And she was determined not to be hospitalized again. I was there for three days and we talked. In 2007, the documentary Nanking was dedicated to Chang, as well as the Chinese victims of Nanking. It's a shame these atrocities had to be happened in the hands of Japanese. We arranged for her to come down and stay with me soon," she said. She used a post office box, never her home address, for mail. Rabiner recalled telling Iris, " 'You're young, but take a flyer.' In her goodbye note, Iris described her guilt about having allowed her son, Christopher, to be vaccinated before the age of 2. Mom was a self hating, mentally ill Asian woman married to a gangly white nerd. Iris met the man she would marry in 1989, when she was a sophomore in journalism at the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana. "This was lying in our basement. The late Iris Chang was eulogized in simultaneous ceremonies in northern California, Washington and Nanjing, China on Friday. 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. At the time, she was several months into research for her fourth book, about the Bataan Death March. Iris Chang (Author, . Some 8,000 died on the notorious "death march." She feared these vaccinations may have caused him to become autistic. 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. It was very painful for me to think about, even then. ", After studying the final results of the Santa Clara Country medical examiner's report, Baker closed his investigation March 1, 2005. Rabiner sensed the book would be important and signed Iris to write it. Iris Chang, author of "The Rape of Nanking", ended her life with a pistol on November 9, 2004. She got from the airport to the hotel, but that was all she could do. The Memorial Hall, which collects documents, photos, and human remains from the massacre, added both a wing and a bronze statue dedicated to Chang in 2005. Iris' reluctance to take medication may indicate the difficulty she had accepting her illness as an illness. NANKING-02/B/19JULY98/SC/TK=IRIS Chang autographing "Rape of Nanking" Sunday at the Treasure Island exhibit. Speaking of the night they met, Brett said, "Iris was beautiful, vivacious -- and sober. "First they gave her an antipsychotic, to stabilize her," her mother said. View this record View. 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. Back to Christopher Douglas Page. 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. Structural Info. "You'll have to forgive me, but I find myself often deeply affected by these stories. "But gradually, she became very depressed," said her father, adding that her doctor in California prescribed an additional medication, an antidepressant. Driving west toward Santa Cruz on Highway 17, she took a turnoff 25 miles from her home and parked on a steep gravel utility road within sight of the highway. [4] During her time in college she also worked as a New York Times stringer from Urbana-Champaign, and wrote six front-page articles over the course of one year. "Yes!" She added one more reason when talking to Patchto help those who lost loved ones like herself heal. ", The book rocketed Iris into the pantheon of American intellectuals. "Iris always came to us to discuss her problems," her mother said. At 10, she entered a young- author competition and won first place. Now author of the deceased writer's biography, The Woman Who Could Not Forget, Chang is scheduled to have a book signing at from 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. Saturday. The medicine made her feel sluggish. "Civilization is tissue thin," Iris wrote. Maxine Hong Kingston and Amy Tan really blew the doors open for fiction writers. She wrote her thesis on "The Poetry of Science." 162 Christopher H Douglas. "We saw cartoons where she was portrayed as this woman with a great big mouth," Brett said. Later, Brett learned that the nanny had urged Iris to cancel the trip. Chang, with a Ph. At the time of her death, Chang was researching a fourth book about the Bataan Death March and was promoting The Chinese in America. . He framed it and hung it on a wall in his home. One speaker called Iris "a hero for those muffled by injustice." This is for the biographers., Suicide, Kamen observes, is in a lot of ways the ultimate act of control. She was assigned to the AP office in Chicago. 2002) University: BS Journalism, University of . Long after college, Changs drive, intelligence, and tireless research continued to put her ahead of her peers. When the American general surrendered on April 9, the Japanese forced the troops to walk 65 miles through sweltering jungle. She asked me if I was religious -- I said I wasn't, not at all. After working briefly as a reporter for The Associated Press . Se cas con Bretton Lee Douglas, con quien tuvo a su hijo Christopher, y vivi en San Jos (California), donde sufri una profunda depresin que le llev al suicidio. We've seen a lot of suicides. Before dawn, Iris awoke and got into her car. After publication of the book, Chang campaigned to persuade the Japanese government to apologize for its troops' wartime conduct and to pay compensation. The manager knew her as a customer and an author -- Iris and Brett ate there often. But just before Iris left for Kentucky -- the last week of July 2004 -- a family emergency forced the teacher to cancel. Sluggishness is a common side effect of Depakote, because it subdues the manic phase of bipolar disorder by depressing the central nervous system. Schell reviewed her book favorably in the New York Times. She believed her phone was tapped. "But this time, I had assumed she was sleeping all day after working all night. But the nanny spoke only Mandarin. Iris dubbed him the "Oskar Schindler of Nanking.". She was committed to her cause, and she radiated life. 