The Burdens of Survival

"Although still virtually unknown in the West, Ooka Shohei (1909-1988) is one of Japan's most important and influential writers and social critics. The Burdens of Survival is both a seminal English-language study of this preeminent literary figure and one of the first scholarly works to thoroughly examine the war literature of a major Japanese veteran-author. Drawing on Robert Jay Lifton's work on traumatic experience and survivor psychology, the book tells the illuminating story of Ooka's arduous journey that began with guilt-ridden survival as a prisoner of war in the Phillipines and culminated some twenty-five years later in the fruitful completion of survivor mission.". "This multidisciplinary study will be of interest to students of modern Japanese literature and those concerned with Japanese perspectives on the Pacific War, trauma studies, the application of psychological theory to literary analysis, and military history."--BOOK JACKET.