There, Iris had lengthy conversations with then-President Bill Clinton and gave him a signed copy of "The Rape of Nanking.". "But as I was leaving, she got apathetic again. ", Rabiner invited Iris to spend a week or so at her home in Westchester County, N.Y. "I figured we'd take a week off and just relax, walk the woods up here. ", Rabiner believes that neither the subject matter of her work nor the intensity of her work habits precipitated Iris' manic-depressive symptoms. Iris Chang interview, Barbara Simpson show, KSFO radio, San Francisco, California 1998 November 8. "No, no! "I wanted to give support to families that suffered the same kind of loss, and it really worked in that way. It documents atrocities committed against Chinese by forces of the Imperial Japanese Army during the Second Sino-Japanese War, and includes interviews with victims. But, her father said, "In spite of many sessions, Iris did not tell the therapist her deepest thoughts. This is for the biographers., Suicide, Kamen observes, is in a lot of ways the ultimate act of control. The Committee of 100 is a national non-partisan organization composed of American citizens of Chinese descent who have achieved positions of leadership in the United States in a broad range of professions. And Iris would buy lunch and dinner for everybody, and they all thought it was great. But Douglas finally told Kamen that Christopher had been born with the help of a surrogate mother. ", The book's popularity meant a lengthy book tour. To me, it was part of that whole intensity that made Iris able to do what she went on to do. We always had to argue all the exceptions she could think of. She knew that in California, she could purchase a relic immediately and avoid the 10-day waiting period necessary with other guns. [19], When you believe you have a future, you think in terms of generations and years. She wrote, "The America of today would not be the same America without the achievements of its ethnic Chinese," and that "scratch the surface of every American celebrity of Chinese heritage and you will find that, no matter how stellar their achievements, no matter how great their contribution to US society, virtually all of them have had their identities questioned at one point or another."[12]. Iris Shun-Ru Chang was born March 28, 1968, in Princeton Hospital, on the university campus in New Jersey where her parents were doing postdoctoral work. We . We go through her and her husband's (Brett Douglas) house in San jose. She hoped to gain access to a time capsule of audiotapes that was sealed within that tank after the war. Chang said she usually gives three reasons for her unconventional decision to write her daughter's biography: to commemorate Iris, to tell Iris' son, Christopher Douglas, all about the mother he lost at age 2, and to set the record straight about Iris' suicide amid media speculations. Iris Chang's coffin was carried to a waiting hearse to be brought to the grave site at Gate of Heaven Cemetery in Los Altos. After two years at Princeton, the family moved to a Midwestern college town, Champaign-Urbana, in Illinois. "Iris was really good at putting her best face forward, even when she was totally exhausted, so I didn't really perceive that there was a real problem," Brett said. Each breath is becoming difficult for me to takethe anxiety can be compared to drowning in an open sea. When I read The Rape of Nanking, I was struck by the parallels in the lives of these two women, Minnie and Iris, Kamen writes. "Iris was so excited when she got the contract for the book," Brett said, recalling how obsessively she ferreted out material. The couple have lived in California since their marriage. She came alive before crowds -- she loved to share, and she was interested in other people's lives. The water district employee called his supervisor, who called 911. For reviews of the book, visit irischang.net/news/index.php. One month later, on Saturday, Dec. 11, the same elegant photograph of Iris was displayed at a memorial honoring her on the 67th anniversary of the invasion of Nanking. The acclaimed author of The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II, who committed suicide on November 9, "felt other people's suffering so intensely, to the point that it made her suffer," said her friend Barbara Masin in a eulogy delivered at a memorial prior to Chang's burial in Los Altos, California. "She was like a battalion commander," Meldahl said. "She was afraid of him when he showed up," Smith said. She lived in San Jose, California in the final years of her life.[6][7]. "We sat down and started talking, and we had a lot to say. Whether it was the CIA or some other organization I will never know. She was too strong-willed not to.". @TheJohnRylands. She was initially a computer science major, but switched to journalism, earning a bachelor's degree at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1989. Born in China, educated at M.I.T. The group meets to address important issues concerning the Chinese-American community, as well as issues affecting U.S.