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]. Douglas described the first time he saw her, when they were in college: "She was a strikingly beautiful girl who carried . In her last call to Kamen, Chang had alluded to highly placed people who didnt like her once again digging into Japanese atrocities during World War II. "We had our lives so structured. 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 was 36. "I thought it would be inspirational. Includes Address (11) Phone (8) Email (3) See Results. "When anybody questioned the validity of what she wrote, she would respond with overwhelming evidence to back it up. She attended University Laboratory High School of Urbana, Illinois, and graduated in 1985. The lack of sleep can exacerbate the illness and vice versa. We go through her and her husband's (Brett Douglas) house in San jose. She worked at the Associated Press and the Chicago Tribune before devoting The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Through a third party, the colonel declined to be interviewed. After leaving Reed's Sport Shop at noon on Monday, Nov. 8, Iris tried to load the revolver she had just purchased. (The book has yet to be translated for publication in Japan.) They lived on a leafy country road. Families, too, have trouble coping. If she had a brain tumor, people would better understand.". Soon she managed to call her mother. On top of that, she wasn't sleeping. The daughter of two university professors who had emigrated from China, Chang was born in Princeton, New . Johns Hopkins University, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign: Children: Christopher: Spouse: Bretton Douglas Related Document. Iris arrived at the gunsmith's at about 2 p.m., carrying a Reed's Sport Shop Bag. Chang is the subject of the 2007 biography, Finding Iris Chang, and the 2007 documentary film Iris Chang: The Rape of Nanking. [22], EPILOGUE FOR THE 2011 EDITION - The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, University Laboratory High School of Urbana, Illinois, The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II, Finding Iris Chang: Friendship, Ambition, and the Loss of an Extraordinary Mind, Global Alliance for Preserving the History of WWII in Asia, "How 'Iris Chang' became a verb: A eulogy", "Iris Chang, Who Chronicled Rape of Nanking, Dies at 36", "Ken Liu's The Paper Menagerie, a dazzling collection", "San Jose community briefs for the week of Nov. 8: Chang Park Opens", "San Jose: Iris Chang Park finally set to open next month", "Historian Iris Chang won many battles / The war she lost raged within", "Iris Chang's suicide stunned those she tried so hard to help", "Historian Iris Chang won many battles/The war she lost raged within", Mercury News - Iris Chang Park Ready for its Unveiling, California Ethnic and Multicultural Archives, University of California at Santa Barbara, Inventory of the Iris Chang Papers -Alumni Records, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Iris_Chang&oldid=1131876832, This page was last edited on 6 January 2023, at 05:22. In the month after her death, the image would be the central icon at each of three Bay Area memorials. At the time of her death, she had been taking the medications Depakote and Risperdal to stabilize her mood.[19]. Iris Chang, author of The Rape of Nanking, ended her life with a pistol on November 9, 2004. The parents of Iris Chang sit close together, their faces drawn. She was 36. "She was like a battalion commander," Meldahl said. ", "Iris truly had no fear. Each breath is becoming difficult for me to takethe anxiety can be compared to drowning in an open sea. Whether it was the CIA or some other organization I will never know. She parked in front of Reed's Sport Shop, a redwood-shingled emporium that sells fishing, cycling and hunting gear. "Iris used to say she never understood why people would commit suicide, so she was definitely not a suicidal type," said Chang. So she took a little bit and then she stopped -- and it shouldn't be stopped like that. Like others, Kamen had wondered if postpartum depression might have played a role in her mental decline. When you do not, you live not just by the day but by the minute. "Iris was very loving," Martel's daughter said. I promise not to visit Web sites that talk about suicide. The book hit the stores at Christmas, a tough selling season for serious nonfiction. Photos for a profile of Iris chang, a prominent author and historian, who died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. She was seeing a therapist two to three times a week, Brett said, but fought against having family members participate. "Most authors are worn out after five or six cities." Title Type Publication date Author(s) Description; Document:The Mysterious Deaths of Ernest Hemingway and Iris Chang: article: 1 August 2011: Facts. Share this on . photo by Tim Kao/the chronicle, Event on 3/6/05 in San