Feb 05, 2016 07:45 PM
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This wasa readability story that really good Fourteen years of war, ending with the comprehensive destruction of a dozen major cities, would have exhausted any nation. It utterly drained and devastated the nascent modern economy of Japan. Nevertheless, a mere forty years later, many Americans again identified Japan as the enemy, because of its seeming economic invincibility. dominant American role in this process is naturally interesting to American readers.
The overall impression Dower conveys is a curious admixture of arrogance, idealism, and realpolitik. The creation of the constitution is an apt illustration. Dissatisfied with the Japanese government's own progress toward reforming the Charter of the Meiji Restoration, the Americans, on MacArthur's orders, simply scrapped the document, wrote an entirely new constitution for Japan, and presented it to the political leaders as a fait accompli for them ts a narrative history. For his research, diaries; letters; photographs; popular songs, stories, books, and movies; and interviews with survivors. This was obviously a monumental undertaking, likely made possible only by Dower's Japanese wife and periodic residences in Japan.
The result is impressive not only as scholarship but also as storytelling, conveying a better sense of daily life than any number of official statistics. It seems a worthy recipient of the National Book Award. Based on this work, Dower belongs in an elite class-with Paul Johnson, Barbara Tuchman, and Daniel Boorstin-of serious historians who can engage non-historian readers.o rubber stamp, all in ONE WEEK.atlast that was a super defeat
