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This article uses theories of theatrical ghosting to analyse Hirata Oriza’s Seoul Shimin (1989–2011), a series of four plays set during Japan’s annexation of the Korean peninsula (1910–45). The series does not elaborate on the details of Japan’s imperial history. Instead, it follows the domestic activities of a family of Japanese merchants living in Seoul. Attending to the series’s oblique references to historical events, this article asserts that Seoul Shimin frames domestic activities as imperial behaviours and marks gaps in contemporary representations of the colony. In so doing, the series portrays the history of Japanese imperialism as elusive even as it stresses the need for younger generations to engage with it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]