Francisco. Another said: "Let us thank her parents. We always had to argue all the exceptions she could think of. Chang, a San Jose resident, took her own life in Los Gatos at age 36. I can never shake my belief that I was being recruited, and later persecuted, by forces more powerful than I could have imagined. He stopped and honked but there was no response. She's very much a perfectionist. "Most lived in dark, squalid apartments cluttered with the debris of poverty and heavy with mildew and humidity," she wrote. Her mother said, "She was always publishing something. As a duo played traditional Chinese music, a group of nearly 100 gathered at the Millbrae headquarters of the Chinese-language daily the World Journal. They made an appointment. So we finally started trying, and then we had our son in 2002. They married in 1964, and each earned a doctorate from Harvard in 1967. 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. Christopher J. Chang (Chemistry), Ral Coronado (Ethnic Studies), Ken Light (Journalism), and Debarati Sanyal . She called this the most important lesson to be learned from the tragedy of Nanking. But there has to be dialogue about how to do that in the long term., In All in My Head, Kamen documents how she learned to slow down and come to terms with a life of chronic pain. In a funny kind of way, she was resolute, she was calm. ", Her father patted the tabletop. I sensed suddenly threats to my own life: an eerie feeling that I was being followed in the streets, the white van parked outside my house, damaged mail arriving at my P.O. including Chang's husband Brett Douglas and the couple's 2-year-old son, Christopher. "Poetry by Iris Chang" was written in neat cursive on the title page. I said, 'You need to go to bed.' ", Despite support from esteemed historians and journalists, including Stephen Ambrose and George Will, some judged Iris' version of history too subjective. Chang said she never took any antidepressants when devastated by Iris' death. An excerpt from an interview with author Iris Chang held during her appearance at the New York State Writers Institute on April 14, 2004. Isles Of Scilly, TR21. That is, successful and invulnerable. Meanwhile, they decided they had put their plans for a family on hold long enough. When Martel read in a newspaper about her death, he asked his daughter, "Is that our Iris? As long as I am alive, these forces will never stop hounding me. "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. Copy photo of Iris Chang with her husband Brett Douglas and their son at his birthday party. It had been one week since their daughter's death. We found 100+ records for Christopher Douglas in KY, NV and 45 other states. That afternoon, she checked herself in to Norton Psychiatric Hospital in Louisville, with help from the colonel. Iris ate quickly, asked for green tea to go and charged $15.11 to her credit card. It read: "I promise to get up and get out of the house every morning. Tsien left for the People's Republic of China in September 1955. Iris sent the Martels photographs from her trip, cards for Chinese New Year and updates on her Bataan project. Each breath is becoming difficult for me to take -- the anxiety can be compared to drowning in an open sea. There are aspects of my experience in Louisville that I will never understand. he said, grinning. I knew immediately I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her.". "A lot of people -- depending on how disturbed they are -- feel that people are plotting against them." Classical AF dissonance between pride in her culture and inability to integrate. "They drop so fast," the letter had read. "Iris was a phenomenon," said one of her former teachers at Johns Hopkins, Ann Finkbeiner. She wrote her 100-page book proposal in a couple of weeks.". Instead it offers the same meticulous attention to detail and thorough immersion in primary sources that distinguishes Changs exhaustively researched books, Thread of the Silkworm (1995), about an accused Chinese spy; The Rape of Nanking, published in 1997 to mark the massacres 60th anniversary; and the 2003 narrative history The Chinese in America. Martel cried, "You son of a bitch! "I had considered running away, but I will never be able to escape from myself and my thoughts. Every suicide is the tragic terminus of a tangle of roads, a route unique as a thumbprint. After her own years of research on the interplay of hormones and the brain, Kamen believes that Changs bipolar condition may have been exacerbated by her fertility treatments. He returned to China and went on to develop its missile system. Iris Chang always outdid Paula Kamen. Ultimately, three notes were found, all dated Monday, Nov. 8, 2004. She wound up committing suicide after finishing her book about the Rape of Nanking. It may be true that Iris Chang committed suicide. She passed the football field and the blocky, concrete auditorium of James Lick High School. Next to it, now, is a copy of Iris' obituary. 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. "It's all for the sake of and in memory of my beloved daughter," Chang said. 