Pills linked to The Rape of Nanking author Iris Chang's death

[Guest guest]

http://www.straight.com/article-394514/vancouver/pills-linked-changs-death

Pills linked to The Rape of Nanking author Iris Chang's death in

her mother Ying-Ying's new book

By Charlie

, May 25, 2011

Rape of Nanking author Iris Chang died in 2004.

American writer Iris Chang has become a mythical figure on both

sides of the Pacific Ocean. Like many legendary tales, her story

offers up numerous interpretations. The daughter of

Taiwanese-immigrant academics, Chang blossomed into a

best-selling author in her late 20s with a shocking 1997 book, The

Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II,

which chronicled an unimaginable slaughter by the Japanese

imperial army in 1937. According to her detailed research,

between 260,000 and 350,000 people perished in the Chinese city.

Torture and gang rape of civilians were commonplace.

Chang’s exploration of this sordid and little-known history

began after she saw a 1994 photo exhibit in Cupertino,

California, on Japanese war crimes in China in the 1930s.

Because she could speak Mandarin, Chang was able to interview

numerous survivors in the city now known as Nanjing. In the Yale

University archives, she also discovered a 500-page diary by an

American missionary named Minnie Vautrin, who set up a refugee

camp for thousands of Chinese women fleeing the massacre. In

addition, Chang made numerous visits to other archives in China

and the United States. The cornerstone of her research was a

detailed diary by a German Nazi who was stationed in Nanjing and

who tried to stop the carnage.

She made the cover of Reader’s Digest; her book was

excerpted in Newsweek, and she met then–U.S. president

Bill Clinton. However, The Rape of Nanking’s

publication caused an uproar in Japan. After writing an op-ed

piece in Newsday entitled “Japan Must Pay for Its War Crimes”,

Chang received hate mail and, according to her mother, an

envelope containing two bullets.

Seven years later, she committed suicide by shooting herself in

the head. Chang was only 36.

Japanese right-wingers have since cited mental illness to

support their arguments that Chang’s book should be dismissed.

Conversely, there has also been speculation among some of

Chang’s fans on the Internet that she was murdered. Others have

suggested that the depth of depravity she recorded caused her to

take her own life. This, in a peculiar way, echoed the

experience of Vautrin, who committed suicide back in the U.S.

after witnessing the horrors of the Nanking massacre.

Now Iris’s mother, Ying-Ying Chang, has decided to set the

record straight with a new biography of her daughter, The

Woman Who Could Not Forget: Iris Chang Before and Beyond The

Rape of Nanking (Pegasus Books). Ying-Ying, a 70-year-old

retired biochemist, has proposed a new theory: the side effects

of antidepressant drugs triggered her daughter’s suicide.

In a phone interview with the Georgia Straight from

her home in San , California, Ying-Ying emphasized that her

daughter was never mentally ill until her breakdown in the

spring of 2004. Over the next six months, she was put on several

medications, including Celexa, Abilify, and Risperdal, before

she took her life.

While researching her book, Ying-Ying visited Harvard Medical

School clinical psychiatrist Teicher, who has linked some

antidepressants to suicide ideation (imaginings) in some

patients. He supplied her with research showing that side

effects may differ depending on racial, ethnic, and gender

differences. “Iris’s psychiatrists—the three psychiatrists—were

all Caucasian,” Ying-Ying pointed out. “They probably don’t well

understand the racial differences.”

Ying-Ying also told the Straight that one drug her

daughter was taking contained a warning for children and

adolescents but never included any cautions for adults. She

emphasized that she’s not opposed to people taking

antidepressants, but she said that people of different racial

backgrounds should be aware that these medicines sometimes have

horrible side effects. Moreover, she said, clinical trials often

involve Caucasian men, who may be able to handle larger doses

without as many consequences. “I also want to educate the

psychiatrists, too,” she added.

With a PhD in biological chemistry from Harvard University,

Ying-Ying is no slouch in evaluating scientific literature. She

did postdoctoral research at Princeton University and has been

published in several journals, including Science. Her

husband, Shau-Jin, is a retired physicist who taught at the

University of Illinois.

Ying-Ying’s book contains numerous letters written by Iris.

