History
Described as a work of "journalistic literature," Underground was originally published as a series of separate interviews Murakami conducted with 60 victims of the attacks and descriptions of how the attacks were carried out, along with his essay, "Blind Nightmare: Where Are We Japanese Going?" In 2000, an English translation was published which included interviews with 8 members of Aum.
Underground was originally published in Japan without the interviews of Aum members – they were published in the magazine Bungei Shunju before being collected in a separate volume, The Place That Was Promised. The English translation combines both books into a single volume, but has been abridged. Underground was translated by Alfred Birnbaum and The Place That Was Promised by Philip Gabriel.
Read more about this topic: Underground: The Tokyo Gas Attack And The Japanese Psyche
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The principal office of history I take to be this: to prevent virtuous actions from being forgotten, and that evil words and deeds should fear an infamous reputation with posterity.”
—Tacitus (c. 55–c. 120)
“Look through the whole history of countries professing the Romish religion, and you will uniformly find the leaven of this besetting and accursed principle of action—that the end will sanction any means.”
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)
“The history of progress is written in the blood of men and women who have dared to espouse an unpopular cause, as, for instance, the black man’s right to his body, or woman’s right to her soul.”
—Emma Goldman (1869–1940)