In post-1945 Japan, the concept of trauma has become inseparable from its experience in the Pacific War, whether it describes Japan itself as a victim, shattered by the destructions of the atomic bombs, or its colonial subjects, speaking up about the atrocities committed by the Japanese military force. In fact, trauma has become the dominant narrative to describe the nation's defeat, and this prevalence is often never questioned. But what came before trauma? Were there any other forms of narrating war in Japan? When exactly did war come to occupy the psychological space? In her lecture, Professor Nakamura considers these questions by looking back at the so-called "prewar" era of Japan and examining the anti-war literature of the detective fiction writer Yumeno Ky{saku together with early psychological studies on the effect of war.
