Furthermore: Where the Headlines Take You
The terrifying images from Japan of tsunami waves, the earthquake, and failing nuclear reactors is sobering, saddening, and heartbreaking. How can the country, especially those people in villages that were utterly destroyed, face another day? Just as any country on the Pacific Rim has had its share of earthquakes, volcano eruptions, and tsunami waves, Japan has endured through previous tragedy, both natural and man-made. The opportunity to rebuild after utter destruction can even have unexpected positive effects, suggest some. Japan may see an economic boost that it hasn't experienced in decades because of the investments in rebuilding the country. And Lesley Downer points to the Japanese national character that will allow them to rebuild bigger and better than ever, as they have done after past disasters.
An earthquake in September 1923 destroyed Yokohama and most of Tokyo, killing 100,000 to 140,000 in the earthquake and resulting firestorms. Yokohama Burning: the Deadly 1923 Earthquake and Fire that Helped Forge the Path to World War II suggests that the ensuing chaos, which resulted in attacks on Koreans living in Japan, the establishment of martial law, and high unemployment, created a situation ripe for the Nationalist fervor that was to grip the country and make it an aggressor in World War II. Joshua Hammer largely focuses on the American perspective in his book, and it is more on the popular end than the scholarly history end of the continuum of disaster narratives. If eyewitness accounts of tragedy are in your reading pile, this should fit in.
Is there any way to say this politely? This country dropped two atomic bombs on Japan, killed and injured hundreds of thousands of people, and completely destroyed two cities. The situation at the time may have allowed the US to make that decision, but after seeing the consequences, I don't think any nation of conscience could make the same choice. The suffering of ordinary people in war, especially children, is horrible to witness, but the Japanese comic series Barefoot Gen will make you want to keep reading. Author Keiji Nakazawa was seven and living in Hiroshima with his family in 1945. This series is his semi-autobiographical account of the bombing, his harrowing account of survival in the days after, and the long-term effects the bomb has on his family, his friends, and the country. Despite the many losses Gen suffers, his spirit is resilient, and this series will stay with you long after you finish reading.
On March 20, 1995, five members of the Aum Shinrikyo cult released deadly sarin gas in the Tokyo subway, killing 13 and injuring hundreds of others. The extreme nature of this attack on the crowded Metro at rush hour had profound effects on Japanese society, and the nation was stunned by this group of well-educated people who had turned on the country. While the media was obsessed with the cult, its leader Shoko Asahara, and the trials of the perpetrators, the victims and their continued suffering didn't stay in the headlines. The novelist Haruki Murakami wrote Underground : the Tokyo gas attack and the Japanese psyche to report on the attacks and tell the stories of the ordinary victims of the attack. Most of the stories are shared as pure reportage and read like a transcript. Murakami, already a famous novelist in Japan at the time, was able to craft riveting interviews with his subjects. The first part of the book is dedicated to the attack and includes the voices of many people there that day and affected by the attacks, as well as some of the perpetrators. The second part of the book focuses on Aum, now known as Aleph, which still follows Asahara's teachings but has denounced the attacks.
Posted by Kate
As reports continue to come in from Japan, the news moves from bad to worse – not only did Friday's magnitude 9.0 earthquake and the following tsunami take lives, destroy property and natural resources, and render millions of people homeless – it has seriously damaged several of Japan's nuclear power plants. The two worst hit plants, Fukushima Daiichi and Fukushima Daini Nuclear Power Stations, have suffered explosions, loss of power to their cooling systems, and partial meltdown. Radioactive material may continue to be released for months. Sobering news, indeed. Since this is hardly the first time a nuclear power plant has suffered an accident, there are many interesting books illustrating different ways these accidents have affected human and natural history – read on for a hand-picked selection.
