Book Description
Requiem for Battleship Yamato is Yoshida Mitsuru's story of his own experience as a junior naval officer aboard the fabled Japanese battleship as it set out on a last, desperate sortie in April 1945. Yoshida was on the bridge during Yamato's fatal encounter with American airplanes, and his eloquent, moving account of that battle makes a singular contribution to the literature of the Pacific war.
The book has long been considered a classic in both Japan and the United States. As with most great battle stories, its ultimate concern is less bombs and bullets than human nature, less death than life. This sensitive translation by Richard Minear is totally faithful to Yoshida's original prose, its language vigorous and idiomatic yet poetic in nature. An informative introduction puts the work in historical and political context and discusses Yoshida's postwar search for the meaning of peace.
Customer Reviews:
poet in uniform.......2006-10-30
young, naive and inexperienced the author chronicles his one and only combat mission. relating his service on the japanese battleship 'yamato' author mitsuru gives perspective not only on what he does but on what he feels. fortunately for the reader mitsuru is an articulate writer who has had the opportunity to rewrite his recollections numerous times over the years before settling on this 'definitive' edition. the book runs as a subtle parallel of stories between the events happening around the author during war and what he thinks and feels as he faces his own mortality. an excellent perspective of man in conflict.
also worth noting is the outstanding translation and introduction by richard minear.
The title should be requiem for the sailors of the Yamato.......2006-02-01
This book is not for readers searching for details of battle, or apologies for participating in the miltary adventure against the US. Yoshida Mitsuru was an unlikely survivor of a suicide mission.
Some of the reviewers have found this book morbid, and focused on death. Mitsuru attempts to describe his feelings and unaswered question that haunted him for the rest of his life. Why was he saved, when so many other died? Was there a purpose to his life, and the life of his dead shipmates. These are questions that all men ask to some extent, but for those caught in a war, life and death are close and constant companions.
The normal thoughts of young men towards life and the future are put aside as their ship plows forward on a suicide mission.
Do not buy or read this book if you are not prepared to think about the personal cost of war. Some have described this as an anti-war book. I do not believe that is a correct description. This book is written by someone whose education and social standing required him to enter the Navy, and go to war. I view this work as a refection of an eyewitness and wounded survivor. Such an experience at such a young age makes one an expert on the war experience, not the root causes of war or their justifications.
Most men who shared Mitsuru's experience do not write, or even disuss their experiences. For some, just the thoughts of their experience is unbearable and the reason some end their days in mental hospitals.
When Mitsuru wrote the first draft of this book, it fell under the authority and censorship of the American Occupation, which did not approve of the text.
Which brings up the question not posed directly by this book. What "truths" were censored during the official investigations surrounding Pearl Harbor, the Bataan Death March, and other matters that impacted on the ledgends and careers of Americans of that time?
A Sailor Remembers.......2004-04-06
"Ours is the signal honor of being the nation's bulwark. One day we must prove ourselves worthy."
Requiem for Battleship Yamato is about sacrifice-immolation on the altar of national survival. It was written not to needlessly lionize the wanton sacrifice of combatants in order to bring to an end what one historian called "a war to establish and revive the stature of man." Instead, it was written, and properly so, as catharsis: Yoshida Mitsuru, as a 20-year old ensign on the bridge of the Yamato during its final voyage, had witnessed War, and thus wished that future generations would no longer be called upon to "prove themselves worthy," and to bear the burden of armed conflict.
Yoshida's prose satisfactorily captures the spirit on board the Yamato prior to its climactic encounter. Yet there is no way to adequately describe what the men of the Yamato went through during the ship's final hours. One author called it "a glorious way to die." Alternatively, the battle could be described as a nautical siege, a maritime battle of Troy. There is no apotheosis in death; death is merely a release from duty. During the battle, one man struggles to keep the deck clean by throwing overboard limbs severed by bomb shrapnel or machine-gun fire. Below decks, men grapple with the bodies of their comrades; once-inviting hot tubs (the Yamato has several of them, we are told) are filled to the brim with the ranks of the dead. In the bridge, officers are mowed down by machine-gun bullets. There is no sanctuary aboard the most massive dreadnought ever constructed.
This is a highly readable book, redolent with poignant memories, written by a man who had the courage to confront his phantoms. Through Yoshida's book, many souls who fought during the Pacific War found a voice.
"Three thousand corpses, still entombed today. What were their thoughts as they died?"
A true classic.......2004-03-15
Although perhaps unsurprising given the scale of Japan's losses and the bitterness of defeat, the fact remains that there are relatively few accounts of the war by those who fought with the Imperial Forces, and even fewer available in English.
