an untarnished image of the martyrs so that such
symbolism might help eclipse some of the daily
suffering they experience due to a war over which
they have no control.
As the novel progresses, Kim returns frequently
to the theme of responsibility and burden. Captain
Lee must perform his job to the best of his abil-
ity, while at the same time protecting his friends
as much as possible. Mr. Shin must keep the ab-
solute truth to himself in order not to demoral-
ize the already overtaxed Christians in Pyongyang.
Park must confront the death of his father (one
of the martyred) and likewise his rejection of the
Christian faith. Chaplain Koh must reevaluate his
responsibilities to his congregation and to army
intelligence.
In each case, the suffering of the civilian popu-
lation effectively conveys the terrors and ravages
of war upon the innocent. By the end of the novel,
when the Republic of Korea army evacuates Pyong-
yang slightly ahead of an all-out Chinese Commu-
nist invasion, once again the innocent suffer, with
no means of escape. Contrasting and eventually
conflating the import of suffering for the Chris-
tian faith with the plight of the civilian citizenry,
Kim forces the reader to question to which group
the novel’s title The Martyred belongs: to the 12
ministers executed on the first day of the Korean
War or to the common Korean citizens sacrificed
every day in the name of a war, a cause that they
remain isolated from and victimized by? Arguably,
for Kim, the answer would be both, along with all
others indelibly marked by the devastation of war.
Bibliography
Kim, Richard E. The Martyred. New York: George
Brazilier, 1964.
Zack Weir
Massey, Sujata (1963– )
Sujata Massey is a multicultural writer born in
Sussex, the United Kingdom, of a German mother
and an Indian father. Her family immigrated to the
United States when Sujata Massey was five, and she
grew up in Philadelphia, Berkeley, California, and
St. Paul, Minnesota. She graduated from Johns
Hopkins University in 1986, majoring in creative
writing. She worked as a journalist for the Balti-
more Evening Sun newspaper until 1991, when she
moved to Japan for two years with her husband,
who was posted there as a navy medical officer.
Back in Baltimore, Massey continued to write
her first novel, which she had begun in Japan. In
1996 she won the Malice Domestic Limited grant
for unpublished writers, with which she managed to
complete the first book. She also signed a contract
for two more detective novels. Since then Massey
has published altogether eight novels, in which the
main character, Rei Shimura, is multiculturally
conditioned like Massey. Rei’s Japanese-American
roots are strongly present in the thematic devel-
opment of each of the novels. Of these eight, the
first four novels are set in Japan. In the next three,
while still related to Japanese culture, the settings
are mostly in the United States, where Rei stays for
a prolonged visit. In the 2005 novel The Typhoon
Lover, Rei returns to Japan. Massey has won the
1998 Agatha Award for the best first novel (The
Salaryman’s Wife) and the 2000 Macavity Award
for the best novel (The Flower Master). Her other
novels have been nominated for various prizes.
All the novels treat, in one way or another, issues
of identity, gender, representation and cultural au-
thenticity. In The Salaryman’s Wife (1997), the first
novel of the series, Rei Shimura is a 27-year-old
teacher of English for the Japanese employees of
the Nichiyu Company. She lives in Tokyo and tries
to remain emotionally and economically indepen-
dent. Taking a vacation in Shiroyama, however,
she gets involved in the mysterious death of Set-
suko Nakamura, the wife of an important Japanese
businessman. In the course of the story, Rei begins
an affair with Hugh Glendinning, a Scottish lawyer
who is first accused of the murder. The plot centers
on family honor, xenophobia, industrial espionage,
the Japanese mafia known as yakuza, and love. A
major side issue in the plot is the status of the ra-
cially hybrid children between American military
servicemen and Japanese women. In the second
novel, Zen Attitude (1998), Rei has launched her182 Massey, Sujata