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The Rape of Nanking (book)

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Cover of the 1998 edition of The Rape of Nanking, published by Penguin Books

The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II is a bestselling 1997 non-fiction book written by Iris Chang about the 1937-1938 Nanking Massacre. It documents the events, based on the author's research, leading up to the Nanking Massacre and the atrocities that were committed. The book also presents the view that the Japanese government has not done enough to redress the atrocities. It is one of the first major English-language books to introduce the Nanking Massacre to Western and Eastern readers alike, and has been translated into several languages.[1] The book was a source of fame for Chang, its subject matter being considered controversial. It was received both with acclaim and criticism by the public and by academics. Chang's research on the book was credited with the finding of the diaries of John Rabe and Minnie Vautrin, both of whom played important roles in the Nanking Safety Zone, a designated area in Nanjing which protected Chinese civilians during the Nanking Massacre.[2]

The book also prompted AOL executive Ted Leonsis to fund and produce Nanking, a 2007 documentary film also about the Nanking Massacre, after he read it.[3]

Inspiration

When Iris Chang was a child, she was told by her immigrant parents, who had escaped from China via Taiwan to the United States during World War II, that during the Nanking Massacre, the Japanese "sliced babies not just in half but in thirds and fourths". In the introduction of The Rape of Nanking, she wrote that throughout her childhood, the Nanking Massacre "remained buried in the back of [her] mind as a metaphor for unspeakable evil." When she searched the local public libraries in her school and found nothing, she wondered why nobody had written a book about it.[4]

The subject of the Nanking Massacre entered Chang's life again almost two decades later when she learnt of producers who had completed documentary films about it. One of the producers was Shao Tzuping, who helped produce Magee's Testament, a film which contains footage of the Nanking Massacre itself, shot by the missionary John Magee.[5] The other producer was Nancy Tong, who, together with Christine Choy, produced and co-directed In The Name of the Emperor, a film containing a series of interviews with Chinese, American, and Japanese citizens.[5] Chang began talking to Shao and Tong, and soon she was connected to a network of activists who felt the need to document and publicize the Nanking Massacre.[4] In December of 1994, she attended a conference on the Nanking Massacre, held in Cupertino, California, and it was what she saw and heard at the conference that motivated her to write The Rape of Nanking.[6] As she wrote in the introduction of the book, while she was at the conference, she was "suddenly in a panic that this terrifying disrespect for death and dying, this reversion in human social evolution, would be reduced to a footnote of history, treated like a harmless glitch in a computer program that might or might not again cause a problem, unless someone forced the world to remember it."[4]

Research

Chang spent two years on research for the book.[2] She found that raw source materials were available in the US, contained in the diaries, films, and photographs of American missionaries, journalists, and military officers who were in Nanjing at the time of the Nanking Massacre.[4] Additionally, she traveled to Nanjing to interview survivors of the Nanking Massacre and to read Chinese accounts and confessions by Japanese army veterans.[7] Chang did not, however, conduct research in Japan, and this left her vulnerable to criticisms on how she portrayed modern Japan in the context of how it deals with its Word War II past.[7]

Chang's research led her to make what one San Francisco Chronicle article called "significant discoveries" on the subject of the Nanking Massacre, in the forms of the diaries of two Westerners that were in Nanjing leading efforts to save lives during the Japanese invasion.[2] The first diary was that of John Rabe, a German Nazi Party member who was the leader of the Nanking Safety Zone, a demilitarized zone in Nanjing that Rabe and other Westerners set up to protect Chinese civilians.[8] The other diary belonged to the American missionary Minnie Vautrin, who saved the lives of about 10,000 women and children when she provided them with shelter in Ginling College.[9] The diaries documented the events of the Nanking Massacre from the perspectives of their writers, and provided detailed accounts of atrocities that they saw, as well as information surrounding the circumstances of the Nanking Safety Zone. Chang dubbed Rabe the "Oskar Schindler of Nanking" and Vautrin the "Anne Frank of Nanking".[2] Rabe's diary is over 800 pages, and contains one of the most detailed accounts of the Nanking Massacre.[10] Translated into English, it was published in 1998 by Random House as a book on its own, called The Good Man of Nanking: The Diaries of John Rabe.[11] Vautrin's diary recounts her personal experience and feelings of the Nanking Massacre; in it, an entry reads, "There probably is no crime that has not been committed in this city today."[12] It was used as source material for a biographical book about Vautrin and her role during the Nanking Massacre, called American Goddess at the Rape of Nanking: The Courage of Minnie Vautrin, written by Hua-ling Hu.[13]