The worst nuclear power plant accident in recent memory was in 1986 at reactor number four at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in the Ukraine. The nearby cities of Chernobyl and Pripyat (both within about 10 miles of the plant) were abandoned shortly after the disaster because the whole area was dangerously radioactive. Photographer Robert Polidori visited about 15 years later, and Zones of Exclusion is his record of what remains. Houses, schools, parks, and streets are still there, but they are crumbling, peeling, shifting, sinking, and leaning. Trees grow in city squares, abandoned schoolrooms lie disheveled but nearly intact under a dozen years of radioactive dust, and rusting boats list in the shallow waters at the edge of the River Pripyat. The photographs are grim, but surprisingly beautiful – and they definitely inspired me to think carefully about the long-term, unintended effects of human endeavors.
Nuclear accidents have occurred in the United States too. The most well-known is the partial core meltdown at Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania in 1979. At the 25-year anniversary of the accident, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission historian J. Samuel Walker published Three Mile Island: A Nuclear Crisis in Historical Perspective. This is a serious text, filled with detail and critical analysis. It's not a breezy read, but it is a very thorough and interesting discussion of the accident in political, social, and historical context, with emphasis on the 1970s-era debate about nuclear power, the regulatory structures in place at the time, and of course, the portrayal of the accident and surrounding crisis in the media and popular culture.
Despite the horrors natural and man-made disasters bring, life continues, and people are able to find some hope. For example, the English language edition of the Japanese daily Asahi Shinbun ran a story this morning about two women who delivered healthy baby girls in Miyako, Iwate Prefecture in the hours after the tsunami struck the town. But we also find inspiration and reassurance in the very act of making it through disaster together. Rebecca Solnit explores this territory in A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster. Solnit uses the examples of five historical disasters, and though none of her examples are nuclear accidents, there is no doubt that they illustrate the dynamics that are evident in all disasters. Included are many little-known stories, like the impromptu flotilla of boats that ferried New Yorkers across the river to safety on 9/11, or the woman who set up a kitchen in Golden Gate Park after the 1906 earthquake and fed anyone who would eat, for free. Solnit's core message is that people, as a rule, respond to disaster in the most helpful, community-minded way, and the experience changes us for the better. No one would ask for an earthquake to strike or a nuclear power plant to melt down, but when it does, it brings out the best in most of us.
Posted by Emily-Jane
Last week's earthquake in the central Italian region of Abruzzi killed more than 200 people and destroyed many homes, businesses and other buildings. But life, limb and livelihood are not the only things to have been damaged – churches, castles and other structures important to Italy's cultural heritage were damaged by the quake also, and Italy is asking other nations to help with the restoration process. This aspect of the tragedy reminds me how often we are unprepared to manage material threats to our cultural treasures, and of how gracefully people sometimes come together after a disaster to help restore buildings and art, and help communities to heal.
In November, 1966, the Arno River topped its banks in the Italian city of Florence, flooding the city and eventually rising to 22 feet in some neighborhoods. Florence is an ancient city with a huge store of libraries, museums, and private collections of paintings, sculpture, rare and antique books, and other treasures, many of which were put at risk by the flood's water and mud. Art conservators came from around the world to help restore Florence's books, paintings, and other artworks – these cultural lifesavers became known as angeli del fango or “mud angels.” In Dark Water: Flood and Redemption in the City of Masterpieces, Robert Clark provides a broad view on the story of the 1966 flood, and on the many floods that preceded it. He begins with a history of flooding in Florence and how it intertwines with the history of the city as a center of fine art, and then goes on to discuss the world's response to the 1966 flood, and the disconnect between Florence, the city of fine art, and Firenze, the practical, working city in which Florentines actually live.
For those of us who prefer novels to nonfiction, there are still ways to learn about Florence's flood. Robert Hellenga's debut novel The Sixteen Pleasures follows Margot Harrington, one of the “mud angels,” who came to Florence to share her skills as a book conservator. After suffering under the unlacquered sexism of the leading mud angels who coordinate and assign book conservation tasks for the various libraries, Margot is assigned to lead restoration of the library belonging to a small convent. Short on money, she moves in with the nuns, makes friends with the mother superior, and discovers some unexpected treasures in the convent's library. The Sixteen Pleasures is a vivid, exciting story despite its mild-mannered setting in the book stacks, and careful readers will note that the technical details of book construction and conservation are both accurate and clearly described.