They reinforce her mother’s argument that she was never mentally

ill while researching The Rape of Nanking and her two

other books, Thread of the Silkworm and The

Chinese in America: A Narrative History. This

correspondence reveals a brilliant and often work-obsessed young

woman who loved her mother. “People have asked me what kind of

relationship I had with my daughter,” Ying-Ying volunteered

during her interview. “I said at the beginning: mother-daughter.

But later on, she was a friend, and then she was my mentor.”

In an emotional aside, Ying-Ying confessed that she could never

have written her book had it not been for her daughter’s

constant refrain that one person can make a difference. “I gave

her birth, but she gave me so much that enriched my life.”

In one note written to her mother in 1997, Iris mentioned two

authors who had committed suicide. Iris quickly added that

compared to most writers, she was “relatively well-grounded”.

Ying-Ying speculated that her daughter’s mental breakdown in

2004 was caused by physical exhaustion brought on by overwork

and the challenges of raising an autistic son. As for the root

cause of her daughter’s suicide, Ying-Ying concluded: “I really

believe it was the medication.”

Ying-Ying Chang will speak at 2 p.m. on June 5 in the Alice

MacKay Room at the Vancouver Public Library central branch. This

will be followed at 3:30 p.m. by a screening of the docudrama Iris

Chang: The Rape of Nanking.

[Guest guest]

http://www.straight.com/article-394514/vancouver/pills-linked-changs-death

Pills linked to The Rape of Nanking author Iris Chang's death in

her mother Ying-Ying's new book

By Charlie

, May 25, 2011

Rape of Nanking author Iris Chang died in 2004.

American writer Iris Chang has become a mythical figure on both

sides of the Pacific Ocean. Like many legendary tales, her story

offers up numerous interpretations. The daughter of

Taiwanese-immigrant academics, Chang blossomed into a

best-selling author in her late 20s with a shocking 1997 book, The

Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II,

which chronicled an unimaginable slaughter by the Japanese

imperial army in 1937. According to her detailed research,

between 260,000 and 350,000 people perished in the Chinese city.

Torture and gang rape of civilians were commonplace.

Chang’s exploration of this sordid and little-known history

began after she saw a 1994 photo exhibit in Cupertino,

California, on Japanese war crimes in China in the 1930s.

Because she could speak Mandarin, Chang was able to interview

numerous survivors in the city now known as Nanjing. In the Yale

University archives, she also discovered a 500-page diary by an

American missionary named Minnie Vautrin, who set up a refugee

camp for thousands of Chinese women fleeing the massacre. In

addition, Chang made numerous visits to other archives in China

and the United States. The cornerstone of her research was a

detailed diary by a German Nazi who was stationed in Nanjing and

who tried to stop the carnage.

She made the cover of Reader’s Digest; her book was

excerpted in Newsweek, and she met then–U.S. president

Bill Clinton. However, The Rape of Nanking’s

publication caused an uproar in Japan. After writing an op-ed

piece in Newsday entitled “Japan Must Pay for Its War Crimes”,

Chang received hate mail and, according to her mother, an

envelope containing two bullets.

Seven years later, she committed suicide by shooting herself in

the head. Chang was only 36.

Japanese right-wingers have since cited mental illness to

support their arguments that Chang’s book should be dismissed.

Conversely, there has also been speculation among some of

Chang’s fans on the Internet that she was murdered. Others have

suggested that the depth of depravity she recorded caused her to

take her own life. This, in a peculiar way, echoed the

experience of Vautrin, who committed suicide back in the U.S.

after witnessing the horrors of the Nanking massacre.

Now Iris’s mother, Ying-Ying Chang, has decided to set the

record straight with a new biography of her daughter, The

Woman Who Could Not Forget: Iris Chang Before and Beyond The

Rape of Nanking (Pegasus Books). Ying-Ying, a 70-year-old

retired biochemist, has proposed a new theory: the side effects

of antidepressant drugs triggered her daughter’s suicide.

In a phone interview with the Georgia Straight from

her home in San , California, Ying-Ying emphasized that her

daughter was never mentally ill until her breakdown in the

spring of 2004. Over the next six months, she was put on several

medications, including Celexa, Abilify, and Risperdal, before

she took her life.

While researching her book, Ying-Ying visited Harvard Medical

School clinical psychiatrist Teicher, who has linked some

antidepressants to suicide ideation (imaginings) in some

patients. He supplied her with research showing that side

effects may differ depending on racial, ethnic, and gender

differences. “Iris’s psychiatrists—the three psychiatrists—were

all Caucasian,” Ying-Ying pointed out. “They probably don’t well

understand the racial differences.”

