The Girl Who Played Go

The Girl Who Played Go

by Shan Sa

Chatto and Windus $182

In Shan Sa's third novel, the game of go is a fulcrum of tradition, contemplation and tranquillity in a ravaged, Japanese-occupied Manchuria. Among those who turn up for the daily game is a 16-year-old girl whose youth, precocity and daring catch her opponents off guard.

Into the square comes a young Japanese officer, dressed in civilian clothes to spy on the Chinese resistance movement. The girl challenges him to a game that unfolds as the Japanese onslaught builds. They play day after day in silence, she unaware that he is the enemy; he not realising that the girl has established a tenuous relationship with the resistance. The officer discovers little of the resistance movement, but becomes increasingly enraptured by the girl's charm and what he sees as 'the perverse extravagance of her strategy'.

The game, which involves trying to surround an opponent's pieces, is, of course, a metaphor for the war itself, and as such works brilliantly. Go also mirrors the cultural affinity and military rivalry between China and Japan. The Chinese invented the game 4,000 years ago but the Japanese became the masters at it, elevating it to what the officer calls 'a divine art'. Yet in this novel, the game acts as a counterpoint to the war, humanising when all else conspires to create misery. 'Go reflects the soul,' the protagonist says. For her, it is almost life itself. At times the game seems pointless, at other times the key for finding how to create happiness. Eye contact, the brutality of the girl's moves, the convoluted deliberations of the soldier, the tilt of a head - tiny, unremarkable gestures bring the protagonist and the officer into a relationship that transcends language, culture and patriotic allegiance.