By M.J. Bednarek
Chang-rae Lee’s A Tender Age lets you observe the violence of everyday life through the eyes of a 10-year-old kid. This juxtaposition evokes the spirit of Oliver Twist and drives the narrative through a series of misadventures set in an urban environment. The child protagonist, Jeon-Gi, is an observant and quiet kid who tries to bury his problems deep inside of himself. Although Lee’s exploration of masculinity through a 10-year-old boy is fascinating, the book’s most gripping element comes from the child’s emotional understanding of his parents’ pain and loneliness. Both his mother and father are Korean immigrants, and the book explores the everyday struggles they face in a new society.
A Tender Age begins with an older version of the protagonist, Jeon-Gi, as he meditatively reflects on life. He stresses the importance of being grateful for the present and how easy it is to overlook the joy in small, everyday moments in our life. He himself admits that he is guilty of this, as he often finds himself thinking about past events. He knows that to set himself free of the past, he must examine the events of his childhood that continue to haunt him. This launches the story into the months leading up to his eleventh birthday—more specifically, the summer of 1976 in New York City.
Lee’s writing is an acute study of a child’s struggle with processing their parents’ suffering. The conflict arises when a child’s innocence clashes with the brutality of the everyday world. For readers of bildungsroman and coming of age stories, this is a familiar territory where character development eventually leads to the loss of innocence. Lee uses these familiar mechanics but dials down excessive conflict. Instead of loud, angry scenes, the book presents a child observing the slow erosion of his parents’ identities. A Tender Age subverts the trope of an angry or disappointed immigrant parent and replaces them with moments of silence and genuine empathy.
Jeon-Gi’s immense internal turmoil externalises itself in an almost imperceptible way. His confidence and sense of belonging diminish with every racist or discriminatory encounter he experiences. The book shows that while a child may not fully grasp the ideological and thematic implication of a slur, they still recognise the violence and brutality of the perpetrator’s action. With each encounter, the child’s sense of safety greatly diminishes. He fears for himself, and for his parents. This sense of fear motivates the development of the child’s defensive mechanisms that produce a cold barrier around him. This ultimately shapes his character and presents sudden eruptions of violence that take days to process.
In this way, the novel is memorable, and I often found myself reflecting on my own experiences living across various countries as a child and teenager. This sense of memory and nostalgia never overwhelms the narrative and instead simply encourages one to reflect on their own childhood. In turn, Chang-rae Lee grounds an emotionally compelling narrative in nuance specific to a Korean immigrant experience, which provides for a valuable perspective in an increasingly globalised world.