-China relations on 5/5/03 in New York. ", Three days before Iris' death, Brett dreamed up a special weekend, just for her. "The boys came together to say, 'Crisis! "He made breakfast for me," she said. After the interview, they kept up an active correspondence. Please forgive me. Iris Chang's many accolades include the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation's Program on Peace and International Cooperation Award, the Woman of the Year award from the Organization of Chinese Americans, and two honorary doctorates (the College of Wooster in Ohio, and California State University at Hayward). ", Iris' parents retired in early 2001, and after Christopher was born, they moved from Illinois and into a home in the same complex. ", At the same time, torrents of hate mail came in, Brett said. I am doing this because I am too weak to withstand the years of pain and agony ahead.". . "When somebody like Iris makes up their mind that they're going to commit suicide, they're going to do it. [13], Chang's visibility as a public figure increased with her final work, The Chinese in America. They married in 1964, and each earned a doctorate from Harvard in 1967. Chang said she usually gives three reasons for her unconventional decision to write her daughter's biography: to commemorate Iris, to tell Iris' son, Christopher Douglas, all about the. The book hit the stores at Christmas, a tough selling season for serious nonfiction. "Though I had heard so much about the Nanking massacre as a child, nothing prepared me for these pictures -- stark black-and-white images of decapitated heads, bellies ripped open and nude women forced by their rapists into various pornographic poses, their faces contorted into unforgettable expressions of agony and shame. "During the massacre some had received physical injuries so severe they had been prevented from making a decent living for decades. Later, he would tell police that she "seemed distracted or aloof.". ", They had moved from a small apartment in Sunnyvale to the San Jose townhome. Armed Suspect Prompts Lockdown At South Bay Childcare Center, Apple Firing Hundreds Of Contractors: Report, 'Our Planet Live In Concert' 2023: Performing Arts Center, San Jose, Santa Cruz Co. Fairgrounds Foundation All-You-Can-Eat Crab Feed 2023: Watsonville, Mission Valley Chorus All-You-Can-Eat Crab Feed 2023: Campbell, [FREE Event] Get Ready for Senior Year! Through a third party, the colonel declined to be interviewed. Consistent with the style of her earlier works, the book relies heavily on personal accounts, drawing its strong emotional content from their stories. " Iris was sometimes teased for her earnestness. I was there for three days and we talked. Rabiner sensed the book would be important and signed Iris to write it. Then, after 15 years of extraordinary achievement and major contributions to American military defense, he was branded a Communist and deported to China where he revolutionized the Chinese missile program and developed the Silkworm missile that later threatened American armed forces. chris douglas owner/creator/artist at karnage clothing Canterbury, New Zealand Chris Douglas Area Sales Manager Wakefield Chris D. Loader operator at Agg. The author, who committed suicide nearly 10 years later, saw a graphic photo exhibition of the 1937 Japanese attack on Nanking civilians and felt an urge to publicize the almost-buried atrocity to the world, according to her mother, Ying-Ying Chang. Chang is the subject of the 2007 biography, Finding Iris Chang, and the 2007 documentary film Iris Chang: The Rape of Nanking. Everything points to suicide.". Waking at 5 a.m., Brett saw Iris was gone. asked Iris, knowing Martel had been saved from near starvation by the brushy mustache he wore. Finally, the group stood to sing a halting but heartfelt rendition of "Amazing Grace.". ", Most of the attacks came from Japanese ultranationalists. We go through her and her husband's (Brett Douglas) house in San jose. Most of the calls were from women, said Betty Hong, executive director of the Oakland clinic. -- Did her single-minded determination, her habit of working beyond exhaustion, contribute to her death? A poster-size photograph of Iris, lit by candlelight, stood vigil on the lawn of Spangler Mortuary in Los Altos in the early evening of Nov. 18. "The Chinese in America: A Narrative History" was published by Viking in 2003. I promise not to hurt myself. "It's been too short.". The air was still, heavy with grief. She got from the airport to the hotel, but that was all she could do. "But Iris herself did not believe she was sick." She described finding threatening notes on her car. In tribute to Chang, the survivors held a service at the Nanjing Massacre Memorial Hall, around the same time as her funeral, held at the Gate of Heaven Cemetery in Los Altos, California on