Ying-Ying also told the Straight that one drug her

daughter was taking contained a warning for children and

adolescents but never included any cautions for adults. She

emphasized that she’s not opposed to people taking

antidepressants, but she said that people of different racial

backgrounds should be aware that these medicines sometimes have

horrible side effects. Moreover, she said, clinical trials often

involve Caucasian men, who may be able to handle larger doses

without as many consequences. “I also want to educate the

psychiatrists, too,” she added.

With a PhD in biological chemistry from Harvard University,

Ying-Ying is no slouch in evaluating scientific literature. She

did postdoctoral research at Princeton University and has been

published in several journals, including Science. Her

husband, Shau-Jin, is a retired physicist who taught at the

University of Illinois.

Ying-Ying’s book contains numerous letters written by Iris.

They reinforce her mother’s argument that she was never mentally

ill while researching The Rape of Nanking and her two

other books, Thread of the Silkworm and The

Chinese in America: A Narrative History. This

correspondence reveals a brilliant and often work-obsessed young

woman who loved her mother. “People have asked me what kind of

relationship I had with my daughter,” Ying-Ying volunteered

during her interview. “I said at the beginning: mother-daughter.

But later on, she was a friend, and then she was my mentor.”

In an emotional aside, Ying-Ying confessed that she could never

have written her book had it not been for her daughter’s

constant refrain that one person can make a difference. “I gave

her birth, but she gave me so much that enriched my life.”

In one note written to her mother in 1997, Iris mentioned two

authors who had committed suicide. Iris quickly added that

compared to most writers, she was “relatively well-grounded”.

Ying-Ying speculated that her daughter’s mental breakdown in

2004 was caused by physical exhaustion brought on by overwork

and the challenges of raising an autistic son. As for the root

cause of her daughter’s suicide, Ying-Ying concluded: “I really

believe it was the medication.”

Ying-Ying Chang will speak at 2 p.m. on June 5 in the Alice

MacKay Room at the Vancouver Public Library central branch. This

will be followed at 3:30 p.m. by a screening of the docudrama Iris

Chang: The Rape of Nanking.

[Guest guest]

http://www.straight.com/article-394514/vancouver/pills-linked-changs-death

Pills linked to The Rape of Nanking author Iris Chang's death in

her mother Ying-Ying's new book

By Charlie

, May 25, 2011

Rape of Nanking author Iris Chang died in 2004.

American writer Iris Chang has become a mythical figure on both

sides of the Pacific Ocean. Like many legendary tales, her story

offers up numerous interpretations. The daughter of

Taiwanese-immigrant academics, Chang blossomed into a

best-selling author in her late 20s with a shocking 1997 book, The

Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II,

which chronicled an unimaginable slaughter by the Japanese

imperial army in 1937. According to her detailed research,

between 260,000 and 350,000 people perished in the Chinese city.

Torture and gang rape of civilians were commonplace.

Chang’s exploration of this sordid and little-known history

began after she saw a 1994 photo exhibit in Cupertino,

California, on Japanese war crimes in China in the 1930s.

Because she could speak Mandarin, Chang was able to interview

numerous survivors in the city now known as Nanjing. In the Yale

University archives, she also discovered a 500-page diary by an

American missionary named Minnie Vautrin, who set up a refugee

camp for thousands of Chinese women fleeing the massacre. In

addition, Chang made numerous visits to other archives in China

and the United States. The cornerstone of her research was a

detailed diary by a German Nazi who was stationed in Nanjing and

who tried to stop the carnage.

She made the cover of Reader’s Digest; her book was

excerpted in Newsweek, and she met then–U.S. president

Bill Clinton. However, The Rape of Nanking’s

publication caused an uproar in Japan. After writing an op-ed

piece in Newsday entitled “Japan Must Pay for Its War Crimes”,

Chang received hate mail and, according to her mother, an

envelope containing two bullets.

Seven years later, she committed suicide by shooting herself in

the head. Chang was only 36.

Japanese right-wingers have since cited mental illness to

support their arguments that Chang’s book should be dismissed.

Conversely, there has also been speculation among some of

Chang’s fans on the Internet that she was murdered. Others have

suggested that the depth of depravity she recorded caused her to

take her own life. This, in a peculiar way, echoed the

experience of Vautrin, who committed suicide back in the U.S.

after witnessing the horrors of the Nanking massacre.

