Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II

“I’m very interested in that period of the occupation by largely American troops just after World War II. It’s one of the most extraordinary episodes in modern history. It was the first time that Japan was occupied in its own history, and the world that was created at that time shaped post-war Japan. I think the author, John Dower, has caught that period – with all its complexity and its absurdity and its benevolence and its dark sides – better than anyone else, even, as far as I know, in Japanese. It’s not only a great work of history, but it’s beautifully written. I think history writing at its best should be, and can be, a form of literature and this would be a good example.” Read more...

The best books on Japan

Ian Buruma, Journalist

This is a key study in the effects on the Japanese of the defeat of Japan by the United States in World War II. Japan would be occupied by the United States until 1952, its government overseen by the American general Douglas MacArthur. The Americans had dropped two atomic bombs on Japan, as well as firebombing Tokyo and yet, surprisingly, the occupation laid the groundwork for democracy, peace and, in the end, lasting prosperity for Japan.

Pearl Harbor Books