Acclaim and criticism

According to William C. Kirby, Professor of History at Harvard University, Chang "shows more clearly than any previous account just what [the Japanese] did", and that she "draws connections between the slaughter in Europe and in Asia of millions of innocents during World War II."[14] Ross Terrill, an associate in research at the Fairbank Center for East Asian Research at Harvard University,[15] wrote that the the book is "scholarly, an exciting investigation and a work of passion."[16] Beatrice S. Bartlett, Emeritus Professor of History at Yale University[17] wrote, "Iris Chang's research on the Nanking holocaust yields a new and expanded telling of this World War II atrocity and reflects thorough research."[16]

Conversely, critic Joshua A. Fogel, Canada Research Chair at York University,[18] argued that the book is "seriously flawed" and "full of misinformation and harebrained explanations".[19] Journalist Timothy M. Kelly[20] described the book as "simple carelessness, sheer sloppiness, historical inaccuracies, and shameless plagiarism" and claimed that Chang had plagiarized passages and an illustration from Japan's Imperial Conspiracy by David Bergamini.[21] St. Olaf College history professor Robert Entenmann[22] also criticized Chang, stating that the "Japanese historical background Chang presents is cliched, simplistic, stereotyped, and often inaccurate."[23]

The original version of a photograph used by Chang—the accuracy of the caption in the book is disputed[7]

San Francisco Chronicle Staff Writer Charles Burress criticized Chang's work in an article published in July of 1998.[7] He cited Ikuhiko Hata, a Japanese history professor at Nihon University, who argued that 11 photos in the book were misrepresented or fake. One particular photo shows women and children walking across a bridge with Japanese soldiers, and captioned as "The Japanese rounded up thousands of women. Most were gang-raped or forced into military prostitution." Hata claimed that the photo orginally appeared in 1937 in a Japanese newspaper, as part of a series of photos that showed peaceful scenes of Chinese villagers under Japanese occupation. Burress also offered his own analysis, pointing out what he felt were mistakes in the book. For example, he claimed that Chang's quote of a secret telegram sent by Japan's foreign minister in 1938 was incorrectly cited as "compelling evidence" that Japanese troops killed at least 300,000 Chinese civilians in Nanjing. According to Burress, the figure of 300,000 Chinese civilians killed actually came from a message sent by a British reporter, concerning deaths not only in Nanjing but in other places as well. Additionally, Burress questioned her motivation for writing the book on whether she wrote it as an activist or as a historian, citing that the book "draws its emotional impetus" from her conviction to not let the Nanking Massacre be forgotten to the world.[7]

Chang attempted to respond to Burress' criticism in a letter written to the San Francisco Chronicle, but the letter was not published by the newspaper.[24] In the letter, she offered criticism of her own concerning Burress' article.[25] Chang found that it was a "disturbing tendency" that Burress quoted right-wing Japanese critics "without demanding evidence to back up their allegations." Furthermore, she claimed that Ikuhiko Hata, a source cited by Burress, was not "regarded as a serious scholar" either in Japan or in the US, because he was a regular contributor to "ultra right-wing" Japanese publications. One such publication had published an article from a Holocaust denier which claimed that no gas chambers were used in Germany to kill Jews. On Burress' criticism of her inaccurate photo captioning, Chang disputed the contention that the caption was wrong. She wrote that her book dealt with the "horror of the Japanese invasion of China", and that the caption reading "The Japanese rounded up thousands of women. Most were gang-raped or forced into military prostitution" contained two statements of indisputable facts. Chang also argued against Burress' claim of her incorrect citation of a telegram sent by Japan's foreign minister. She wrote that while the original figure of 300,000 Chinese civilian deaths in Nanjing was reported by a British reporter, this figure was cited in a message that Japan's foreign minister sent to his contacts in Washington, DC. Being a figure used by a high-ranking Japanese government official, Chang claimed that this was evidence that the Japanese government recognized 300,000 as the number of Chinese civilian deaths. Finally, she criticized Burress for his "nitpick" of small details in order to draw attention away from the scope and magnitude of the Nanking Massacre, writing that such was a "common tactic" of Holocaust deniers.[25]

Public reception

The Rape of Nanking sold more than half a million copies when it was first published in the US, and according to The New York Times, received general critical acclaim.[26] Iris Chang became an instant celebrity in the US;[27] she was awarded honorary degrees,[28] invited to give lectures and to discuss the Nanking Massacre on shows like Good Morning America, Nightline, and The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, and was profiled by The New York Times as well as featured on the cover of Reader's Digest.[6] The book was on the New York Times' Best Seller list for 10 weeks and sold more than 125,000 copies in four months.[7] Hillary Clinton invited her to the White House, US historian Stephen Ambrose described her as "maybe the best young historian we’ve got",[27] and the Organization of Chinese Americans named her National Woman of the Year.[28] The book's popularity prompted a lengthy book tour, with Chang visiting 65 cities in over a year and a half.[2]

