Fires on the Plain

…best-known novel is Nobi (1951; Fires on the Plain), which tells the story of Tamura, a sick Japanese soldier wandering in the Philippine jungles in the aftermath of the war who eventually goes mad and is saved by his Christian faith. In an essay published in Tin House in 2016,…

…most powerful was Nobi (1951; Fires on the Plain) by Ōoka Shōhei, which described defeated Japanese soldiers in the Philippine jungles. The atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 also inspired much poetry and prose, though it was often too close to the events to achieve artistic integrity.…

…best-known novel is Nobi (1951; Fires on the Plain), which tells the story of Tamura, a sick Japanese soldier wandering in the Philippine jungles in the aftermath of the war who eventually loses his sanity and is saved by his Christian faith. The novel won the Yomiuri Prize and ranks…