The Rape of Nanking

By: Iris Chang

Narrated by: Anna Fields

Length: 8 hrs and 3 mins

Publisher's summary

In December 1937, in the capital of China, one of the most brutal massacres in the long annals of wartime barbarity occurred. The Japanese army swept into the ancient city of Nanking and within weeks not only looted and burned the defenseless city but systematically raped, tortured and murdered more than 300,000 Chinese civilians. Amazingly, the story of this atrocity- one of the worst in world history- continues to be denied by the Japanese government.

The Rape of Nanking tells the story from three perspectives: that of the Japanese soldiers who performed it; of the Chinese civilians who endured it; and finally of a group of Europeans and Americans who refused to abandon the city and were able to create a safety zone that saved almost 300,000 Chinese. It was Iris Chang who discovered the diaries of the German leader of this rescue effort, John Rabe, whom she calls the "Oskar Schindler of China." A loyal supporter of Adolf Hitler, but far from the terror planned in his Nazi-controlled homeland, he worked tirelessly to save the innocent from slaughter.

©1997 by Iris Chang (P)1997 by Blackstone Audiobooks

A must read

While extremely heartbreaking, infuriating and disgusting this a must read. This should never be forgotten.

Horrifying and Astounding

Unbelievable how little this is taught in American World History courses at the secondary school level.

EDUCATE EVERYONE

I would recommend this book to anyone. It’s so important to understand and have knowledge of such atrocity. We are taught the holocaust, but why not the rape of Nanjing?

Tough but True

Tough read. Lots of parts that are hard to listen to. But at the end of the day this was a wonderful book that really taught me about this incident in history while also making it obvious to me why it had been so hard to learn about it before now.

Required Reading

We are so ignorant of the realities of our world. So many governments are so desperate to manipulate, hide, and spin everything that happens to shape the perceptions of the world, we are left with such profound and detrimental blindess.

This book is one blazing light that exposed an incredibly vital piece of humanity's dark history. Our young people should be required to read this book in high school.

Horrifying and disturbing events that must be remembered

Iris Chang brought out the horrors that happened to the 1930s invasion of Nanking by Imperial Japan. It was more of an essay that expressed her views on a terrible event. It shed light on how Japanese troops were indoctrinated in the Bushido mindset mixed with early 20th century nationalism and feudal politics that propelled Japan into a militarized society that looked at those who were not Japanese as inferior; and revered and worshipped their Emperor as a god. This multifaceted combination of forces inevitably brought the worst of humanity especially on Nanking and many other cities that were sacked at the time.

Gave the story 4 stars since I thought she jumped back in forth through the timeline.

Don’t Let This Be Forgotten!

Read this and tell everyone you know about it. Don’t let this important piece of history drown.

Imagine you went to school and didn’t learn about what Nazi Germany did to the Jewish people. Imagine it being blown off and ignored. That’s what has happened to the victims of Nanking China. It’s disgraceful what we have allowed to slip through the cracks.

This novel is gut wrenching, just like you would assume a novel of this nature to be. Suck it up, and sit through it. Listening to what happened is 1 millionth of the pain the actual victims went through. They deserve to be heard and acknowledged. Talk about it, don’t let it be ignored.

An extraordinarily confronting history

I found this history something necessary for people to know about. However I could not listen through the entire listen, the repetition of violence was too harrowing for me to listen to the end.

A harrowing but important look at the past

I've read my way through many gruesome chapters of human history, but few compare to this event. The author's passionate research into this subject has bore fruit not for the weak of stomach but important to be known all the same.

Shocking

a part of history that should have been told a long time ago. Everyone should read it.