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. Mom died, dad attempted to raise the son using classic meek white dad tactics, probably filled the kid's head with delusions about Jesus and stuff. Christopher P Douglas, 63. Please reload the page and try again. ", During two years of research, Iris made significant historical discoveries. "We set out a very big lunch -- meat trays and sandwiches and desserts," she said. IRIS CHANG, Author, "The Rape of Nanking:" Well, in 1937, in December, the Japanese swept into the city of Nanking and within six to eight weeks, they had massacred more . But for us to be able to write nonfiction, the stories of our lives -- on a lot of levels, it was revolutionary. Pearl Harbor was still smoldering when Japanese planes bombed the Philippines' Bataan Peninsula, where Martel was stationed with a National Guard tank battalion. She wore herself out." Iris Chang (), before her untimely death, was one of America's leading young historians. She knew that in California, she could purchase a relic immediately and avoid the 10-day waiting period necessary with other guns. At the first memorial -- that evening's "visitation" -- friends signed the guest book and offered condolences to the family. "Iris thought it was an injustice. Coast Miwok dried the roots and . ", His voice slipped to a whisper. "There is an aspect of paranoia in the majority of suicides," Baker said. It was just after nine on a November morning in 2004 and he had spotted a female driver who was either asleep or in trouble. They just kept saying, 'We'll print another 10,000, we'll print another 10,000.' ", When Zia and Iris met for the first time, they planned a quick lunch. It is far better that you remember me as I wasin my heyday as a best-selling authorthan the wild-eyed wreck who returned from Louisville. 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.". I will stop by to visit my parents then go for a long walk. Among other things, the compulsively well-organized Chang began losing credit cards every couple of weeks, according to Douglas, and in her last year she became paranoid about everything from viruses attacking her computer to attempts by the government to recruit her, a la The Manchurian Candidate. She said she had never thought she would write a book unrelated to. As the coffin was lowered into the ground, the black-clad tribe of mourners formed a line. Chang also lectures frequently before business, university and other groups interested in human rights, World War II history, Cold War history, the Asian American experience, Sino-American relations, and the future of American civil liberties. He explained that the gunpowder she had was unsafe to use indoors. I will follow the doctor's orders for medications. Chang, with a Ph.D. in biological chemistry from Harvard University, had a scientist's career until her retirement in 2002. Iris told her mother that working on it was a vacation after "Rape of Nanking. So you see, she was really a fighter. "Did you really look like Charlie Chaplin?" Homicide detectives would eventually determine that Iris had loaded all six chambers of the gun, placed the barrel between her lips, and fired. "Michael is very outgoing, very extroverted -- Iris is different," said Mrs. Chang. Upon his return to China, Tsien developed the Dongfeng missile program, and later the Silkworm missile, which was used by the Iraqi military during its war on Iran and against the United States-led coalitions during the Persian Gulf War and the 2003 invasion of Iraq. ", Martel was slightly hard of hearing, but his memory was crisp. Fleetwood Mask is coming to the Montgomery Theater! . Blood covered her clothes. "Richard was Iris' friend," said Chang. The half-inch lead ball perforated her hard palate, passed through her left dural sinus, her left cerebral and occipital lobes, broke partially through her skull and came to rest without exiting her scalp. Iris collapsed in bed. Such "black powder" firearms, popular with Civil War re-enactors, require skill to load and fire. Chang will continue her book-signing tour after Saturday's event in Cupertino. ", As Iris' good friend Barbara Masin said, "Those who are close to her did everything that they possibly could have done. ", Later, Iris challenged the Japanese ambassador to a debate on the "MacNeil-Lehrer NewsHour" on PBS. The book with both Chang's and Rhodes' names on its cover has sold more copies than expected and received positive reviews, including one in the Wall Street Journal, since its launch in May. She said she had never thought she would write a book unrelated to science, and in English, her second language, but she did. Iris had been haunted since childhood by the graphic stories she was told about Nanking. Iris would be interviewing them, somebody else would be filming them, somebody else would be photocopying records, and somebody would be sending documents down to UPS. Mo Hayder dedicated a novel to her. Sunday morning, they drove to Santa Cruz for lunch on the pier, then went to her favorite spa, Chaminade -- a 300-acre mission-style resort, surrounded by redwoods and eucalyptus, in the Santa Cruz Mountains. The cycle of mood shifts that distinguish the disease -- from manic highs to depressive lows -- differs with every sufferer. . But this time, "she appeared unhappy," the manager told investigators. This could be a one-time event or it could signal the onset of bipolar disorder, the doctors told them. He went to her desk in her upstairs office and found a note next to the computer.