For this reason alone `Requiem for Battleship Yamato' would command attention even if it were only an average work. But it is not an average work; it is a classic in the truest sense of this much abused word, which must be placed alongside books such as `The Last Enemy' by Richard Hillary.
Written in a spare, almost poetic style, `Requiem' tells the story of the Yamato's last doomed sortie from the viewpoint of one of her junior officers. Alongside glimpses of life on board the great battleship, we gain an insight into the thoughts and personal lives of her crew as they prepare for what most realise will be a mission from which there will be no return.
As the tension mounts and enemy forces close in for the inevitable kill, Yoshida provides a moving commentary on the Yamato's last days and hours, with poignant vignettes of such figures as the force commander Vice Admiral Ito, who had correctly appreciated the futility of the mission yet carried out his task with calm resolution.
With the Yamato entering her final death agony, Yoshida gives us harrowing descriptions of the effects of explosives and steel on human flesh - a timely reminder in this age of glossy propaganda of the true face of battle. Then there is the homecoming, with Yoshida's personal struggle to come to terms with the meaning of his survival while so many of his comrades are dead.
No review of this book would be complete without acknowledging the outstanding work of its translator, Richard Minear, who has also provided an excellent introduction. Thanks to his efforts, this work will not only be read with profit by the military historian, but anyone who seeks to broaden his understanding of the human condition.
High Tragedy and Futility in the Pacific...........2003-07-19
In the 1950's and 60's, Japanese memoirs of the Pacific War flooded forth from the publishers. Saburo Sakai's "Samurai", Hara's "Japanese Destroyer Captain," Mochitsura Hashimoto's "Sunk!" are just the tip of the spear. But Yoshida's "Requiem for Battleship Yamato" is simply in a class by itself. The youngest officer on board the mighty battleship, he was present when the giant was ordered on her suicide sortie. Escorted by the anti-aircraft cruiser Yahagi and numerous destroyers in April 1945, Yamato's mission was sublimely ridiculous: sail down toward the Ryuku Islands (where a massive American task force was staging the invasion of Okinawa), attack the landing force, beach itself, expend all weapons and ammunition, then the surviving crew members would join the garrison in Okinawa's defense. It was no surprise that the force didn't even make it halfway before being annihilated by U.S. planes. Yoshida's book is poetic and is beautifully translated by Richard Minnear who also provides a superb introduction as well. Yoshida's account of the American air attacks which inevitably shattered the Yamato, the Yahagi and most of the escorting destroyers come off as not combat, but high slaughter. Veterans who survived idiotic orders and suicide charges will find a spiritual brother in Yoshida. Don't be surprised if you have a tear in your eye for the brave crews of these ships as you close this book for the last time.
Written as a tribute to his shipmates, "Requiem" is also a powerful anti-war book.
Book Description
Written by a team of leading scholars, this richly illustrated book, with over 200 colour and black and white pictures, presents an authoritative and comprehensive history of the Crusades from the preaching of the First Crusade in 1095 to the legacy of crusading ideas and imagery today.
Customer Reviews:
Historical facts. No more........2006-11-09
This is a very important book for people who want to know the facts without stories of romance and chivalry. It is very well organized with chapters dedicated to all the aspects of life from the time of the Crusades, aspects ranging from the military orders in various periods of time to the evolution of crusading literature. I recommend this book for people who need an overview of the period of the Crusades. It is also advisable, in order to comprehend the whole picture of the Crusades, to read opinions from the Muslim side. A very good book in this region is "Arab Historians of the Crusades" (The Islamic World Series) by Francesco Gabrieli.
High-gloss paper w/ a straight-forward approach to the Crusades.......2006-03-24
This is an intro book to the Crusades.
What I liked about The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades was it's very 'neat' look at history. It is a clean-cut array of events in prose form, with several pictures and illustrations, without moral position taken. This way, the reader can use the information given and put it into a context of discussion and a wider analysis of the time period covered. The only down-side was probably that, having used it in a classroom setting, I felt almost as if it were too 'story-book', too illustrative. The information, however, is substantial.
An excellent tome on the crusades to begin your historical journey!.......2006-01-10
The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades introduced me to several aspects of the military campaigns and enduring influences they had which I had never been exposed. I have read other books on this topic and have learned a great deal, however, additional topics such as poetry, song and architecture were items which up until my reading of this book I had not even considered. After reading this book you will realize as perhaps as I that one has merely scratched the surface of Crusade history. I highly recommend this source if you would be interested in getting a bigger and better picture of this often misunderstood and oft-maligned period of history in western civilization.
