Listen to the Voices from the Sea

Midori Yamanouchi
 9780940866850
0-940866-85-4

When this volume first appeared in Japan almost exactly a half century ago, the impact was immediate and dramatic. It became the psychological wellspring for the Japanese postwar peace movement. One person.

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it deeply influenced was Dr. Midori Yamanouchi, who resolved to finally make it more widely available by translating it into English with the help of Joseph Quinn, S.J. It is a deeply moving collection of diaries written by young Japanese soldiers who gave their lives in a series of battles going from China, through the Pacific to the skies closer to Japan. Many of them were cultivated young university students, full of life and dreams, reflecting on the beauty of life, the love of their families and the painful duty that was their lot. Most moving, in the latter part of the book, are the thoughts of the kamikaze pilots, especially those drafted into the suicide squadron in its last desperate stages. These voices are sad voices, the now stilled voices of tragedy. Kike Wadatsumi no Koe or Listen to the Voices from the Sea was a best seller in Japan at the time it came out, followed by a movie version. Overall, an insight into war and the human spirit that rivals such western classics as The Red Badge of Courage or All Quiet on the Western Front.