DISQUS

archangel · 6 months ago

did the authors mention in the index, Violet Chang, who had begun the quintessential work on Bataan just six years ago? She was the author of the acclaimed Rape of Nanking, a young mother. She struggled to interview survivors of the march from Bataan, and ... well, there is much more to the story of a lone author bearing up under the unbearable stories of many survivors who went through hell's hell in Asia during the horror-war there, including Bataan. There is the reality of post-secondary trauma. Disaster workers often are affected by it, any professional who works with people who have experienced the unspeakable.

It would have been a debt of honor to mention Chang, for she was not able, given years of laboring neck-deep in horrific stories of survivors, herself, to complete the work. She took her life at age 34, in 2004...

you can read one account of her life at wikipedia

dr.e

D. E.Rodriguez · 6 months ago

I do not remember her from the text of the book. She is not in the index, but I haven't gone through the voluminous notes yet.

Thanks for mentioning her.

D.

D. E.Rodriguez · 6 months ago

dr. E,

I received the following information from the authors:

"Thank you very much for your support of the book and for sending along Dr. Estés inquiry. We did not know Iris Chang personally, but of course read her book, "The Rape of Nanking" along the way, and when we were in Japan, we heard a lot of comment on the book from the some twenty-five former Imperial Army soliders we interviewed. We've also read other books on the Nanking and critiques of Iris's work. Indeed, one of the most powerful books about the Japanese Army and what led up to Nanking was written by Tatsuzo Ishikawa who, as a writer assigned to the IJA, traveled with the Japanese troops in 1938 on their way to Nanking. Soldiers Alive is both chilling and prescient. Iris began her work on Bataan several years after we began our project; in fact I think she was contacting some of the same sources we'd interviewed. So we were indeed curious about her progress. To lose anyone so young under such circumstances was both sad and tragic, especially for her family. Her notes and interviews were turned over to another writer we know very well, Joe Galloway. I don't think Joe is going to proceed with the project. It's always hard for one writer to walk around in another's shoes. I think Iris would have liked Tears In The Darkness, would have found that while it also offered the Japanese point of view, it made the wages of war and the devastating consequences of atrocity very clear. At least we hope she would have liked it. Again, thank you very much for your support of our work.

Michael Norman and Elizabeth M. Norman"


Dorian de Wind

nalogan1925 · 6 months ago

I was disappointed in examining the references to find that the Normans apparently were not aware of one of the best accounts of the Bataan Death March and its aftermath that is contained in the memoir written immediately after he was freed [written while recuperating for a year in the hospitals from the injuries imposed on his body by the brutal Japs] by Dr. Alfred Abraham Weinstein and bearing the title "Barbed Wire Surgeon", published The Macmillan Company, 1947, 310 pages.

There is an excellent New York Times review at

http://select.nytimes.com/mem/archive/pdf?res=F...

which was written by an older doctor who died in 1970.

It is a pathetic comment on our appreciation of the contribution of such men as Dr Weinstein that the Atlanta (GA) public library no longer lists in its holding this book by one of Atlanta's leading citizens in the period just after World War II. With librarians discarding from their shelves books that are not in active circulation, future generations are being denied access to the great contributions of men like Dr. Weinstein.

emn · 5 months ago

Dear Mr. Logan,

Thank you for getting in touch with me. I have been a long time fan of Barbed Wire Surgeon and read it many times when I wrote I my first book on Bataan, We Band Of Angels. The nurse in that book whom I became very close too, Helen Cassiani Nestor,told me many stories about Dr. Weinstein. She worked with him on Bataan and knew him well. He was a gifted surgeon who possessed a wonderful sense of humor and a deep commitment to his patients. I am so pleased you know and are a "fan" of his book with me . We used 3400 articles, books and diaries in writing Tears in the Darkness and our reference list included only those book etc that we quoted directly in the text. In no way did we intentionally exclude this fine, fine memoir. I would recommend to any one, any time.


Sincerely,
Elizabeth Norman

Oyajidesu · 5 months ago

We may forgive, but we certainly do not forget. My cousin was with the 200th Coastal Artillery (New Mexico National Guard) - the first to fire and the last to surrender at Bataan. He survived the Death March, Camp O'Donnell, Cabanatuan, The Hell Ships, Japan and finally died of exhaustion digging coal in Mukden, China as a slave laborer for Mitsubishi. His death was only a few weeks before liberation and VJ Day.

Of the 1,850+ New Mexicans that went to the Philippines in October 1941, approximately 600 were alive at VJ Day in August 1945 and only about 300 were still alive in 1946.

I believe that my cousin would have forgiven his Japanese tormentors. His mother did and prayed for the Japanese mothers who had lost their sons, but who never knew their fates. Better people than me.

I only wish that his story could have been written.