Iris Chang

The Rape of Nanking

the forgotten holocaust of World War II

The rape of Nanking

Jared stoll

“Power kills, absolute power kills absolutely”

a horrifying book but a must read. the forgotten asian holocaust. accountability in the form of literature 

claire sim qiu yan

Eva Ströberg

The Rape of Nanking - Iris Chang
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⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
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It took me awhile to finish this book, not because it was tedious to read as many non-fictions could be, but mostly because I needed some breather from what I read.
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The Rape of Nanking, or the Nanking massacre, it was dubbed as the forgotten Holocaust of WWII. Around 300.000 (if not more) Chinese were killed and raped between 1937-1938 when Japanese troops occupied the former capital but Japanese government never actually acknowledge the fact either, citing that was mere battle casualty. 
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The descriptions of the atrocities were horrendous and unthinkable. Chang did a thorough research for the book, all the interviews, documents, even experts’ views on why it happened.
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Growing up Indonesian, the tale of Japanese soldiers’ cruelty during the WWII was no stranger to us. It is indeed baffling how a nation that has entirely different image and excessive politeness culture at present could perform such cruelty in other time and situations. 
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It is a recommended read, despite the horrifying facts in the book that makes it almost unbearable to read. If we forget history, we are doomed to repeat it again.
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PS: The author committed suicide in 2004, 7 years after the book was released in 1997
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#irischang #therapeofnanking #bookstagram #currentlyreading #2023reads #americanauthor #asianamericanauthors

Jenny Qian

this book had such a profound impact on me, i was hating my journalism degree and this really incited a new-found passion for what i was studying at the time. i respect iris chang very much, she went through great lengths to capture real stories of the nanjing massacre. i was truly shocked at how horrendous the massacre was, and how brutal humanity can be. 

sm admiration for iris chang. 🪽

isa/bella

probably the best historical nonfiction i will ever read in my life. iris chang's genius is dazzling

Later this week I'll write up a review detailing why I've rated this 3 stars. In the meantime, know that this book concerns an important piece of history and is a decent introductory work about the massacres in Nanking. Definitely worth reading. 

Ashlyn

Savindi Jinasena

Cover Gushing Worthiness:I don’t think I need to elaborate on this cover because I think that the image of it is powerful enough for readers to know what the content in this book is going to be. I do think however that the sub-title of this book which is The Forgotten Holocaust of WWII should have been in larger font because I think this event is one of the most important historical events to occur in the twentieth century.

Review: will say that this book is by no means for the lighthearted. If people are going to pick up this book thinking that it is a lighthearted historical read, I’m sorry to burst the bubble because it most certainly is not. By the end of this book you will come out knowing more about the strain of Sino-Japanese relations, but you will also be emotionally distraught.

I have to say that I picked up the most unfortunate time to read this book because one of my classmates passed away and I only found out about her death last Friday. I was so rattled by that news and it didn't help that I was assigned a book about trauma and tragedy to read either.

Historically many people are unaware of the events of the Nanking massacre, simply because of the way it was reported because there were few reports that came out of Nanking when the massacres occurred. Some were quick to dismiss these tragic events while others succumbed to the power of the Japanese government’s propaganda and bribery machine unfortunately. In that respect Chang’s book has helped to shed light on the gruesome events which took place in Nanking for six weeks in 1937.

The Rape of Nanking is divided into three parts containing the origins of the event, media coverage, war crime trials and the current situation and people’s perceptions concerning the events of Nanking. This is a thoroughly well researched book which contains horrific photographs of the victims and the westerns who aided them, interviews, diary entries, some newspaper headlines/snippets of articles etc. It is obvious that Iris Chang wanted to shed light on the events of 1937 and she did so exceptionally.

The only reason I know about the Nanking massacre is because I've taken classes on East Asia and Modern China. If it were not for those classes I would have walked around clueless and I’m glad I know about the events.

As I said before this is a book that has literally left me in such an emotionally distressing state of mind. It’s frightening to think that human kind are capable of such cruelty and brutality. It is not that I haven’t been emotionally affected by reading about the holocaust or WWII but this book really shook me because I’m at an age where I understand the gravity of such acts. China and Japan have been countries that I've always admired, but after reading this book I don’t know what to think anymore. I think I was more horrified that the Japanese government would continue to deny the events that occurred in Nanking and try to vilify foreigners such as John Rabe or the doctors who stayed behind to assist the injured. What upset me more than anything were the pictures of some of the victims who were buried alive, raped and killed, burned, the list can go on. But what left me so disgusted was when I read that some of the soldiers laughed after raping women and killing them. For the life of me I couldn't believe humankind could be capable of such atrocities.

In the end what people, including myself have to understand is that those who committed and denied the horrors of Nanking are not the entire Japanese population. They are but a minority who happen to be in powerful positions in the governments. I don't know if this book was meant to be written with bias, but I truly believe that Iris Chang really wanted the world to know what happened in Nanking and have people express their opinions on it. She gave the voiceless a voice, even though ultimately she lost her own.