Not a book for the general public.......2005-07-04
On the back cover you can read: "written by a team of leading scholars, this richly illustrated book.....presents an authoritative and comprehensive history of the Crusades from the preaching of the First Crusade in 1905 to the legacy of crusading ideas and imaginery today".
In fact it is a book written by scholars for scholars only and it is very different from the other many books about the Crusades that follow a cronological description of the history of the events that took place.
The book is composed of 15 chapters, written by different authors, that have little or no coordination at all, so it is no informative. The contents are very descriptive of the orientation of the book: ... Songs of the crusades, Architecture in the latin east, Images of the crusades in the 19th and 20th centuries, Revival and Survival (the orders today). As good scholars they authors also plague the book with a lot of fashionalbe, weird and mislead theories, very much repeated along the book like that the spanish reconquista was part of the crusades.
The book has many pictures, and some of the articles-chapters are interesting because they focus more deeply on a given issue, but it doesn't treat adequately the history of the crusades, the fears, pains, feats and ambitions of the crusaders, the way of life on the Holy Land, and the daily relationships between the several clashing cultures.
After reading the book you will not have a true picture about the flow of events that lead to the Crusades and their outcome. At the most it is a book for those that already have many other books on the subject, and want to have a look to its pictures and know a particular point of view of some of its authors.
Definitely not worth buying for the general public as one of the first readings.
Review of Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades.......2004-03-19
By:Jonathan Riley-Smith
Reviewed by:D. Wang
P.5
The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades is a book about you want and don't want to know about the crusades. The book's opening chapters aren't about the actual military action at all. It's about the minds of the crusaders, the songs of the time, the Latin East. It's not until chapter nine that military orders, movements, and actions are mentioned. The book concludes with a comparison of modern day events and the crusades.
I liked this book because of the sheer amount of information. on page 86 it says "Men and women, including elderly crusaders, came to Jerusalem to end their days. The charnel chambers in the Hospitallers' ruined twelfth-century cemetry-church at Alcheldamach, just outside Jersalem, are still filled with the bones of pious Christians." It is extremely doubtful you will find this variety of information in a textbook.
This book really took the effort to find all the information possible. An entire chapter of the book is devoted to songs about the crusade. There are not many books about a series of wars where an entire chapter is devouted to songs. The book puts a lot a information and visual material in 436 pages. It is very easy to be overwhelmed, and the authors should have made it easier to comprehend.
My favorite part of the book is the last chapter. "In a surprising development, however, the theology of force that underpinned crusading has been revived, especially in Latin America, by a militant wing of Christian Liberation." It is amzing how we humans fall from the same things over and over again, and this chapter previews of what might come. I like to compare our present to our past because it makes you realize how many times we've made the same mistake over and over again. Sometimes we just fail to take the past into consideration.
Book Description
This richly illustrated book tells the story of Christianity from its origins to the present day. Written by a team of scholars, all authorities in their fields, it spans 2000 years of colourful incident to give an uniquely authoritative history of Christianity for the general reader. Every aspect of the faith is explored. The introduction discusses Christian interpretations of the historical process, and the links and tensions between religious and artistic inspiration. The first section runs chronologically from the earliest Christian communities to 1800, and includes chapters on Eastern Christendom, Christianity and Islam, the Reformation, the Enlightenment, and the expansion of Christianity. The second section is divided by geographical area, and covers the period from 1800 to the present day. There are special studies of Britain and Europe, North America, South America, Africa, India, the Far East, and the Orthodox Churches of Eastern Europe. The final section 'Christianity Today and Tomorrow' considers questions of Christian theology, conscience and belief and explores new images of the Christian community, ending with a glimpse of the future of Christanity. Throughout, the book, reflects the changing world in which Christians have found themselves, and gives full weight to events and movements where the Christian response has been challenged and re-evaluated. There are over 350 illustrations, and 32 full colour plates, all specifically chosen to complement the broad-ranging text. Authoritative, comprehensive and highly readable, this book captures the richness and vitality of Christian art and thought in a wide variety of cultures and times.
Customer Reviews:
Very Good Overview of the Growth and Spread of Christianity.......2005-03-09
The Oxford folks have produced a very good overview of the Christian world from the death of Christ to the present time.
This book gives a good accounting of the major doctrinal and organizational challenges facing Christendom over the last two centuries as well as detailing its growth from a band of Jewish reformers to the world wide force it is today.
