He includes quotes from them and also dedicates a chapter on their perception of America.
Sharp addresses the American standpoint on the Japanese at the time of WWII and the publication of Hersey’s “Hiroshima.” He says that the Americans at the time were essentially racist and hostile towards the Japanese and Hersey broke this popular view with his release of “Hiroshima.” “From Yellow Peril to Japanese Wasteland: John Hersey’s ‘Hiroshima’.” Twentieth Century Literature, 46.4 (2000): 434-52.
Writing Ground Zero: Japanese Literature and the Atomic Bomb. Treat provides criticisms on several works by Japanese authors about the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during the Second World War.Ĭhicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1995. As an American, he analyzes these works and how these authors represented the events of the bombings. In particular, I would like to focus on his criticism on the novel Black Rain by Masuji Ibuse, a work that, according to Treat, is moving due to its representation of typical characters that encounter an atypical catastrophe.
