A Cold Wind From Idaho - by Lawrence Matsuda (Paperback)

About the Book

Poetry. Asian & Asian American Studies. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942, resulting in a cataclysmic series of events affecting all persons of Japanese ancestry then residing on the West Coast of the United States. So calamitous were these actions that a noted scholar asserted that this action constitutes "the defining event in the history of Japanese Americans." What does this have to do with a book of poetry titled A COLD WIND FROM IDAHO? Those Americans familiar with the Pacific Northwest Japanese American World War II experience will understand the imagery wrought by the title as being both evocative and apt. The metaphor of freezing winter winds chilling the body and then entering the soul of those affected conveys fittingly how the Japanese Issei and Japanese American Nisei encountered, braved, and then survived the cold iciness of Idaho's winters while they were huddled in a primitive American barbed wire concentration camp.

Book Synopsis

President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942, resulting in a cataclysmic series of events affecting all persons of Japanese ancestry then residing on the West Coast of the United States. So calamitous were these actions that a noted scholar asserted that this action constitutes "the defining event in the history of Japanese Americans."What does this have to do with a book of poetry titled A COLD WIND FROM IDAHO? Those Americans familiar with the Pacific Northwest Japanese American World War II experience will understand the imagery wrought by the title as being both evocative and apt. The metaphor of freezing winter winds chilling the body and then entering the soul of those affected conveys fittingly how the Japanese Issei and Japanese American Nisei encountered, braved, and then survived the cold iciness of Idaho's winters while they were huddled in a primitive American barbed wire concentration camp.

About the Author

Lawrence Matsuda was born in the Minidoka, Idaho Concentration Camp during World War II. He and his family were among the approximately 120,000 Japanese incarcerated without a crime. Matsuda has a PhD and was a public school teacher, administrator, principal, visiting professor, consultant and is currently a writer and poet. In 2015 he won a regional Emmy for chapter one of a graphic novel that was animated by the Seattle Channel. Overall he has authored three books of poetry inspired by the forced incarceration, one novel and, one graphic novel. In 2023 he won an honorable mention for Shapeshifter Minidoka Idaho Concentration Camp Legacy as part of the 2022 Idaho Book of the Year award contest. More information about Matsuda can be found at: lawrencematsuda.com