The period spanning the 1930s to the 1960s is pivotal to Asian American literary history in that it witnessed both the early development of the Asian American novel and a phenomenal growth of Asian American short fiction. This chapter describes the work of Asian American writers, Toshio Mori, Hisaye Yamamoto, Bienvenido N. Santos and Carlos Bulosan. Mori and Yamamoto participated in ethnic cultural codification through portrayals of Japanese immigrant life from Nisei perspectives. The Chauvinist is perhaps the most speculative of Mori's stories about prewar Japanese immigrant life. Yamamoto's Yoneko's Earthquake is a work widely celebrated for its multiple layers of meaning and rich symbolism. Scent of Apples is paradigmatic of Santos's fictional construction of the predicament facing Filipino immigrants. Short fiction legitimizes small-scale disruption of the patterns of continuity closely associated with the novel form, by engaging with major positions about the latter's realist premises and actual functions.

There is a rich history of incarceration literature produced by Niseis (second-generation, American-born), some of which appeared very shortly after the end of the war. This chapter focuses on selected representative texts written by Niseis, and published up through the 1970s. This body of work represents varied and deeply felt responses that are often coded critiques of the Japanese American incarceration. Three of the most foundational texts about the incarceration appeared within eight years of its official end: Miné Okubo's Citizen 13660, Hisaye Yamamoto's The Legend of Miss Sasagawara, and Monica Sone's Nisei Daughter. Notable in all three texts is an overt description or narrative of camp life and a covert critique of the racism and failure of an espoused U.S. democracy. As a dissenting text, John Okada's No-No Boy was direct in its depiction of the cost wrought by the war, incarceration, and reductive, racist notions of citizenship.