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And she was determined not to be hospitalized again. I was there for three days and we talked. In 2007, the documentary Nanking was dedicated to Chang, as well as the Chinese victims of Nanking. It's a shame these atrocities had to be happened in the hands of Japanese. We arranged for her to come down and stay with me soon," she said. She used a post office box, never her home address, for mail. Rabiner recalled telling Iris, " 'You're young, but take a flyer.' In her goodbye note, Iris described her guilt about having allowed her son, Christopher, to be vaccinated before the age of 2. Mom was a self hating, mentally ill Asian woman married to a gangly white nerd. Iris met the man she would marry in 1989, when she was a sophomore in journalism at the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana. "This was lying in our basement. The late Iris Chang was eulogized in simultaneous ceremonies in northern California, Washington and Nanjing, China on Friday. 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. At the time, she was several months into research for her fourth book, about the Bataan Death March. Iris Chang (Author, . Some 8,000 died on the notorious "death march." She feared these vaccinations may have caused him to become autistic. 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. It was very painful for me to think about, even then. ", After studying the final results of the Santa Clara Country medical examiner's report, Baker closed his investigation March 1, 2005. Rabiner sensed the book would be important and signed Iris to write it. Iris Chang, author of "The Rape of Nanking", ended her life with a pistol on November 9, 2004. She got from the airport to the hotel, but that was all she could do. The Memorial Hall, which collects documents, photos, and human remains from the massacre, added both a wing and a bronze statue dedicated to Chang in 2005. Iris' reluctance to take medication may indicate the difficulty she had accepting her illness as an illness. NANKING-02/B/19JULY98/SC/TK=IRIS Chang autographing "Rape of Nanking" Sunday at the Treasure Island exhibit. Speaking of the night they met, Brett said, "Iris was beautiful, vivacious -- and sober. "First they gave her an antipsychotic, to stabilize her," her mother said. View this record View. 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. Back to Christopher Douglas Page. 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. Structural Info. "You'll have to forgive me, but I find myself often deeply affected by these stories. "But gradually, she became very depressed," said her father, adding that her doctor in California prescribed an additional medication, an antidepressant. Driving west toward Santa Cruz on Highway 17, she took a turnoff 25 miles from her home and parked on a steep gravel utility road within sight of the highway. [4] During her time in college she also worked as a New York Times stringer from Urbana-Champaign, and wrote six front-page articles over the course of one year. "Yes!" She added one more reason when talking to Patchto help those who lost loved ones like herself heal. ", The book rocketed Iris into the pantheon of American intellectuals. "Iris always came to us to discuss her problems," her mother said. At 10, she entered a young- author competition and won first place. Now author of the deceased writer's biography, The Woman Who Could Not Forget, Chang is scheduled to have a book signing at from 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. Saturday. The medicine made her feel sluggish. "Civilization is tissue thin," Iris wrote. Maxine Hong Kingston and Amy Tan really blew the doors open for fiction writers. She wrote her thesis on "The Poetry of Science." 162 Christopher H Douglas. "We saw cartoons where she was portrayed as this woman with a great big mouth," Brett said. Later, Brett learned that the nanny had urged Iris to cancel the trip. Chang, with a Ph. At the time of her death, Chang was researching a fourth book about the Bataan Death March and was promoting The Chinese in America. . He framed it and hung it on a wall in his home. One speaker called Iris "a hero for those muffled by injustice." This is for the biographers., Suicide, Kamen observes, is in a lot of ways the ultimate act of control. She was assigned to the AP office in Chicago. 2002) University: BS Journalism, University of . Long after college, Changs drive, intelligence, and tireless research continued to put her ahead of her peers. When the American general surrendered on April 9, the Japanese forced the troops to walk 65 miles through sweltering jungle. She asked me if I was religious -- I said I wasn't, not at all. After working briefly as a reporter for The Associated Press . Se cas con Bretton Lee Douglas, con quien tuvo a su hijo Christopher, y vivi en San Jos (California), donde sufri una profunda depresin que le llev al suicidio. We've seen a lot of suicides. Before dawn, Iris awoke and got into her car. After publication of the book, Chang campaigned to persuade the Japanese government to apologize for its troops' wartime conduct and to pay compensation. The manager knew her as a customer and an author -- Iris and Brett ate there often. But just before Iris left for Kentucky -- the last week of July 2004 -- a family emergency forced the teacher to cancel. Sluggishness is a common side effect of Depakote, because it subdues the manic phase of bipolar disorder by depressing the central nervous system. Schell reviewed her book favorably in the New York Times. She believed her phone was tapped. "But this time, I had assumed she was sleeping all day after working all night. But the nanny spoke only Mandarin. Iris dubbed him the "Oskar Schindler of Nanking.". She was committed to her cause, and she radiated life. 