The book received praise from news media. The Wall Street Journal wrote that it was the "first comprehensive examination of the destruction of this Chinese imperial city", and that Chang "skillfully excavated from oblivion the terrible events that took place." The Atlantic Monthly wrote that it was "a crushing indictment of the Japanese army's behavior." The Chicago Tribune wrote that it was "a powerful new work of history and moral inquiry" and that "Chang takes great care to establish an accurate accounting of the dimensions of the violence." The Philadelphia Inquirer wrote that it was a "compelling account of a horrendous episode that, until recently, has been largely forgotten", and that "animals do not behave the way the Japanese troops of the Imperial Army behaved."[29]

Aftermath

The book is the main source of fame for Iris Chang, who is well-respected in China for raising awareness of the Nanking Massacre in the Western world.[28] Succumbing to her battle with depression, Chang took her own life in November of 2004.[2] After her suicide, a memorial service was held in China by Nanking Massacre survivors at the same time as her funeral in Los Altos, California, and the Memorial Hall of the Victims in the Nanjing Massacre, a memorial site in Nanjing built to commorate the victims of the Nanking Massacre,[30] added a wing dedicated to her in 2005.[31] In the US, a Chinese garden in Norfolk, Virginia, which contains a memorial to Minnie Vautrin, added a memorial dedicated to Chang, including her as the latest victim of the Nanking Massacre, and drawing parallels between Chang and Vautrin, who also took her own life.[31] Vautrin exhausted herself trying to protect women and children during the Nanking Massacre and subsequently during the Japanese occupation of Nanjing, finally suffering a nervous breakdown in 1940. She returned to the US for medical treatment, committing suicide a year later.[9]

Response in Japan

The Rape of Nanking has caused controversy in Japan.[32] Los Angeles Times staff writer Sonni Efron reported that in addition to receiving criticism by Japanese "ultranationalists" who believe that the massacre in Nanjing never took place, Chang was also criticised by Japanese liberals, who "insist the massacre happened but allege that Chang's flawed scholarship damages their cause."[33] Associate Professor David Askew of Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University stated that Chang's work dealt a "severe blow" to the "Great Massacre School" of thought, which advocates for the validity of the findings at the Tokyo Trials. Askew further argued that "the Great Massacre School has thus been forced into the (unusual) position of criticising a work that argues for a larger death toll."[34]

The book was never published in a translated Japanese language edition. Problems with translation efforts surfaced immediately after a contract was signed for the Japanese publishing of the book. A Japanese literary agency informed Chang that several Japanese historians declined to review the translation, and that one professor backed out due to pressure placed on his family from "an unknown organization".[26] According to Japan scholar, Ivan P. Hall,[35] revisionist historians in Japan organised a committee of right-wing scholars to condemned the book with repeated appearances at the Foreign Correspondents' Club in Tokyo and throughout Japan. They prevailed on Kashiwa Shobo, the contracted Japanese publisher of the book, to insist that Chang edit the book for "corrections" they wanted made, to delete photographs and alter maps, and also to publish a rebuttal to Chang's book. Chang disagreed with the changes and, as a result, withdrew the Japanese publishing of the book. The rebuttal piece was published in the form of a 288-page book, titled A study of The Rape of Nanking, written by Nobukatsu Fujioka, an education professor at Tokyo University,[36] and Shudo Higashinakano, Professor of Intellectual History at Asia University.[37][38]

Higashinakano pointed out 90 historical factual errors in the first 64 pages of The Rape of Nanking, some of which were corrected in the 1998 Penguin Books edition of the book. Amongst the mistakes that were pointed out, for example, the book stated that for "250 years Japanese military technology failed to advance beyond the bow and sword", but Japan had actually been producing their own guns since rifles were introduced to the country. Another mistake that was pointed out was that the book had referred to Matthew C. Perry as "Commander Matthew Perry" when he was actually a commodore and should be referred to as "Commodore Matthew Perry".[39] As further criticism of Chang's book, Higashinakano argued, in an opinion column that appeared in Sankei Shimbun, that the book was "pure baloney", that there was "no witness of illegal executions or murders", and that "there existed no 'Rape of Nanking' as alleged by the Tokyo Trial."[37]

