Dec 31, 2009

Aftermath | Historical Context

Although Waters published “Aftermath” in 2001, the work is set in Japan right after the end of World War II. On August 14, 1945, following several military defeats and the United States’ dropping of an atomic bomb on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan’s emperor Hirohito surrendered unconditionally to the Allied powers, which included the United States, France, and Great Britain. Japan had been devastated during the war, with all its major cities except for Kyoto suffering from severe bombing damage. Following Japan’s surrender, the Allied powers led by the...