Empire of the Sun Empire of the sun is a rites of passage novel about James Ballards life in Shanghai during the Japanese invasion in the 1940s It describes James life from how he changes from a posh and upper class expatriate to becoming a lonely Shanghai roamer and his time at Lunghua camp at which his views of the four main nations in the book England Japan China and America change completely Ballard presents the English at the beginning of the novel as a superpower posh and rich We know thi