References

  1. ^ "A Brief Biography of Iris Chang" (PDF). Global Alliance for Preserving the History of WW II in Asia. Retrieved 2007-07-27.
  2. ^ a b c d e f "Historian Iris Chang won many battles/The war she lost raged within". SFGate. 2005-04-17. Retrieved 2007-07-22. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  3. ^ "Ted Leonsis Takes a Sharp Turn". The Washington Post. 2006-07-31. Retrieved 2007-07-22. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  4. ^ a b c d Iris Chang (1998). The Rape of Nanking. Penguin Books. ISBN 0-465-06835-9.
  5. ^ a b "Proposal for The Nanking Conference at Princeton University" (PDF). Princeton University. Retrieved 2007-07-23.
  6. ^ a b "The Rape of Nanking". Penguin Group USA. Retrieved 2007-07-22.
  7. ^ a b c d e f "Wars of Memory". SFGate. 1998-07-26. Retrieved 2007-07-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  8. ^ "Rabe's Records of "The Rape of Nanjing" Discovered". The Chinese University of Hong Kong. 1996-09-26. Retrieved 2007-07-23. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  9. ^ a b "American Goddess at the Rape of Nanking". Southern Illinois University. Retrieved 2007-07-23.
  10. ^ Malcolm Trevor (2001). Japan: Restless Competitor. Routledge. p. 121. ISBN 1903350026.
  11. ^ John Rabe (1998). The Good Man of Nanking: The Diaries of John Rabe. Random House. ISBN 037540211X.
  12. ^ "Scarred by history: The Rape of Nanjing". BBC News. 2005-04-11. Retrieved 2007-07-27. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  13. ^ "An American hero in Nanking". Asia Times. 2002-08-24. Retrieved 2007-07-27. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  14. ^ Forward by William C. Kirby, in: Iris Chang (1998). The Rape of Nanking. Penguin Books. ISBN 0-465-06835-9.
  15. ^ "Ross Terrill". Basic Books. Retrieved 2007-07-21.
  16. ^ a b Quotes on the Jacket and Interior of - Iris Chang (1998). The Rape of Nanking. Penguin Books. ISBN 0-465-06835-9.
  17. ^ "Beatrice S. Bartlett". Yale University. Retrieved 2007-07-21.
  18. ^ "Joshua A. Fogel". Sino-Japanese Studies. Retrieved 2007-07-22.
  19. ^ Joshua A. Fogel (1998). "Reviewed Work". The Journal of Asian studies. 57 (3): 818–820. Retrieved 2007-07-21. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
  20. ^ "Timothy M. Kelly". University of Kentucky. Retrieved 2007-07-21.
  21. ^ Timothy M. Kelly (2000). "Book Review: The Rape of Nanking by Iris Chang". Edogawa Women's Junior College Journal (15). {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
  22. ^ "Robert Entenmann". St. Olaf College. Retrieved 2007-07-23.
  23. ^ "Book review of The Rape of Nanking". University of the West of England. Retrieved 2007-07-23.
  24. ^ "San Francisco Chronicle refused to publish Iris Chang's rebuttal". VikingPhoenix.com. 1999-06-18. Archived from the original on 2001-03-05. Retrieved 2007-07-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  25. ^ a b "Iris Chang's Letter to the San Francisco Chronicle". IrisChang.net. Retrieved 2007-07-21.
  26. ^ a b "History's Shadow Foils Nanking Chronicle". The New York Times (article hosted by IrisChang.net). 1999-05-20. Retrieved 2007-07-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  27. ^ a b "One final victim of the Rape of Nanking?". Times Online. 2005-03-17. Retrieved 2007-07-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  28. ^ a b c "Chinese American writer found dead in South Bay". SFGate. 2004-11-11. Retrieved 2007-07-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  29. ^ "Media Praise For The Rape of Nanking". IrisChang.net. Retrieved 2007-07-21.
  30. ^ "WWW Memorial Hall of the Victims in the Nanjing Massacre". The Chinese University of Hong Kong. Retrieved 2007-07-23.
  31. ^ a b "Iris Chang's suicide stunned those she tried so hard to help -- the survivors of Japan's 'Rape of Nanking'". SFGate. 2004-11-20. Retrieved 2007-07-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  32. ^ "LDP-DPJ group plan to scrutinize 'Rape of Nanking'". The Japan Times. 2007-02-23. Retrieved 2007-07-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  33. ^ "Nanjing Massacre Disputed Again!". CHGS Newsletter. 3 (1). University of Minnesota Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies. 2000. Retrieved 2007-07-21.
  34. ^ "The Nanjing Incident". electronic journal of contemporary japanese studies. 2002-04-04. Retrieved 2007-07-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  35. ^ "Ivan P. Hall". Japan Review Net. Retrieved 2007-07-22.
  36. ^ "Nobukatsu Fujioka". University of Tokyo. Retrieved 2007-07-22.
  37. ^ a b "California State Assembly Should Indict the Atomic Bomb Droppings on Japan". Association for Advancement of Unbiased View of History. 1999-09-05. Retrieved 2007-07-22. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  38. ^ "Japan and the U.S.: Sidelining the Heterodox". Japan Policy Research Institute. 2002. Retrieved 2007-07-22. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
  39. ^ "Thanks for correcting some mistakes". Association for Advancement of Unbiased View of History. Retrieved 2007-07-22.

External links

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