I would have liked a little more on the early rise and struggle of the church to find its place both doctrinally and in the Roman world, but this is a very solid book for someone wanting to explore the breadth of Christianity's two millennia.
A good overall history, but very Anglocentric........1999-12-22
I gave this book three stars because it has some very good qualities, and some qualities that detract from it. First, it offers a history of Christianity that neither focuses on the positive aspects nor on the negative aspects of the religion. Instead, it attempts to offer an objective retelling of the story of Christianity's spread. As far as this goes, I recommend this book.
There are two problems with this book, however. First, it is certainly very biased toward the British. Written by many English scholars, this is not terribly surprising considering their propensity for a superiority complex. But, if one can ignore this bias, and even laugh at it in some places, it does not take away from the learning experience of reading this book. What does harm this experinece are the assumptions that the authors make about the knowledge of their audience. I have a fairly good background in Christian history, and I read this to fill in some of the gaps. What I found were a lot of teasers to stories I did not know. The authors would mention some fairly obscure person or event without elaboration, expecting the reader to understand what he/she was talking about. This became quite annoying after awhile.
In conclusion, this book is a good read for anyone who wants to learn more about Christian history, but don't expect it to be comprehensive.
Book Description
This is the story of a book, but a book like no other.The Bible has been in continuous use for nearly 2000 years and the larger part-the Hebrew Bible or Old Testament- is much older. It has played a central role throughout western history, as a source of conflict at many levels, and inspirer of heroic acts of witness both individually and collectively. Today it continues to inspire people working for a better world and a better humanity. It is the single greatest influence on the development of English literature, and subject of some of the world's finest art and music. Yet, surprisingly, its actual contents vary across different versions and translations, and remain a matter for serious debate to the present day. Here a distinguished team of scholars presents an authoritative account of that story, richly illustrated, and bringing to bear the latest findings. It tells how and why a collection of writings in Semitic languages and Greek that we now call the Books of the Bible came to be written over a period of about 800 years; and how even before the Bible existed as one volume its constituent parts were interpreted and subjected to a scrutiny that no other writing has had to endure. The story traces the several routes whereby what was to be called the canon of Scripture was determined, and controversies surrounding which writings should be regarded as authoritative. It describes how over centuries the writings were copied, translated, and printed; how interpreted in Judaism and in the churches in the East and the West, and it concludes with surveys of how the Bible is being used today in feminist criticism, and in the movements for theological liberation in Latin America, Africa, and Europe.
Customer Reviews:
The Oxford Illustrated History of the Bible.......2007-05-14
I purchased this book looking for a guide to the actual history of hos the Bible came to be. This book delivered, sort of. It covered what I was looking for, but not in the depth that I really wanted. The collection of writers seem to know their subject matter, but the editing of putting together is somewhat lacking. It seems to be an overview of everything it sets out to define. There is no cross referencing or anything else that would make this a single-volume research book. At times the book is down right boring. Very nlittle is offered to captivate the reader's attention.
Yet the book is not without its merits. It gives the casual reader enough information to promote further study. It has very colorful artwork, though perhaps not enough (too many black and white copies of paintings). This book takes a dedicated reader to plow through it, but it may very well be rewarding for the right person.
Extremely dull writing, not for Biblical Studies per se.......2007-02-05
Similar books on the smae subject are written in a much more lively style. I've tried several times to read this book and just can't go on. So i've only read about one fourth of the book. The train of thought is hard to follow because the author goes of on some tangent, or clouds the main idea with insignificant and/or irrelevent details. It takes more concentration than I can muster to return to the main point of that section, if a main point can even be sorted out.
The book seems to focus more on how the Bible has been used through the centuries, and not so much about authorship and dating of the individual books. The book is not really about the Bible itself, but about the people and societies/organizations that have used it or been impacted by it throughout history. I belongs in the category of western/European history and not in the category of Biblical Studies. It might also abe categorized as History of Literature, or something like that.
My disclaimer: for the aforementioned reasons I've based this review on a quick parousal of the entire book and a more thourough reading of the first quarter of the text. I hope this helps.
History With an Agenda.......2004-07-20
This book started out meeting my expectations of discussion concerning how the Bible as we know it today has evolved since its conception. There is adequate discussion of the various versions and how they were produced and the abundant trials along the way for many of the first translators trying to get the Bible into the common masses' hands.
From there this book delves into textual criticism which is a logical course given that the Bible's various interpretations have much to do with the actions done in the name of God. This leads the authors to discuss how the Bible was/is used by its readership throughout history. I thought that there was not nearly enough discourse on the major threads of Christianity and Judaism, given the absolute importance of these denominations and Western civilization.
