Citizen 13660 (Classics of Asian American Literature)

This book was a real eye opener, but not in the way I expected. The illustrations are somewhat crude but worth looking at, the text is flat though informational, but unfortunately the narrative rarely seeps down to the personal. What were these people portrayed actually thinking? This we just don't get to see. But none of that is the eye opener part. That came with the revelation as I delved deeper into this book that the actual situation as described here was never as grim or draconian as I had always pictured it. Certainly our government was misguided in taking this action, let me be clear about that. It's just that the mental picture I had always pictured concerning concentration camps did not mesh with what I learned in this book. All things considered, life was not as harsh in these camps as we are generally led to believe. Certainly this was no easy street, (and let me again emphasize that I am not defending the existence of these camps), but it seems like after the initial chaos our government actually tried to improve the conditions in these camps, and that for the most part those interned had adequate food, clothing, etc., had schools for their children, and were even allowed to landscape their premises and plant gardens, etc., and do whatever they could to improve their lodgings with whatever materials they had on hand. What they lacked, of course, was the ability to leave, but it seems from this book that even in that they were granted considerable leeway. And the government actually did have reason for its original concern: as this book finally lets out near the end, there were some among those interned whose loyalty certainly was questionable and in a number of cases quite openly hostile to the USA and at the very least in sympathy with, if not actually aiding (of this point we are given no information) the government of Japan. And it seems from this text that once these cases were weeded out, the remaining interns were given more and more opportunities to leave. Again, this is not to excuse our government for setting up these camps. There were other ways they could have handled the situation of loyalty, and let us hope that this type of thing is never allowed to happen again. Still, the conditions in the camps themselves seem not to have been as bad as we are led to believe. This is a revealing historical document.

I used this to try and understand the how the US Citizens of Japanese ancestry and the Issei survived in the prison camps to which they were committed because of racism and paranoid. Ironically the most famous WWII spy working for Japan in California was the British WWI fly ace Frederick Rutland.

Citizen 13660 is a story about the Japanese internment camps and life within them. It is nice to finally read some literature from this event in history. The internment camps were not established until after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. I did not know that we erected interment camps to place Japanese people in during the war. When they said internment camps, I couldn’t help but think about the Holocaust. Fortunately, it wasn’t anywhere near as horrific as a concentration camp. The author uses single panel drawing with captions to tell the story and the style of drawings were very desireable to my eye. Another thing I liked about this book, it really showed the strength of the human spirit in dark times. This book is a great novel that could be read in the high school classroom and it is also a great piece of free read material as well.

Great condition! Such a great book too! Use it for a college class yet literally finished it in 2 readings!!

I purchased this book to supplement my 8th grade language arts curriculum which looks at the internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII. I have since requested a class set of this title as it is the most useful and engaging text I've seen on the topic. The drawings really add to the interest factor for 14 year olds.

The book is very well written and gives a true image of what life was like in the camp. The illustrations further enhanced the story . Would be a great book for student history reading as many do not even know that it exisited.

Unbelievable story. Intermittent Camp is just a nice way to say PRISON! I still can’t believe this actually occurred here in this country.

I got this to supplement Farewell to Manzanar for middle school teaching, amazing book.

O esperado

第二次世界大戦中のアメリカにおける日系人収容の体験談。アメリカの国費で欧州留学もした画家である筆者が収容体験を淡々とユーモアに富んだ絵と文章で綴る。過酷な状況を恨むでもなく、できることから対処しようとする姿、主張すべきはする姿が印象的。永遠に語り継がれるべき記憶遺産だと思います。