Imaginary Death
A man dies. He dies because he must—because without his death, there is no story, and, in the end, no history itself. So begins Mariko Nagai’s Imaginary Death, a creative nonfiction book that examines how the author’s grandfather, an ordinary man born in a small village in the early 20th century, is...
I tiakina i:
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| Hōputu: | Online |
| Reo: | Ingarihi |
| I whakaputaina: |
punctum books
2025
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| Ngā marau: | |
| Urunga tuihono: | ONIX_20250929T144438_9781685712372_7 |
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Kāore He Tūtohu, Me noho koe te mea tuatahi ki te tūtohu i tēnei pūkete!
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| _version_ | 1869514594452504576 |
|---|---|
| author | Nagai, Mariko Nagai |
| author_browse | Nagai, Mariko Nagai |
| author_facet | Nagai, Mariko Nagai |
| author_sort | Nagai, Mariko Nagai |
| collection | Directory of Open Access Books |
| description | A man dies. He dies because he must—because without his death, there is no story, and, in the end, no history itself. So begins Mariko Nagai’s Imaginary Death, a creative nonfiction book that examines how the author’s grandfather, an ordinary man born in a small village in the early 20th century, is unmade and remade into a perfect Japanese Imperial Soldier by the era he was born into. In the kaleidoscope composed of archival documents, letters, journals, research, interviews, and photographs, Imaginary Death traces the life of a man who fought and died for the empire, whose death, obscured by lack of documentation, must be composited of many possible ways men could die in Papua New Guinea. Only forty out of four thousand men from the regimental unit survived by the end of the repatriation in 1946: his was one small death out of many. In the tradition of James Agee and Walker Evans’s seminal work on the Great Depression Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, Imaginary Death is a work that is part meditation, part history, and part fragments of memory that tell a story of a Japanese soldier’s life and death during World War II. Ultimately, Imaginary Death is a textual landscape of imagination, fact, history, and dreams all intersecting to create a psychological terrain that is not limited in the same way as history or nonfiction books, but is rather a new imaginative cartography, no less real than history itself. |
| format | Online |
| id | doab-20.500.12854ir-166802 |
| institution | Directory of Open Access Books |
| language | eng |
| publishDate | 2025 |
| publishDateRange | 2025 |
| publishDateSort | 2025 |
| publisher | punctum books |
| publisherStr | punctum books |
| record_format | ojs |
| spelling | doab-20.500.12854ir-1668022025-09-30T05:07:34Z Imaginary Death Nagai, Mariko Nagai World War II intergenerational trauma Japan military history Pacific War masculinity Japanese Imperial Military thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHW Military history::NHWR Specific wars and campaigns::NHWR7 Second World War thema EDItEUR::1 Place qualifiers::1F Asia::1FP East Asia, Far East::1FPJ Japan thema EDItEUR::V Health, Relationships and Personal development::VF Family and health::VFJ Coping with / advice about personal, social and health topics::VFJQ Coping with / advice about mental health issues::VFJQ3 Coping with / advice about PTSD and other psychological traumas thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JB Society and culture: general::JBS Social groups, communities and identities::JBSF Gender studies, gender groups::JBSF2 Gender studies: men and boys thema EDItEUR::D Biography, Literature and Literary studies::DN Biography and non-fiction prose::DNB Biography: general::DNBH Biography: historical, political and military A man dies. He dies because he must—because without his death, there is no story, and, in the end, no history itself. So begins Mariko Nagai’s Imaginary Death, a creative nonfiction book that examines how the author’s grandfather, an ordinary man born in a small village in the early 20th century, is unmade and remade into a perfect Japanese Imperial Soldier by the era he was born into. In the kaleidoscope composed of archival documents, letters, journals, research, interviews, and photographs, Imaginary Death traces the life of a man who fought and died for the empire, whose death, obscured by lack of documentation, must be composited of many possible ways men could die in Papua New Guinea. Only forty out of four thousand men from the regimental unit survived by the end of the repatriation in 1946: his was one small death out of many. In the tradition of James Agee and Walker Evans’s seminal work on the Great Depression Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, Imaginary Death is a work that is part meditation, part history, and part fragments of memory that tell a story of a Japanese soldier’s life and death during World War II. Ultimately, Imaginary Death is a textual landscape of imagination, fact, history, and dreams all intersecting to create a psychological terrain that is not limited in the same way as history or nonfiction books, but is rather a new imaginative cartography, no less real than history itself. 