Now Iris’s mother, Ying-Ying Chang, has decided to set the

record straight with a new biography of her daughter, The

Woman Who Could Not Forget: Iris Chang Before and Beyond The

Rape of Nanking (Pegasus Books). Ying-Ying, a 70-year-old

retired biochemist, has proposed a new theory: the side effects

of antidepressant drugs triggered her daughter’s suicide.

In a phone interview with the Georgia Straight from

her home in San , California, Ying-Ying emphasized that her

daughter was never mentally ill until her breakdown in the

spring of 2004. Over the next six months, she was put on several

medications, including Celexa, Abilify, and Risperdal, before

she took her life.

While researching her book, Ying-Ying visited Harvard Medical

School clinical psychiatrist Teicher, who has linked some

antidepressants to suicide ideation (imaginings) in some

patients. He supplied her with research showing that side

effects may differ depending on racial, ethnic, and gender

differences. “Iris’s psychiatrists—the three psychiatrists—were

all Caucasian,” Ying-Ying pointed out. “They probably don’t well

understand the racial differences.”

Ying-Ying also told the Straight that one drug her

daughter was taking contained a warning for children and

adolescents but never included any cautions for adults. She

emphasized that she’s not opposed to people taking

antidepressants, but she said that people of different racial

backgrounds should be aware that these medicines sometimes have

horrible side effects. Moreover, she said, clinical trials often

involve Caucasian men, who may be able to handle larger doses

without as many consequences. “I also want to educate the

psychiatrists, too,” she added.

With a PhD in biological chemistry from Harvard University,

Ying-Ying is no slouch in evaluating scientific literature. She

did postdoctoral research at Princeton University and has been

published in several journals, including Science. Her

husband, Shau-Jin, is a retired physicist who taught at the

University of Illinois.

Ying-Ying’s book contains numerous letters written by Iris.

They reinforce her mother’s argument that she was never mentally

ill while researching The Rape of Nanking and her two

other books, Thread of the Silkworm and The

Chinese in America: A Narrative History. This

correspondence reveals a brilliant and often work-obsessed young

woman who loved her mother. “People have asked me what kind of

relationship I had with my daughter,” Ying-Ying volunteered

during her interview. “I said at the beginning: mother-daughter.

But later on, she was a friend, and then she was my mentor.”

In an emotional aside, Ying-Ying confessed that she could never

have written her book had it not been for her daughter’s

constant refrain that one person can make a difference. “I gave

her birth, but she gave me so much that enriched my life.”

In one note written to her mother in 1997, Iris mentioned two

authors who had committed suicide. Iris quickly added that

compared to most writers, she was “relatively well-grounded”.

Ying-Ying speculated that her daughter’s mental breakdown in

2004 was caused by physical exhaustion brought on by overwork

and the challenges of raising an autistic son. As for the root

cause of her daughter’s suicide, Ying-Ying concluded: “I really

believe it was the medication.”

Ying-Ying Chang will speak at 2 p.m. on June 5 in the Alice

MacKay Room at the Vancouver Public Library central branch. This

will be followed at 3:30 p.m. by a screening of the docudrama Iris

Chang: The Rape of Nanking.

[Guest guest]

http://www.straight.com/article-394514/vancouver/pills-linked-changs-death

Pills linked to The Rape of Nanking author Iris Chang's death in

her mother Ying-Ying's new book

By Charlie

, May 25, 2011

Rape of Nanking author Iris Chang died in 2004.

American writer Iris Chang has become a mythical figure on both

sides of the Pacific Ocean. Like many legendary tales, her story

offers up numerous interpretations. The daughter of

Taiwanese-immigrant academics, Chang blossomed into a

best-selling author in her late 20s with a shocking 1997 book, The

Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II,

which chronicled an unimaginable slaughter by the Japanese

imperial army in 1937. According to her detailed research,

between 260,000 and 350,000 people perished in the Chinese city.

Torture and gang rape of civilians were commonplace.

Chang’s exploration of this sordid and little-known history

began after she saw a 1994 photo exhibit in Cupertino,

California, on Japanese war crimes in China in the 1930s.

