Ian McKellen King Lear SHAKESPEARE

Death and the Maiden (1994) Trailer

Wider Reading : American Play Memorializes "Comfort Women"

The play deals with the issue of women forced to 'comfort' Japanese soldiers during World War 2. The women were mainly form Korea and China. These countries had been invaded and brutally occupied during the Japanese expansion known as "The Empire of the Sun". This is an example of where literature and imaginative constructs meet History and Ethics in Theory of Knowledge. Does literature, eventhough it is fiction based on fact help us understand history or does it confuse us? Another interesting question is what are the differences between the way modern Germany has dealt with its Nazi past and the way Japan deals with its past? Are you aware of the controversy surrounding school textbooks in Japan and the way they deal with World War 2? A counter-claim might be that many Japanese people feel that they too are victims of the war because of the nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Another point might be that we only focus on the war crimes of the losers and if the allies had lost the war, there might have been war crimes trials for some of their actions in World War 2.  So complicated but interesting.

THE WHITE TIGER: Aravind Adiga, Winner of the Man Booker Prize2008

THE GOD OF SMALL THINGS