Research Catalog

Title

Evil men / James Dawes.

Author

Dawes, James, 1969-

Publication

• Cambridge, Massachusetts : Harvard University Press, [2013]
• ©2013

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

xiv, 263 pages; 22 cm

Summary

"Presented with accounts of genocide and torture, we ask how people could bring themselves to commit such horrendous acts. A searching meditation on our all-too-human capacity for inhumanity, Evil Men confronts atrocity head-on--how it looks and feels, what motivates it, how it can be stopped. Drawing on firsthand interviews with convicted war criminals from the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945), James Dawes leads us into the frightening territory where soldiers perpetrated some of the worst crimes imaginable: murder, torture, rape, medical experimentation on living subjects. Transcending conventional reporting and commentary, Dawes's narrative weaves together unforgettable segments from the interviews with consideration of the troubling issues they raise. Telling the personal story of his journey to Japan, Dawes also lays bare the cultural misunderstandings and ethical compromises that at times called the legitimacy of his entire project into question. For this book is not just about the things war criminals do. It is about what it is like, and what it means, to befriend them. Do our stories of evil deeds make a difference? Can we depict atrocity without sensational curiosity? Anguished and unflinchingly honest, as eloquent as it is raw and painful, Evil Men asks hard questions about the most disturbing capabilities human beings possess, and acknowledges that these questions may have no comforting answers."--Publisher's website.

Subject

• 1937-1945
• Sino-Japanese War, 1937-1945 > Atrocities > Psychological aspects
• Sino-Japanese War, 1937-1945 > Personal narratives, Japanese
• War criminals > Japan > Interviews
• War criminals > Psychology
• War crimes > Psychological aspects
• Guerre sino-japonaise, 1937-1945 > Atrocités > Aspect psychologique
• Crimes de guerre > Aspect psychologique
• Psychological aspects
• Atrocities
• Atrocities > Psychological aspects
• War criminals
• War criminals > Psychology
• Gewaltdelikt
• Grausamkeit
• Japanisch-Chinesischer Krieg
• Soldat
• Japaner
• Sino-Japanese War, 1937-1945 > Personal narratives, Japanese
• Japan

Genre/Form

• Interview
• Personal Narrative
• interviews.
• Personal narratives
• Interviews
• Personal narratives – Japanese
• Interviews.
• Récits personnels.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (pages 227-254) and index.

Contents

Preface -- Evil Men -- Notes -- Acknowledgments -- Index.

ISBN

• 9780674072657
• 0674072650
• 9780674416796
• 0674416791

LCCN

• 2012038236
• 40022208895
• 99952887793

OCLC

• 812067687
• SCSB-10175744

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library