Listen to the Voices from the Sea: Writings of the Fallen Japanese Students

Rating:
Summary: A Dramatic Anti-War Book From Japan
Review: Dr. Midori Yamanouchi's translation of this post World War II collection of letters is brilliant. The work is a deeply moving collection of diaries written by young Japanese soldiers who gave their lives in a series of battles going from China, through the Pacific to the skies closer to Japan. Many of them were cultivated young university students, full of life and dreams, reflecting on the beauty of life, the love of their families and the painful duty that was their lot. These are sad voices, the now stilled voices of tragedy. Overall, an insight into war and the human spirit that rivals such western classics as "The Red Badge of Courage" or "All Quiet on the Western Front". Generations often forget the 'sins' of the past. Reading this book - now in English - may just remind us to avoid the trajedy of war at all costs.

Rating:
Summary: Fresh Perspectives On Japanese Militarism
Review: Professors Yamanouchi & Quinn offer a much needed corrective to the five-decade old demonization of the Japanese soldier. This evocative, poetic, and compelling collection of soldiers' letters strikes down the dusty image of Japan's warriors as mindless, unthinking fanatics. In this volume we discover an entirely new and fresh insight into the mind-set and attitudes of young sailors, soldiers, and airmen who died in the service of Japan. The reader cannot help but be impressed by the sensitivity of these young men, by their literary yearnings, by their touching hopes for their families and futures, by the lyrical portraits they paint of even the grim and dangerous settings to which the war brought them. No little debt is owed to the editors for their masterful translation of these letters into useful and understandable American idiom. This is a rare and unforgettable reading experience which illuminates once again the common threads which bind humanity.

Rating:
Summary: Fresh Perspectives On Japanese Militarism
Review: Professors Yamanouchi & Quinn offer a much needed corrective to the five-decade old demonization of the Japanese soldier. This evocative, poetic, and compelling collection of soldiers' letters strikes down the dusty image of Japan's warriors as mindless, unthinking fanatics. In this volume we discover an entirely new and fresh insight into the mind-set and attitudes of young sailors, soldiers, and airmen who died in the service of Japan. The reader cannot help but be impressed by the sensitivity of these young men, by their literary yearnings, by their touching hopes for their families and futures, by the lyrical portraits they paint of even the grim and dangerous settings to which the war brought them. No little debt is owed to the editors for their masterful translation of these letters into useful and understandable American idiom. This is a rare and unforgettable reading experience which illuminates once again the common threads which bind humanity.