Burnt Shadows

Shamsie establishes cosmopolitanism, the belief that all people are part of one global community, as an aspirational ideal that is threatened by nationalism, the prioritizing of one nation’s goals or ideas to the exclusion or harm of other nations’ well-being. Shamsie uses Konrad and Hiroko’s story in Part 1 to establish the pattern she will repeat in each subsequent section of the novel: The forces of nationalism—Japanese, Pakistani, British, or American—ultimately doom the cosmopolitan goals of Shamsie’s characters. Hiroko and Konrad’s love is hindered by Japanese prejudices and ended by American militarism. Sajjad’s connection to his diverse homeland is severed by religious conflict. Harry Burton’s idealism is ground down by years of facilitating or enacting violence in the name of American exceptionalism. Kim Burton doesn’t see herself as a bigot, yet her prejudice against Muslims unintentionally dooms Raza. Even Raza, who dreams of only learning languages and friendship, gets caught in the sweep of Islamic extremism through Pakistan by way of his attempts at friendship with Abdullah.

Shamsie closely connects nationalism with both racism with fear: In Nagasaki, the once-cosmopolitan city has been transformed by war into a place hostile to foreigners like Konrad.