Literature after Fukushima: An introduction

Book section : Introduction

The Great East Japan Earthquake, tsunami, and multiple meltdowns at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant have had long-lasting and far-reaching consequences. Despite the arrival of the 10-year anniversary of the disaster in March 2021, it is clear that the recovery is far from complete. Over the course of the last decade, the literary community produced a variety of responses to the catastrophic series of events that began on March 11, 2011. Analyzing key works in the expanding corpus of 3.11 literature, Literature after Fukushima aims to keep the ongoing dimensions of the disaster and its global implications at the heart of public and scholarly debates. The triple disaster gave rise to new terms of reference and to fresh ways of looking at the world post-3.11. Literature after Fukushima stands as a testament to this sea change, demonstrating how the disaster reframed both social reality and discourse in various areas, including trauma studies, ecocriticism, regional identity, food safety, civil society, and more. Each chapter examines aspects of these perspectival shifts in the literary world, tracing the reshaping of Japanese identity in the years after 3.11. The cultural productions explored offer a glimpse into the public imaginary and demonstrate how disasters can fundamentally reshape our individual and shared conception of both history and the present moment.

Authors: Flores, L; Geilhorn, B

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Routledge
• Host title: Literature after Fukushima: From Marginalized Voices to Nuclear Futurity
• Pages: 1-8
• Series: Asia's Transformations
• Place of publication: London
• Publication date: 2023-03-28
• DOI: 10.4324/9781003285328-1
• EISBN: 9781003285328
• ISBN: 9781032258577
• Language: English
• Subtype: Introduction