Returning to 1937: Discussing the Nanjing Massacre

About the Topic

To forget a massacre is to inflict it a second time.

My home is beside the river in Xiaguan, Nanjing, where a ten-kilometer running path follows the bank. From middle school through university, I liked walking there at sunset.

A breeze came from the river; runners passed, while older residents nearby played music and danced in the evening light.

Only after reading Iris Chang’s The Rape of Nanking did I learn that, decades earlier, bodies had been piled on the ground beneath my feet and blood had stained the river.

This history is distressing and necessary to face. It changed how I saw my hometown and the value of peace. It also revealed acts of humanity amid violence and the need to prevent recurrence. The memory has stayed with me, and I would like to share it.

Following the dance drama Deep in Memory, I would like us to return to Nanjing in 1937.

We will consider how war and militarism changed soldiers, remember refugees’ suffering, and recognize foreign residents who sheltered more than two hundred thousand Chinese people. It is also a way to consider how much ordinary peaceful life means.

Iris Chang cautioned that criticism of Japanese actions in a particular time and place must not become criticism of all Japanese people. Such a conflation harms both the victims’ memory and the Japanese people.

Returning to this history should not prolong indiscriminate anger or hatred. It should ask why the tragedy occurred and how it might be prevented from recurring.

We remember those killed and acknowledge the Europeans and Americans who protected people in the Safety Zone. I hope this discussion can help us move beyond cycles of hatred toward care for life and peace.

At the time of this announcement, twenty-one registered survivors of the Nanjing Massacre remained. Its memory will continue through people such as Iris Chang, Li Xiuying, John Rabe, and Azuma Shirō. This history gives particular weight to peace.

Those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it.