even invented to suit Mainlander tastes” (16). Aoyama’s persistent craving for dishes like winter melon tea and grass jelly is therefore a symbolic desire to breach the colonial divide and experience the “real” Taiwan, a place systematically cordoned off from her by the very authorities who invited her. By letting Chi-chan mediate Aoyama’s experience of Taiwanese culture, Yáng challenges the myth of benevolent assimilators who claim to preclude themselves from the empire’s colonialist ambitions.