In 2004 Iris Chang committed suicide and left behind a two-year old Son and a loving husband. As sad as this sounds, I’m not surprised that Ms.Chang took her own life. If I was so upset reading the contents of this book, then I don’t want to imagine what it was like for her to research and write this book. When I spoke to my professor about wanting to do a paper on the events of Nanking his words to me were”Keep in mind the example of Iris Chang because this paper will be traumatic to write.” After hearing these words from him I’ve decided not to write my paper on the events of Nanking because I don’t think I’m emotionally capable of research and writing about these events again.

Overall as disturbing and upsetting as it was to read The Rape of Nanking it is a book that must be read because those who were victims of this senseless massacre deserve to have their voices heard. There were times where I wanted to put this book down because it was too much, but a part of me is glad that I read the whole book. It showed me what humanity is capable of, but it also gave me hope when I read the accounts of John Rabe. In the end there is at least a little light in those dark corners of our lives.

My Rating: 5/5

Would I recommend it? Yes, but not to the lighthearted.

Nelson Zagalo

Had Iris Chang not committed suicide in 2004, I probably would not have read her book "The Rape of Nanking" (1997). Chang was heavily attacked by Japan in the form of her discreditation, but that does not seem to have been the only reason for her demise. When she died she was working on the subject of the "Bataan Death March", another little known Japanese war crime. Reading "The Rape of Nanking" was one of my most violent reading experiences ever, twice I felt vomit rise in my throat. At the end of the book, you realise that many of those who survived that hell perished early shortly afterwards. This made me feel that perhaps our cognitive-emotional capacity is not prepared for such dissonance. To lead a normal life of human empathy while inwardly living with horrors of this calibre.

Published in Portuguese with links at:
https://virtual-illusion.blogspot.com...

雪 xue

how many times can a heart break? to nanjing, my first love.

The New York Times bestselling account of one of history's most brutal -- and forgotten -- massacres, when the Japanese army destroyed China's capital city on the eve of World War II In December 1937, one of the most horrific atrocities in the long annals of wartime barbarity occurred. The Japanese army swept into the ancient city of Nanking (what was then the capital of China), and within weeks, more than 300,000 Chinese civilians and soldiers were systematically raped, tortured, and murdered. In this seminal work, Iris Chang, whose own grandparents barely escaped the massacre, tells this history from three perspectives: that of the Japanese soldiers, that of the Chinese, and that of a group of Westerners who refused to abandon the city and created a safety zone, which saved almost 300,000 Chinese. Drawing on extensive interviews with survivors and documents brought to light for the first time, Iris Chang's classic book is the definitive history of this horrifying episode. "Chang vividly, methodically, records what happened, piecing together the abundant eyewitness reports into an undeniable tapestry of horror." - Adam Hochschild, Salon

The Forgotten Holocaust Of World War II

The Rape Of Nanking

Vivian

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

Mariel Adrianna de la Garza

It wasn't until my class on "Asia during World War II" that I learned about the atrocities which occurred at Nanking. The topic is glossed over in textbooks and should not be. The book itself is engaging and made even more so by the tragedy of Iris Chang's suicide, purportedly due in part to the stress and weight of what she went through and learned in writing the book.

China has endured much hardship in its history, as Iris Chang shows in her ably researched The Rape of Nanking, a book that recounts the horrible events in that eastern Chinese city under Japanese occupation in the late 1930s. Nanking, she writes, served as a kind of laboratory in which Japanese soldiers were taught to slaughter unarmed, unresisting civilians, as they would later do throughout Asia. Likening their victims to insects and animals, the Japanese commanders orchestrated a campaign in which several hundred thousand--no one is sure just how many--Chinese soldiers and noncombatants alike were killed. Chang turns up an unlikely hero in German businessman John Rabe, a devoted member of the Nazi party who importuned Adolf Hitler to intervene and stop the slaughter, and who personally saved the lives of countless residents of Nanking. She also suggests that the Japanese government pay reparations and apologize for its army's horrific acts of 60 years ago.

Rachel

The Rape of Nanking is a hard book to read. Its unsettling at times and just makes you hate people. Most of us Americans probably never heard about the Nanking Massacre when we learned about WWII, I remember vaguely learning Japan was invading China, but that was it. What the Japanese did to the Chinese is Nanking is horrific, it goes beyond war and there just no justifying it. The Japanese killed hundreds of thousands Chinese civilians in degrading and torturous ways within a matter of a few days. They raped thousands of women and mutilated their genitals, forced family members to watch and participate, and killed everyone once they were done. Iris Chang explains from 3 angles how the massacre happened, from the Japanese government side, the Chinese government and civilians and Western foreigners who stayed to document and help create a safety zone. She also shows how this event was handled immediately after and then how it was white washed away to the point many Japanese deny it ever happened despite photo proof. The Rape of Nanking is very well written, but I felt it didn’t go deep enough into it. It’s a good starting point and it’s goes full circle from cause, event, lasting effect.

The Rape of Nanking

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