Japan in War and Peace: Essays on History, Culture and Race

Business & Money

Dower, John W.

Economics

HarperCollins Publishers, Ltd

Japan’s brilliant and influential postwar photographer Shomei Tomatsu (b. 1930) has created some of the most dramatic images in the history of photography. Many of his photographs have become icons of the twentieth century. This important book is the first in-depth English-language study of Tomatsu’s work. Richly illustrated and handsomely designed, it features more than one hundred plates representingin ten thematic sectionsthe full range of his career.
Tomatsu emerged in the 1950s with his sensitive pictures of postwar Japan. In the 1960s the artist turned his camera to the aftermath of the atomic bomb and the lingering presence of the U. S. military in his homeland. In subsequent decades his lens has captured the elation of Japan’s economic boom and the problems inspired by his culture’s increasing westernization. Throughout, Tomatsu’s pictures have consistently resonated not only with Japanese society but also with American culture. Included in this book are essays by distinguished scholars on all aspects of the artist’s life and career as well as a selection of brief excerpts from Tomatsu’s own writings, many of which have never appeared in English.
Skin of the Nation (the book’s subtitle) is both a literal and metaphorical reference to the surfaces that have appeared in countless pictures throughout Tomatsu’s career. For the artist, skin is more than just a surface, it is a kind of map in which one can read the story of Japanits essence and its future.

Shomei Tomatsu: Skin of the Nation

Arts & Photography

Rubinfien, Leo

Phillips, Sandra S.

Shomei Tomatsu

Photography & Video

Yale University Press

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the 1999 National Book Award for Nonfiction, finalist for the Lionel Gelber Prize and the Kiriyama Pacific Rim Book Prize, Embracing Defeat is John W. Dower's brilliant examination of Japan in the immediate, shattering aftermath of World War II. Drawing on a vast range of Japanese sources and illustrated with dozens of astonishing documentary photographs, Embracing Defeat is the fullest and most important history of the more than six years of American occupation, which affected every level of Japanese society, often in ways neither side could anticipate. Dower, whom Stephen E. Ambrose has called "America's foremost historian of the Second World War in the Pacific," gives us the rich and turbulent interplay between West and East, the victor and the vanquished, in a way never before attempted, from top-level manipulations concerning the fate of Emperor Hirohito to the hopes and fears of men and women in every walk of life. Already regarded as the benchmark in its field, Embracing Defeat is a work of colossal scholarship and history of the very first order. John W. Dower is the Elting E. Morison Professor of History at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is a winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for War Without Mercy.

Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II

History

Asia

W.W.Norton&Company

Finalist for the 2010 National Book Award in Nonfiction: The Pulitzer Prize-winning historian returns with a groundbreaking comparative study of the dynamics and pathologies of war in modern times. Over recent decades, John W. Dower, one of America’s preeminent historians, has addressed the roots and consequences of war from multiple perspectives. In War Without Mercy (1986), winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award, he described and analyzed the brutality that attended World War II in the Pacific, as seen from both the Japanese and the American sides. Embracing Defeat (1999), winner of numerous honors including the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award, dealt with Japan’s struggle to start over in a shattered land in the immediate aftermath of the Pacific War, when the defeated country was occupied by the U.S.-led Allied powers. Turning to an even larger canvas, Dower now examines the cultures of war revealed by four powerful events―Pearl Harbor, Hiroshima, 9-11, and the invasion of Iraq in the name of a war on terror. The list of issues examined and themes explored is wide-ranging: failures of intelligence and imagination, wars of choice and “strategic imbecilities,” faith-based secular thinking as well as more overtly holy wars, the targeting of noncombatants, and the almost irresistible logic―and allure―of mass destruction. Dower’s new work also sets the U.S. occupations of Japan and Iraq side by side in strikingly original ways. One of the most important books of this decade, Cultures of War offers comparative insights into individual and institutional behavior and pathologies that transcend “cultures” in the more traditional sense, and that ultimately go beyond war-making alone. 122 black-and-white illustrations

Cultures of War: Pearl Harbor / Hiroshima / 9-11 / Iraq

Military

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the 1999 National Book Award for Nonfiction, finalist for the Lionel Gelber Prize and the Kiriyama Pacific Rim Book Prize, Embracing Defeat is John W. Dower's brilliant examination of Japan in the immediate, shattering aftermath of World War II. Drawing on a vast range of Japanese sources and illustrated with dozens of astonishing documentary photographs, Embracing Defeat is the fullest and most important history of the more than six years of American occupation, which affected every level of Japanese society, often in ways neither side could anticipate. Dower, whom Stephen E. Ambrose has called "America's foremost historian of the Second World War in the Pacific," gives us the rich and turbulent interplay between West and East, the victor and the vanquished, in a way never before attempted, from top-level manipulations concerning the fate of Emperor Hirohito to the hopes and fears of men and women in every walk of life. Already regarded as the benchmark in its field, Embracing Defeat is a work of colossal scholarship and history of the very first order. John W. Dower is the Elting E. Morison Professor of History at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is a winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for War Without Mercy. 75 illustrations and map