November 12, 2004. She had worn herself out on a book tour for the paperback release of The Chinese in America and spent some time in a mental health ward in Kentucky in August 2004. "Iris was a very strong person, even when she was depressed," said Brett. "Iris was much in demand and gave many talks," Brett recalled, adding with a laugh, "she was schmoozing the whole time." Theirs was not just a story of war, but of boys becoming men, she said in a transcription of one of her many taped interviews. SHAU-JIN CHANG (FATHER), left, AND YING-YING CHANG (MOTHER), PARENTS OF IRIS CHANG, WHO COMMITTED SUICIDE IN NOVEMBERR 2004. But just in time, Iris changed the subject, prompting him to tell a lighter story. She wrote three books, which made her visible as a public figure. But friends say Iris began to voice concerns for her safety. She hadn't ever heard much of Ray Charles' music before, and when we got home, she went upstairs and was browsing all kinds of information on Ray Charles on the Internet.". A local veteran, Arthur Kelly, who was assisting her research helped her check into Norton Psychiatric Hospital in Louisville, where she was diagnosed with reactive psychosis, placed on heavy medication for three days and then released to her parents. "Iris was a phenomenon," said one of her former teachers at Johns Hopkins, Ann Finkbeiner. But Rabiner had been looking for someone conversant in the sciences and in Mandarin to write a biography of Hsue-Shen Tsien. Background Iris Chang was born on March 28, 1968, Princeton, New Jersey, to a family of Taiwan migrants. Getting ready for the trip, Iris went into overdrive. Register for a user account. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. If they had let her get into Submit, she may not have become a journalist," he added. But not so well known is that the idea for the book came to author Iris Chang while she was in Cupertino at the in December 1994. After her death, she became the subject of tributes from fellow writers. "She got what she wanted and got out," he said. ", "Iris truly had no fear. They kept in touch every day by e-mail. It's a date he won't forget. He was misled by Iris. File photo of Iris Chang and her husband Brett Douglas with Hillary Rodham Clinton. It was the first history of Japan's brutal 1937 occupation of China's capital city and documented the weekslong rampage. "Christopher sensed that something was going wrong with Iris," Brett said. Photos for a profile of Iris Chang, a prominent author and historian, who died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. He established an International Safety Zone in Nanking before the Japanese soldiers arrived from Shanghai. Iris Chang loved life, her mother said: "I want people to know Iris, not just her suicide. ", The book's popularity meant a lengthy book tour. Reporter Richard Rongstad eulogized her as "Iris Chang lit a flame and passed it to others and we should not allow that flame to be extinguished.". I was not alone in eating Iris dust, Kamen noted ruefully in an essay she wrote for Salon shortly after Changs death. If she had a brain tumor, people would better understand.". "To see her on TV, defending 'Rape of Nanking' so fiercely and so fearlessly -- I just sat down, stopped, in awe," said Helen Zia, author of "Asian-American Dreams: Emergence of an American People" and co-author, with Wen-Ho Lee, of "My Country Versus Me: The First-Hand Account by the Los Alamos Scientist Who Was Falsely Accused. "So they tried to make it harder and harder." He is an actor, known for The Young and the Restless (1973), Playing Mona Lisa (2000) and Cyber Bandits (1995). But today Christopher is healthy. Iris Chang wrote those lines in 1978, when she was 10, and 19 years before her harrowing book, The Rape of Nanking, brought her worldwide acclaim. . At Reed's Sport Shop one month after her death, the spot on the top shelf of the glass-topped case where Iris' gun had lain was still vacant. Title Type Publication date Author(s) Description; Document:The Mysterious Deaths of Ernest Hemingway and Iris Chang: article: 1 August 2011: Worse, Chang had started out as a computer science major and switched with Kamens encouragement. I will follow the doctor's orders for medications. The Rape of Nanking remained on the New York Times Bestseller list for 10 weeks. I said, 'You need to go to bed.' Later, Iris told interviewers that, as a child, "it was hard for me to even visualize how bad it was, because the stories seemed almost mythical -- people being chopped into pieces, the Yangtze River running red with blood. You have a young kid. But that meant diving back into her Bataan Death March research. Most lived in poverty so crushing that even a minimal amount of financial compensation from Japan could have greatly improved the conditions of their lives. Iris insisted she had already passed. Homicide detectives would eventually determine that Iris had loaded all six chambers of the gun, placed the