Finally, and discouragingly, the book ends with liberation theology with a main focus on feminism and African-American advances and here is where this book reads like a political agenda or a subtle apology. I found these issues a poor choice for the last 50 pages of the book. Should they have been ignored, probably not, but overkill comes to mind.
A mixed kettle of fish..........2001-07-09
Like The Bible itself, this volume is a library of `books'. It includes works of varying styles and topics, written by various authors, and collected under a single cover. This collection of 16 essays, by an assortment of writers, (in my opinion) makes for a patchwork approach. The articles vary wildly in quality and approach.
The photographs, color plates, woodcuts, and engravings are absolutely spectacular, and complement the adjacent text. It's a pity they are not numbered, but they ARE indexed (by page number and T,B,L,C,R locations) in an addendum curiously titled `Acknowledgement of Sources'.
The Oxford Illustrated History of the Bible is divided into four sections: (1) The Historical Background of the Making of the Bible; (2) Text and Translation of the Making of the Bible; (3) The Study and Use of the Bible; and (4) Contemporary Interpretation. My ratings of each subsection are: 5-star, 5-star, 4-star, and 1-star.
Starting with the first two sections dealing with the Making of the Bible, don't miss the contributions of Philip Davies, `The Apocrypha,' David Parker's `The New Testament'; and Stanley E. Porter's `Modern Translations'. Be aware however that Porter is solely concerned with translation of the Bible into English... those expecting coverage of any other focus will be sadly disappointed. One `chapter' I had looked forward to reading was `The Bible in the Eastern Churches'. Bebawi's essay on this topic was a total disappointment. It was especially sad, since the next article (by Philip Alexander, see below) was so well done!
Despite the fact that The Bible is 70 percent Old Testament and 30 percent New Testament, this book reflects a predictably disproportionate interest in Christianity. (Predictable because so many more people adhere to Christianity than to Judaism). Nonetheless, Philip Alexander's section, `The Bible in Judaism' is an excellent contribution. Geoffrey Khan's portion, `The Hebrew Bible' is also superb.
I found the last section (Contemporary Interpretation) to be a waste of paper and ink. The four essays included are: Feminist Scholarship; Liberation Theology: Latin America; Liberation Theology: Africa and the Bible; and Liberation Theology: Europe. It boggled my mind to find (1) nothing about contemporary American fundamentalist interpretations of the Bible, (2) nothing about the technical problems of translation (like the problem of the shepherd/sheep analogy to island-dwelling fishermen who have never seen a sheep or any conception of why a shepherd would be involved with these creatures); (3) nothing about the relationship of the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament to religions and sects indebted to them but not based on them (such as The Church of Latter Day Saints and Islam just to mention two!); (4) nothing about the Pentecostal movement, especially important in Latin America; (5) nothing about Biblical interpretations by `sects' (ranging from the Branch Davidians to the Jehovah's Witnesses - I could go on and on... This work is obviously academic (in a very narrow cultural sense), and - despite the pretensions of Section four (Contemporary Interpretation) - parochial. I was tempted to use a razor blade, and cut this entire section out of an otherwise excellent book!
Considering the amount of effort that went into this work, I wish that the editors had provided timelines. It is probably a better learning procedure to go through the text with an Excel spreadsheet or Word tables open, extracting data from the text into a chronologically coherent summary, but it is `a pain'. If a reader can do it, the editor could have done it.
This is an excellent work, despite many lacunae. It filled an educational gap in my knowledge, and - given the partisan glosses that Bible study usually includes - should help others with a sincere desire to learn more about this library of religious readings.
Product Description
LEATHER BOUND book accented in 22kt gold! !
Product Description
BRAND NEW LEATHERBOUND BOOK ACCENTED IN 22 KT GOLD.
Product Description
BRAND NEW LEATHERBOUND BOOK ACCENTED IN 22 KT GOLD. Absolutely authoritative... covering 2,000 years of history... every significant movement... here is the extraordinary story of the Christian faith. 350 beautiful illustrations enhance the informative text. 7 1/2" x 9 3/4", 724pp
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Battleship Musashi: The Making and Sinking of the Worlds Biggest Battleship
A Glorious Way to Die: The Kamikaze Mission of the Battleship Yamato, April 1945
The Battleship Yamato
Imperial Japanese Navy Aircraft Carriers 1921-45
Captured Honor: Pow Survival in the Philippines and Japan