Finalist for the 2010 National Book Award in Nonfiction and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize: “A thought-provoking . . . book about the way events echo―and mis-echo―down the corridors of history.”―Financial Times Over recent decades, John W. Dower, one of America’s preeminent historians, has addressed the roots and consequences of war from multiple perspectives. In War Without Mercy (1986), winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award, he described and analyzed the brutality that attended World War II in the Pacific, as seen from both the Japanese and the American sides. Embracing Defeat (1999), winner of numerous honors including the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award, dealt with Japan’s struggle to start over in a shattered land in the immediate aftermath of the Pacific War, when the defeated country was occupied by the U.S.-led Allied powers. Turning to an even larger canvas, Dower now examines the cultures of war revealed by four powerful events―Pearl Harbor, Hiroshima, 9-11, and the invasion of Iraq in the name of a war on terror. The list of issues examined and themes explored is wide-ranging: failures of intelligence and imagination, wars of choice and “strategic imbecilities,” faith-based secular thinking as well as more overtly holy wars, the targeting of noncombatants, and the almost irresistible logic―and allure―of mass destruction. Dower’s new work also sets the U.S. occupations of Japan and Iraq side by side in strikingly original ways. One of the most important books of this decade, Cultures of War offers comparative insights into individual and institutional behavior and pathologies that transcend “cultures” in the more traditional sense, and that ultimately go beyond war-making alone. 122 black-and-white illustrations

Americas

John Dower's War Without Mercy describes the ugly racial dimensions of the conflict in the Asian theater of World War II and their consequences on both military and reconstruction policy in the Pacific. "In the United States and Britain," Dower reminds us, "the Japanese were more hated than the Germans before as well as after Pearl Harbor.

War Without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War

Faber and Faber

Embracing Defeat: Japan In The Wake Of World War II (Turtleback School & Library Binding Edition)

Turtleback

Yoshida was a fascinating character. As a classical colonialist of the British school he did not as a Japanese consul mind at all Japanese encrouchement upon China (after all the Western powers all did the same), but what he did mind was conflict with the UK and US over spheres of influence there, which he desperately tried to avoid. The Brits tried to give him a fair hearing in order to seek compromise with Japan, since they did not fight war at two fronts. But then it increasingly became clear that Yoshida had become a freelancer without authority to talk on behalf of Tokyo. Dismissed into retirement by MoFA he was soon ignored ignomiously. He continued to plot cautiously for peace negotiations (for which the Allies were unavailable) and then for surrender, until the Kempetai got wind of this and briefly threw him into jail. This qualification endeared him to MacArthur and SCAP to make him postwar PM of Japan, a task which he fulfilled against all odds twice. This is a first rate, th

Empire and Aftermath: Yoshida Shigeru and the Japanese Experience, 1878-1954 (Harvard East Asian Monographs)

Biographies & Memoirs

Leaders & Notable People

Harvard Univ Pr

Embracing Defeat tells the story of the transformation of Japan under American occupation after World War II. When Japan surrendered unconditionally to the Allied Forces in August 1945 it was exhausted; while America's Pacific combat lasted less than four years Japan had been fighting for 15. 60 percent of its urban area lay in ruins. Through the collapse of the authoritarian state and America's six-year occupation Japan was able to set off in entirely new directions. Because the victors had no linguistic or cultural access to the losers' society they were obliged to govern indirectly. General Douglas MacArthur decided at the outset to maintain the civil bureaucracy and the institution of the emperor: democracy would be imposed from above in what the author terms "Neocolonial Revolution". His description of the manipulation of public opinion as a wedge was driven between the discredited militarists and Emperor Hirohito is especially fascinating. Tojo, on trial for his life, was requested to take responsibility for the war and deflect it from the emperor; he did and was hanged. John W. Dower's analysis of popular Japanese culture of the period--songs, magazines, advertising, even jokes--is brilliant and reflected in the book's 80 well-chosen photographs. With the same masterful control of voluminous material and clear writing that he gave us in War Without Mercy the author paints a vivid picture of a society in extremis and reconstructs the extraordinary period during which America moulded a traumatised country into a freemarket democracy and bulwark against resurgent world communism. --John Stevenson

W.W. Norton & Co., Inc.

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Books by Dower, John W.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Dower, John W.. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Japan in War and Peace: Essays on History, Culture and Race

Shomei Tomatsu: Skin of the Nation

Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II

Cultures of War: Pearl Harbor / Hiroshima / 9-11 / Iraq

Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II

Cultures of War: Pearl Harbor / Hiroshima / 9-11 / Iraq

War Without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War

Embracing Defeat: Japan In The Wake Of World War II (Turtleback School & Library Binding Edition)

Empire and Aftermath: Yoshida Shigeru and the Japanese Experience, 1878-1954 (Harvard East Asian Monographs)

Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II