Fires on the plain / Shohei Ooka ; translated from the Japanese by Ivan Morris.
Title
Fires on the plain / Shohei Ooka ; translated from the Japanese by Ivan Morris.
Subject
World War, 1939-1945--Fiction.
Description
Graphic, award-winning novel written by Japanese veteran of the war in Leyte, from the Japanese perspective.
The main character in the novel, Private Tamura, is a Japanese soldier who gradually loses his humanity due to sickness and starvation; he and his sick, hungry friends are turned away by headquarters as they were no longer worth the food they were being given, and had to survive on their own. Private Tamura sees his comrades so desperate for food that they turn to cannibalism, looting, and murder. Tamura himself kills a Filipino couple, simply because he stumbles upon them while he is in search of food. Still, he tries to keep his humanity alive.
Dramatic and powerful, it is based on actual events. Ooka was not in Leyte himself, as he was in Mindoro; but he experienced the same things his character in the novel did. Ooka became a noted writer in Japan after the war, and wrote of his own experiences as well as a detailed history of the war in Leyte.
Originally published in Japanese (the title in Japanese is "Nobi"), the book became a best seller and was made into an award winning movie.
The main character in the novel, Private Tamura, is a Japanese soldier who gradually loses his humanity due to sickness and starvation; he and his sick, hungry friends are turned away by headquarters as they were no longer worth the food they were being given, and had to survive on their own. Private Tamura sees his comrades so desperate for food that they turn to cannibalism, looting, and murder. Tamura himself kills a Filipino couple, simply because he stumbles upon them while he is in search of food. Still, he tries to keep his humanity alive.
Dramatic and powerful, it is based on actual events. Ooka was not in Leyte himself, as he was in Mindoro; but he experienced the same things his character in the novel did. Ooka became a noted writer in Japan after the war, and wrote of his own experiences as well as a detailed history of the war in Leyte.
Originally published in Japanese (the title in Japanese is "Nobi"), the book became a best seller and was made into an award winning movie.
Creator
Ooka, Shohei.
Publisher
New York : Alfred A. Knopf, c1957
Date
1957
Format
22 x 15 cm.
Type
Hardbound
Identifier
14003045X
Call Number
PZ 4.O575 1957
Accession Number
15302 / 13781
Edition
1st ed.
Pagination
vi, 248 p.
Notes
2 copies (1957; 1969) translated from the Japanese by Ivan Morris
Files
Collection
Citation
Ooka, Shohei., “Fires on the plain / Shohei Ooka ; translated from the Japanese by Ivan Morris.,” FHL-Roderick Hall, accessed December 6, 2025, https://fhl.omeka.net/items/show/359.