Memory and History

I went to Davidson last night to hear a lecture by a professor of history from Columbia University, Dr. Carol Gluck, who specializes in Japanese history. She spoke on "Past Obsessions: World War II in History and Memory." She distinguished memory carefully from history, but noted that memory colors history. It is interesting that the East and West German museums have been closed, and replaced by a museum which has been in planning for 16 years: the German Museum, in Berlin. The story told is the Western one.

I remembered a dinner I had 12 years ago like it was yesterday, because the content was so chilling. I was at a medical meeting, and ate dinner with a kindly Japanese pathologist who had also just arrived that evening. He was older, approaching retirement. While discussing recent medical discoveries, I mentioned what a miracle I thought it was, for Japanese and American scientists and doctors to work together so effectively, when only 50 years ago there was such a horrible war between our countries. The Japanese pathologist said, "Yes, but we had to react like that. The British, Dutch, and Americans had cut off our oil supplies, and we had to react. It was self-preservation, you see?"

Was this guy some Rip Van Winkle Japanese soldier, plucked from the jungles of Saipan?
Dr. Gluck noted that his response was the one taught to his Japanese generation. In contrast, she noted, many Japanese youth today are glibly unaware that Japan was ever in a war with America.