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]. Douglas described the first time he saw her, when they were in college: "She was a strikingly beautiful girl who carried . In her last call to Kamen, Chang had alluded to highly placed people who didnt like her once again digging into Japanese atrocities during World War II. "We had our lives so structured. 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 was 36. "I thought it would be inspirational. Includes Address (11) Phone (8) Email (3) See Results. "When anybody questioned the validity of what she wrote, she would respond with overwhelming evidence to back it up. She attended University Laboratory High School of Urbana, Illinois, and graduated in 1985. The lack of sleep can exacerbate the illness and vice versa. We go through her and her husband's (Brett Douglas) house in San jose. She worked at the Associated Press and the Chicago Tribune before devoting The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Through a third party, the colonel declined to be interviewed. After leaving Reed's Sport Shop at noon on Monday, Nov. 8, Iris tried to load the revolver she had just purchased. (The book has yet to be translated for publication in Japan.) They lived on a leafy country road. Families, too, have trouble coping. If she had a brain tumor, people would better understand.". Soon she managed to call her mother. On top of that, she wasn't sleeping. The daughter of two university professors who had emigrated from China, Chang was born in Princeton, New . Johns Hopkins University, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign: Children: Christopher: Spouse: Bretton Douglas Related Document. Iris arrived at the gunsmith's at about 2 p.m., carrying a Reed's Sport Shop Bag. Chang is the subject of the 2007 biography, Finding Iris Chang, and the 2007 documentary film Iris Chang: The Rape of Nanking. [22], EPILOGUE FOR THE 2011 EDITION - The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, University Laboratory High School of Urbana, Illinois, The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II, Finding Iris Chang: Friendship, Ambition, and the Loss of an Extraordinary Mind, Global Alliance for Preserving the History of WWII in Asia, "How 'Iris Chang' became a verb: A eulogy", "Iris Chang, Who Chronicled Rape of Nanking, Dies at 36", "Ken Liu's The Paper Menagerie, a dazzling collection", "San Jose community briefs for the week of Nov. 8: Chang Park Opens", "San Jose: Iris Chang Park finally set to open next month", "Historian Iris Chang won many battles / The war she lost raged within", "Iris Chang's suicide stunned those she tried so hard to help", "Historian Iris Chang won many battles/The war she lost raged within", Mercury News - Iris Chang Park Ready for its Unveiling, California Ethnic and Multicultural Archives, University of California at Santa Barbara, Inventory of the Iris Chang Papers -Alumni Records, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Iris_Chang&oldid=1131876832, This page was last edited on 6 January 2023, at 05:22. In the month after her death, the image would be the central icon at each of three Bay Area memorials. At the time of her death, she had been taking the medications Depakote and Risperdal to stabilize her mood.[19]. Iris Chang, author of The Rape of Nanking, ended her life with a pistol on November 9, 2004. The parents of Iris Chang sit close together, their faces drawn. She was 36. "She was like a battalion commander," Meldahl said. ", "Iris truly had no fear. Each breath is becoming difficult for me to takethe anxiety can be compared to drowning in an open sea. Whether it was the CIA or some other organization I will never know. She parked in front of Reed's Sport Shop, a redwood-shingled emporium that sells fishing, cycling and hunting gear. "Iris used to say she never understood why people would commit suicide, so she was definitely not a suicidal type," said Chang. So she took a little bit and then she stopped -- and it shouldn't be stopped like that. Like others, Kamen had wondered if postpartum depression might have played a role in her mental decline. When you do not, you live not just by the day but by the minute. "Iris was very loving," Martel's daughter said. I promise not to visit Web sites that talk about suicide. The book hit the stores at Christmas, a tough selling season for serious nonfiction. Photos for a profile of Iris chang, a prominent author and historian, who died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. She was seeing a therapist two to three times a week, Brett said, but fought against having family members participate. "Most authors are worn out after five or six cities." Title Type Publication date Author(s) Description; Document:The Mysterious Deaths of Ernest Hemingway and Iris Chang: article: 1 August 2011: Facts. Share this on . photo by Tim Kao/the chronicle, Event on 3/6/05 in San