barrel between her lips, and fired. "There was a time earlier, in September, when we were worried, but she seemed to come out of that. Chang, who lived in San Jose, shot herself to death Nov. 9 in her car, parked along a rural road south of Los Gatos. Contents After publication of the book, Chang campaigned to persuade the Japanese government to apologize for its troops' wartime conduct and to pay compensation. In the backseat, a teddy bear was tucked into the car seat of her 2-year-old son, Christopher. "Iris used to say she never understood why people would commit suicide, so she was definitely not a suicidal type," said Chang. He could see the travel was taking a toll on her. But all of them wanted the opportunity to talk about the massacre before their deaths. Iris Chang (), before her untimely death, was one of America's leading young historians. Chang, with a Ph.D. in biological chemistry from Harvard University, had a scientist's career until her retirement in 2002. ", Rabiner said Iris "found her voice" in promoting "Rape of Nanking." Open sky surrounds broad, rolling lawns at the crest of a hill. Once the Allies won the war, the story was forgotten. In her goodbye note, Iris described her guilt about having allowed her son, Christopher, to be vaccinated before the age of 2. "When I was obsessed about Iris, my husband and my son suggested taking me to see a therapist, but I said no," said Chang. Published by Basic Books on December 1997 (the 60th anniversary of the massacre) and in paperback by Penguin in 1998, "The Rape of Nanking" the first, full-length English-language narrative of the atrocity to reach a wide audience remained on the New York Times bestseller list for several months, became a New York Times Notable Book, and was cited by Bookman Review Syndicate as one of the best books of 1997. When Brett woke to find Iris gone early Monday morning, he called San Jose police, reporting that she was missing, on medication and a suicide risk. On the day of Iris Chang's death, word spread quickly over news wires and the Internet. Between eulogies, a guitarist played "Let It Be." As long as I am alive, these forces will never stop hounding me. in champaign- urbana- 1985 courtesy mr and mrs chang, CHANG_rs1.jpg Author Iris Chang speaks at a panel at the twelfth annual conference of the Committee of 100, at the Waldorf-Astoria, in New York, Saturday, April 26, 2003. It read: "I promise to get up and get out of the house every morning. It also showed publishing houses that there is a market for books about the Chinese experience. We'll be sending you The Daily Reader starting soon. "Civilization is tissue thin," Iris wrote. Chang said she usually gives three reasons for her unconventional decision to write her daughter's biography: to commemorate Iris, to tell Iris' son Christopher Douglas all about the mother he lost at age 2, and to set the record straight about Iris' suicide amid media speculations. But it turned out she wasn't sleeping during the day either. And maybe more than the first two books I wrote combined, too.. ", Iris had convinced her doctor to reduce her dosage. For her, it was a relief," said Masin. "She would go into a town -- and with Tony Meldahl's help, it was even better. She is best known for her best-selling 1997 account of the Nanking Massacre, The Rape of Nanking, and in 2003, The Chinese in America: A Narrative History. At the first memorial -- that evening's "visitation" -- friends signed the guest book and offered condolences to the family. "This high school alone lost 200 students -- 28 were with the Bataan company. And through the months afterward, I couldnt help but think of Minnie and why she captured Iris imagination as a historian. After leaving China, Vautrin suffered a breakdown; she committed suicide in 1941.v, Tue 11/6, 7:30 PM, Barbaras Bookstore, 1218 S. Halsted, 312-413-2665, Wed 11/7, 7 PM, 57th Street Books, 1301 E. 57th, 773-684-1300. Another said: "Let us thank her parents. But even before the publication of "The Chinese in America: A Narrative History," Chang had established herself as an invaluable source of information about Asia, human rights, and Asian American history. Chang said she did some research on the psychiatric drugs and the antidepressants Iris took in the months between a temporary nervous breakdown and her suicide. Iris Chang. She also focused on human rights. "She should not have gone.". As she later told an interviewer, "I wrote 'Rape of Nanking' out of a sense of rage. It was unusual for Basic Books to consider such an untested writer. Schell reviewed her book favorably in the New York Times. At 11:56 a.m., Iris presented her driver's license and counted out $517 in cash -- she was carrying nearly $4,000 -- and left the store with an ivory-handled Ruger "Old Army" .45 replica revolver. And she was determined not to be hospitalized again. The first was John Rabe, a German member of the Nazi party who was living in the Chinese capital