Because she could speak Mandarin, Chang was able to interview

numerous survivors in the city now known as Nanjing. In the Yale

University archives, she also discovered a 500-page diary by an

American missionary named Minnie Vautrin, who set up a refugee

camp for thousands of Chinese women fleeing the massacre. In

addition, Chang made numerous visits to other archives in China

and the United States. The cornerstone of her research was a

detailed diary by a German Nazi who was stationed in Nanjing and

who tried to stop the carnage.

She made the cover of Reader’s Digest; her book was

excerpted in Newsweek, and she met then–U.S. president

Bill Clinton. However, The Rape of Nanking’s

publication caused an uproar in Japan. After writing an op-ed

piece in Newsday entitled “Japan Must Pay for Its War Crimes”,

Chang received hate mail and, according to her mother, an

envelope containing two bullets.

Seven years later, she committed suicide by shooting herself in

the head. Chang was only 36.

Japanese right-wingers have since cited mental illness to

support their arguments that Chang’s book should be dismissed.

Conversely, there has also been speculation among some of

Chang’s fans on the Internet that she was murdered. Others have

suggested that the depth of depravity she recorded caused her to

take her own life. This, in a peculiar way, echoed the

experience of Vautrin, who committed suicide back in the U.S.

after witnessing the horrors of the Nanking massacre.

Now Iris’s mother, Ying-Ying Chang, has decided to set the

record straight with a new biography of her daughter, The

Woman Who Could Not Forget: Iris Chang Before and Beyond The

Rape of Nanking (Pegasus Books). Ying-Ying, a 70-year-old

retired biochemist, has proposed a new theory: the side effects

of antidepressant drugs triggered her daughter’s suicide.

In a phone interview with the Georgia Straight from

her home in San , California, Ying-Ying emphasized that her

daughter was never mentally ill until her breakdown in the

spring of 2004. Over the next six months, she was put on several

medications, including Celexa, Abilify, and Risperdal, before

she took her life.

While researching her book, Ying-Ying visited Harvard Medical

School clinical psychiatrist Teicher, who has linked some

antidepressants to suicide ideation (imaginings) in some

patients. He supplied her with research showing that side

effects may differ depending on racial, ethnic, and gender

differences. “Iris’s psychiatrists—the three psychiatrists—were

all Caucasian,” Ying-Ying pointed out. “They probably don’t well

understand the racial differences.”

Ying-Ying also told the Straight that one drug her

daughter was taking contained a warning for children and

adolescents but never included any cautions for adults. She

emphasized that she’s not opposed to people taking

antidepressants, but she said that people of different racial

backgrounds should be aware that these medicines sometimes have

horrible side effects. Moreover, she said, clinical trials often

involve Caucasian men, who may be able to handle larger doses

without as many consequences. “I also want to educate the

psychiatrists, too,” she added.

With a PhD in biological chemistry from Harvard University,

Ying-Ying is no slouch in evaluating scientific literature. She

did postdoctoral research at Princeton University and has been

published in several journals, including Science. Her

husband, Shau-Jin, is a retired physicist who taught at the

University of Illinois.

Ying-Ying’s book contains numerous letters written by Iris.

They reinforce her mother’s argument that she was never mentally

ill while researching The Rape of Nanking and her two

other books, Thread of the Silkworm and The

Chinese in America: A Narrative History. This

correspondence reveals a brilliant and often work-obsessed young

woman who loved her mother. “People have asked me what kind of

relationship I had with my daughter,” Ying-Ying volunteered

during her interview. “I said at the beginning: mother-daughter.

But later on, she was a friend, and then she was my mentor.”

In an emotional aside, Ying-Ying confessed that she could never

have written her book had it not been for her daughter’s

constant refrain that one person can make a difference. “I gave

her birth, but she gave me so much that enriched my life.”

In one note written to her mother in 1997, Iris mentioned two

authors who had committed suicide. Iris quickly added that

compared to most writers, she was “relatively well-grounded”.

Ying-Ying speculated that her daughter’s mental breakdown in

2004 was caused by physical exhaustion brought on by overwork

and the challenges of raising an autistic son. As for the root

cause of her daughter’s suicide, Ying-Ying concluded: “I really

believe it was the medication.”

Ying-Ying Chang will speak at 2 p.m. on June 5 in the Alice

MacKay Room at the Vancouver Public Library central branch. This

will be followed at 3:30 p.m. by a screening of the docudrama Iris

Chang: The Rape of Nanking.