The East-West House

Review
By The San Francisco Chronicle

This biography soft-focuses on the struggles of a biracial child, growing up in the early 20th century, mainly in Japan, where he was shunned as a gaijin, or stranger. . . . Hale finds worthy metaphor in a project undertaken by Noguchi at age 8 - building a house, ‘half Eastern, half Western in design … a mixture like his own.’ An author’s note connects such early experience to a lifetime of work and to Noguchi’s personal and aesthetic identity.