in 1937. It is far better that you remember me as I was -- in my heyday as a best-selling author -- than the wild-eyed wreck who returned from Louisville . Such harsh logic, symptomatic of the disease, rendered her unable to extend her own magnificent compassion to herself. Please reload the page and try again. Her last, widely-acclaimed book focused on Chinese immigrants and t heir descendents in the United States their sacrifices, their achievements and their contributions to the fabric of American culture, an epic journey spanning more than 150 years. At the time, she was several months into research for her fourth book, about the Bataan Death March. Winning that prize led to dreams of becoming a writer, her father said. Though her work life was not without controversy, she seemed to be a very successful woman, driven by the need to share the dark corners of history with the world. The motorist who went to investigate the white Oldsmobile parked off highway 17, which runs between San Jose and Santa Cruz in northern California, was a . Similar situation to my own. After brief stints at the Associated Press and the Chicago Tribune, she pursued a master's degree in Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University. Iris Chang lived and worked in California. Iris Chang, a best-selling author who chronicled the Japanese occupation of China and the history of Chinese immigrants in the United . Another person Chang said she should thank most is Richard Rhodes, who wrote the book's introduction. As the coffin was lowered into the ground, the black-clad tribe of mourners formed a line. "Most authors are worn out after five or six cities." "Poetry by Iris Chang" was written in neat cursive on the title page. "Rape of Nanking" became an immediate best-seller and established her as an outspoken advocate for victims of Japanese war crimes. But Kamens book, unlike, say, Truth & Beauty, novelist Ann Patchetts controversial memoir of her thorny friendship with the late writer Lucy Grealy, relies very little upon navel-gazing rumination. The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Stories about Chang's grandparents' harrowing escape were part of her family legacy and prompted her to embark on this ambitious project, for which she interviewed elderly survivors of the massacre and discovered thousands of rare documents in four different languages. "You'll have to forgive me, but I find myself often deeply affected by these stories. The foyer was filled with enormous bouquets sent by well-wishers. "There are a fair number of people who don't take kindly to what she wrote in 'The Rape of Nanking,' " Brett said, "so she's always been very, very private about our family life. "The doctors wanted her to continue in therapy, so sometimes they would go along with her. "But I woke up at 2 a.m. and she was pacing the hallway," Brett said. "There is no way that a family member could sort out all the details, let alone their own feelings, because they're connected to the person," Dr. Christopher Douglas Retweeted. Opting for a master's degree, she was accepted by the Graduate Writing Seminar at Johns Hopkins University and moved to Baltimore in 1990. She wasnt a jealous personality. The coroner's report, dated Dec. 23, 2004, stated: "Based on the medical investigator's report and the autopsy findings, Iris Chang, a 36-year-old Asian female, died from a self-inflicted intra-oral gunshot wound. Her obituary was published in newspapers worldwide. Both were born in mainland China. After eloquent eulogies by family and friends, a tribute written by U. S. Rep. Michael Honda was recited, which he had read into the Congressional Record earlier that week: "Her fierce pride of her Chinese American heritage empowered others with the certainty that they were truly Americans Our community has lost a role model and close friend; the world has lost one of its finest and most passionate advocates of social and historical justice. Chang had returned to World War II for the book she was working on when she died, interviewing survivors of the Bataan Death March who were, like the Chinese, demanding an official apology from the Japanese government. She passed the iron gates of Calvary Catholic Cemetery, where marble statues of winged angels, their heads bowed in prayer, mark the graves of early settlers. She touched her fingertips to her forehead, then waved her hand to the heavens: "It's because Iris is a dreamer." Paula Kamen. Some became overwrought with emotion during the interviews and broke down into tears. For Asian Americans to write nonfiction about Asia or Asian America was relatively new. Smith said to the hotel, but that was sealed within that after! S popularity meant a lengthy book tour looking for someone conversant in the Chinese experience made her visible as public! Too weak to withstand the years of her work habits precipitated Iris manic-depressive! 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