Abstract: The International Settlement plays a very important role in Kazuo Ishiguro's When We Were Orphans. Prior to the Japanese assault on Shanghai in 1937, the International Settlement served as the homeland of Christopher Banks, the Shanghai-born British detective. Banks' mother's anti-opium campaign justified the presence of British expatriates in Shanghai. In wartime Shanghai, the Settlement became a safe haven for all. Chapei, the very place of heavy fighting on the other bank of Suchow Creek, became an inferno for British expatriates. In Chinese people's eyes, the prewar Settlement was “foreigners' city”, in which Chinese people were bullied and humiliated by imperialists headed by the British. In wartime Shanghai, however, the Settlement became the sanctuary of Chinese refugees. The unoccupied area in Shanghai was known as Gudao (solitary island) from November 1937 to December 1941. Gudao, together with Gu'er (orphan), represented very sophisticated politics of home in tumultuous Shanghai.

Key words: When We Were Orphans, International Settlement, politics of home, opium trade, Anti-Japanese War