Of course, natural disasters have struck beloved antiquities in other places as well. In 1927, an earthquake damaged the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, which marks the site where many Christians believe Jesus Christ was crucified and buried. This most holy of Christian shrines is managed jointly by several churches – chiefly the Armenian Apolistic, Roman Catholic, and Eastern Orthodox churches, and the balance is a tenuous one. Monks and priests working at the church have regularly, if infrequently, come to blows over territorial claims and purported slights. For decades, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre sat damaged and in danger of falling in on itself. Yet somehow, the churches came together with the aid of popes, kings, architects, and many others, devised a plan to rebuild the church, and managed to begin to carry it out. Raymond Cohen's Saving the Holy Sepulchre traces this remarkable story from its roots in the unusual management of the church over time through the restoration now underway.
But these books all raise another question: what do we learn from the experience of cleaning up after a flood, earthquake, or other calamity? In Planning for Disaster, William G. Ramroth, Jr. looks at how events like the 1666 fire of London, the San Francisco earthquake and fire of 1906, and the 9/11 attacks in New York City have affected how we build buildings and plan cities. When have we learned our lessons, and when have we simply repeated past mistakes?
Posted by Emily-Jane
At 10 a.m. this morning Southern California held a region-wide earthquake drill. Can you picture it? Millions of people in schools, workplaces, at home, and on public transit interrupted their normal lives and pretended that there was a 7.8 magnitude earthquake on the San Andreas fault, lasting for about three minutes.
I spent a few years in Southern California as a child and I regarded earthquake drills as a major highlight of the school year – but an earthquake drill that everyone takes part in sounds even more fun! The part of me that is still 10 years old knows it would be exciting to participate in something big and important and out of the normal order of things. But, a drill this comprehensive also appeals to my super-responsible inner adult. Now that I'm grown up, I know that when I have to do difficult, stressful things, it really does pay to have had a chance to practice first. And it might be nice to have the experience of practicing for an earthquake with everyone in the whole metro area – neighbors, co-workers, friends and strangers alike. Perhaps we'll get our chance someday.
In the meantime, it's only responsible for me to remind you all that although earthquakes aren't as frequent here in Cascadia as they are along the San Andreas fault, we are prone to them, too. And furthermore, ice storms, tornadoes, floods and volcanic eruptions have all occurred here within living memory. The library has dozens of books that can help you hone your survival skills, but if you're interested in understanding why some folks do well in disasters, and other don't; or if you wonder why some disasters are just, well, more disastrous than others, I'd recommend The Unthinkable: Who Survives When Disaster Strikes–And Why. Author Amanda Ripley examines past disasters through stories of real people's experiences, and scientific studies of disaster survival and emergency management. Here's one startling conclusion she makes: mass panic in disasters is actually quite rare. For the most part, when unexpected horror arrives, people help each other and act in a way that is outwardly quite calm. And what's Ripley's advice about how you and I can prepare for a calamity? She asserts that one of smartest, most efficient things local government and disaster planning organizations can do to help make disasters less, um, disastrous, is to encourage people to meet their neighbors and co-workers. Give folks a chance to practice a little bit of “safety first” with each other, she says, and not only will they have experience to draw on when it's really important, but may have begun to establish relationships with each other. Basic competence and human cooperation are quite important in surviving the unthinkable, it seems.
If you're more of a historical bent and the news of Southern California's earthquake drill has got you thinking about the past, you might appreciate Denial of Disaster, by Gladys Hansen and Emmet Condon. It's about the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire, but instead of telling the story with narrative, statistics, or personal stories, it presents hundreds of previously unpublished photographs of the destruction following the earthquake, and of the fire, the looting, and the rebuilding of the city. The pictures are vivid, fascinating, appalling, and beautiful at the same time.
Posted by Emily-Jane
