50 YEARS AFTER THE BOMB - COMMEMORATION, CENSORSHIP AND CONFLICT

When either Americans or Japanese talk about the bombings, they not on ly engage thinking about the meaning of the second world war, but also of subsequent wars, the relationship of citizens to the state, the me aning of democratic participation and the state's prerogatives to make war, While the two official stories reveal much about the national my ths of each nation, in the end, the official stories are wholly inadeq uate to capture the lived experience of all the people of either count ry or to grasp the ongoing significance of the nuclear era.