2025-09-30T05:07:34Z 2025-09-30T05:07:34Z 2025-09-29T12:47:33Z 2025 book ONIX_20250929T144438_9781685712372_7 https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/106170 9781685712372 9781685712365 https://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/166802 eng open access image/jpeg Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/20.500.12657/106170/1/9781685712372.pdf punctum books punctum books 10.53288/0531.1.00 10.53288/0531.1.00 12970da4-0116-4486-b8be-fc9756703ab1 9781685712372 9781685712365 punctum books 302 Brooklyn, NY open access |
| spellingShingle | World War II intergenerational trauma Japan military history Pacific War masculinity Japanese Imperial Military thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHW Military history::NHWR Specific wars and campaigns::NHWR7 Second World War thema EDItEUR::1 Place qualifiers::1F Asia::1FP East Asia, Far East::1FPJ Japan thema EDItEUR::V Health, Relationships and Personal development::VF Family and health::VFJ Coping with / advice about personal, social and health topics::VFJQ Coping with / advice about mental health issues::VFJQ3 Coping with / advice about PTSD and other psychological traumas thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JB Society and culture: general::JBS Social groups, communities and identities::JBSF Gender studies, gender groups::JBSF2 Gender studies: men and boys thema EDItEUR::D Biography, Literature and Literary studies::DN Biography and non-fiction prose::DNB Biography: general::DNBH Biography: historical, political and military Nagai, Mariko Nagai Imaginary Death |
| title | Imaginary Death |
| title_full | Imaginary Death |
| title_fullStr | Imaginary Death |
| title_full_unstemmed | Imaginary Death |
| title_short | Imaginary Death |
| title_sort | imaginary death |
| topic | World War II intergenerational trauma Japan military history Pacific War masculinity Japanese Imperial Military thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHW Military history::NHWR Specific wars and campaigns::NHWR7 Second World War thema EDItEUR::1 Place qualifiers::1F Asia::1FP East Asia, Far East::1FPJ Japan thema EDItEUR::V Health, Relationships and Personal development::VF Family and health::VFJ Coping with / advice about personal, social and health topics::VFJQ Coping with / advice about mental health issues::VFJQ3 Coping with / advice about PTSD and other psychological traumas thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JB Society and culture: general::JBS Social groups, communities and identities::JBSF Gender studies, gender groups::JBSF2 Gender studies: men and boys thema EDItEUR::D Biography, Literature and Literary studies::DN Biography and non-fiction prose::DNB Biography: general::DNBH Biography: historical, political and military |
| topic_facet | World War II intergenerational trauma Japan military history Pacific War masculinity Japanese Imperial Military thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHW Military history::NHWR Specific wars and campaigns::NHWR7 Second World War thema EDItEUR::1 Place qualifiers::1F Asia::1FP East Asia, Far East::1FPJ Japan thema EDItEUR::V Health, Relationships and Personal development::VF Family and health::VFJ Coping with / advice about personal, social and health topics::VFJQ Coping with / advice about mental health issues::VFJQ3 Coping with / advice about PTSD and other psychological traumas thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JB Society and culture: general::JBS Social groups, communities and identities::JBSF Gender studies, gender groups::JBSF2 Gender studies: men and boys thema EDItEUR::D Biography, Literature and Literary studies::DN Biography and non-fiction prose::DNB Biography: general::DNBH Biography: historical, political and military |
| url | ONIX_20250929T144438_9781685712372_7 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT nagaimarikonagai imaginarydeath |