Francisco. Another said: "Let us thank her parents. We always had to argue all the exceptions she could think of. Chang, a San Jose resident, took her own life in Los Gatos at age 36. I can never shake my belief that I was being recruited, and later persecuted, by forces more powerful than I could have imagined. He stopped and honked but there was no response. She's very much a perfectionist. "Most lived in dark, squalid apartments cluttered with the debris of poverty and heavy with mildew and humidity," she wrote. Her mother said, "She was always publishing something. As a duo played traditional Chinese music, a group of nearly 100 gathered at the Millbrae headquarters of the Chinese-language daily the World Journal. They made an appointment. So we finally started trying, and then we had our son in 2002. They married in 1964, and each earned a doctorate from Harvard in 1967. 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. Christopher J. Chang (Chemistry), Ral Coronado (Ethnic Studies), Ken Light (Journalism), and Debarati Sanyal . She called this the most important lesson to be learned from the tragedy of Nanking. But there has to be dialogue about how to do that in the long term., In All in My Head, Kamen documents how she learned to slow down and come to terms with a life of chronic pain. In a funny kind of way, she was resolute, she was calm. ", Her father patted the tabletop. I sensed suddenly threats to my own life: an eerie feeling that I was being followed in the streets, the white van parked outside my house, damaged mail arriving at my P.O. including Chang's husband Brett Douglas and the couple's 2-year-old son, Christopher. "Poetry by Iris Chang" was written in neat cursive on the title page. I said, 'You need to go to bed.' ", Despite support from esteemed historians and journalists, including Stephen Ambrose and George Will, some judged Iris' version of history too subjective. Chang said she never took any antidepressants when devastated by Iris' death. An excerpt from an interview with author Iris Chang held during her appearance at the New York State Writers Institute on April 14, 2004. Isles Of Scilly, TR21. That is, successful and invulnerable. Meanwhile, they decided they had put their plans for a family on hold long enough. When Martel read in a newspaper about her death, he asked his daughter, "Is that our Iris? As long as I am alive, these forces will never stop hounding me. "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. Copy photo of Iris Chang with her husband Brett Douglas and their son at his birthday party. It had been one week since their daughter's death. We found 100+ records for Christopher Douglas in KY, NV and 45 other states. That afternoon, she checked herself in to Norton Psychiatric Hospital in Louisville, with help from the colonel. Iris ate quickly, asked for green tea to go and charged $15.11 to her credit card. It read: "I promise to get up and get out of the house every morning. Tsien left for the People's Republic of China in September 1955. Iris sent the Martels photographs from her trip, cards for Chinese New Year and updates on her Bataan project. Each breath is becoming difficult for me to take -- the anxiety can be compared to drowning in an open sea. There are aspects of my experience in Louisville that I will never understand. he said, grinning. I knew immediately I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her.". "A lot of people -- depending on how disturbed they are -- feel that people are plotting against them." Classical AF dissonance between pride in her culture and inability to integrate. "They drop so fast," the letter had read. "Iris was a phenomenon," said one of her former teachers at Johns Hopkins, Ann Finkbeiner. She wrote her 100-page book proposal in a couple of weeks.". Instead it offers the same meticulous attention to detail and thorough immersion in primary sources that distinguishes Changs exhaustively researched books, Thread of the Silkworm (1995), about an accused Chinese spy; The Rape of Nanking, published in 1997 to mark the massacres 60th anniversary; and the 2003 narrative history The Chinese in America. Martel cried, "You son of a bitch! "I had considered running away, but I will never be able to escape from myself and my thoughts. Every suicide is the tragic terminus of a tangle of roads, a route unique as a thumbprint. After her own years of research on the interplay of hormones and the brain, Kamen believes that Changs bipolar condition may have been exacerbated by her fertility treatments. He returned to China and went on to develop its missile system. Iris Chang always outdid Paula Kamen. Ultimately, three notes were found, all dated Monday, Nov. 8, 2004. She wound up committing suicide after finishing her book about the Rape of Nanking. It may be true that Iris Chang committed suicide. She passed the football field and the blocky, concrete auditorium of James Lick High School. Next to it, now, is a copy of Iris' obituary. 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. "It's all for the sake of and in memory of my beloved daughter," Chang said. 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. Mom died, dad attempted to raise the son using classic meek white dad tactics, probably filled the kid's head with delusions about Jesus and stuff. Christopher P Douglas, 63. Please reload the page and try again. ", During two years of research, Iris made significant historical discoveries. "We set out a very big lunch -- meat trays and sandwiches and desserts," she said. IRIS CHANG, Author, "The Rape of Nanking:" Well, in 1937, in December, the Japanese swept into the city of Nanking and within six to eight weeks, they had massacred more . But for us to be able to write nonfiction, the stories of our lives -- on a lot of levels, it was revolutionary. Pearl Harbor was still smoldering when Japanese planes bombed the Philippines' Bataan Peninsula, where Martel was stationed with a National Guard tank battalion. She wore herself out." Iris Chang (), before her untimely death, was one of America's leading young historians. She knew that in California, she could purchase a relic immediately and avoid the 10-day waiting period necessary with other guns. At the first memorial -- that evening's "visitation" -- friends signed the guest book and offered condolences to the family. "Iris thought it was an injustice. Coast Miwok dried the roots and . ", His voice slipped to a whisper. "There is an aspect of paranoia in the majority of suicides," Baker said. It was just after nine on a November morning in 2004 and he had spotted a female driver who was either asleep or in trouble. They just kept saying, 'We'll print another 10,000, we'll print another 10,000.' ", When Zia and Iris met for the first time, they planned a quick lunch. It is far better that you remember me as I wasin my heyday as a best-selling authorthan the wild-eyed wreck who returned from Louisville. 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.". I will stop by to visit my parents then go for a long walk. Among other things, the compulsively well-organized Chang began losing credit cards every couple of weeks, according to Douglas, and in her last year she became paranoid about everything from viruses attacking her computer to attempts by the government to recruit her, a la The Manchurian Candidate. She said she had never thought she would write a book unrelated to. As the coffin was lowered into the ground, the black-clad tribe of mourners formed a line. Chang also lectures frequently before business, university and other groups interested in human rights, World War II history, Cold War history, the Asian American experience, Sino-American relations, and the future of American civil liberties. He explained that the gunpowder she had was unsafe to use indoors. I will follow the doctor's orders for medications. Chang, with a Ph.D. in biological chemistry from Harvard University, had a scientist's career until her retirement in 2002. Iris told her mother that working on it was a vacation after "Rape of Nanking. So you see, she was really a fighter. "Did you really look like Charlie Chaplin?" Homicide detectives would eventually determine that Iris had loaded all six chambers of the gun, placed the barrel between her lips, and fired. "Michael is very outgoing, very extroverted -- Iris is different," said Mrs. Chang. Upon his return to China, Tsien developed the Dongfeng missile program, and later the Silkworm missile, which was used by the Iraqi military during its war on Iran and against the United States-led coalitions during the Persian Gulf War and the 2003 invasion of Iraq. ", Martel was slightly hard of hearing, but his memory was crisp. Fleetwood Mask is coming to the Montgomery Theater! . Blood covered her clothes. "Richard was Iris' friend," said Chang. The half-inch lead ball perforated her hard palate, passed through her left dural sinus, her left cerebral and occipital lobes, broke partially through her skull and came to rest without exiting her scalp. Iris collapsed in bed. Such "black powder" firearms, popular with Civil War re-enactors, require skill to load and fire. Chang will continue her book-signing tour after Saturday's event in Cupertino. ", As Iris' good friend Barbara Masin said, "Those who are close to her did everything that they possibly could have done. ", Later, Iris challenged the Japanese ambassador to a debate on the "MacNeil-Lehrer NewsHour" on PBS. The book with both Chang's and Rhodes' names on its cover has sold more copies than expected and received positive reviews, including one in the Wall Street Journal, since its launch in May. She said she had never thought she would write a book unrelated to science, and in English, her second language, but she did. Iris had been haunted since childhood by the graphic stories she was told about Nanking. Iris would be interviewing them, somebody else would be filming them, somebody else would be photocopying records, and somebody would be sending documents down to UPS. Mo Hayder dedicated a novel to her. Sunday morning, they drove to Santa Cruz for lunch on the pier, then went to her favorite spa, Chaminade -- a 300-acre mission-style resort, surrounded by redwoods and eucalyptus, in the Santa Cruz Mountains. The cycle of mood shifts that distinguish the disease -- from manic highs to depressive lows -- differs with every sufferer. . But this time, "she appeared unhappy," the manager told investigators. This could be a one-time event or it could signal the onset of bipolar disorder, the doctors told them. He went to her desk in her upstairs office and found a note next to the computer.
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