is a Japanese

autobiographical An autobiography, sometimes informally called an autobio, is a self-written account of one's own life. It is a form of biography. Definition The word "autobiography" was first used deprecatingly by William Taylor in 1797 in the English peri ...

book by

Kyuichi Tokuda was a Japanese politician and first chairman of the Japanese Communist Party from 1945 until his death in 1953. Biography Kyuichi Tokuda was born in 1894 in Okinawa and became a lawyer following graduation from Nihon University in 1920. He joi ...

and Yoshio Shiga.

Background

''Eighteen Years in Prison'' describes the life of Tokuda Kyuichi, and Yoshio Shiga, who were both

communists Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a so ...

imprisoned in

Imperial Japan The also known as the Japanese Empire or Imperial Japan, was a historical nation-state and great power that existed from the Meiji Restoration in 1868 until the enactment of the post-World War II 1947 constitution and subsequent forma ...

. The events in the book include their liberation from

Fuchu Prison Fuchu, King of Chu (), clan name Xiong, () was from 227 to 223 BC the last king of the state of Chu during the late Warring States period of ancient China (though sources argue that Lord Changping was the last king of Chu). Fuchu was his give ...

following the defeat of the

Empire of Japan The also known as the Japanese Empire or Imperial Japan, was a historical nation-state and great power that existed from the Meiji Restoration in 1868 until the enactment of the post-World War II 1947 constitution and subsequent fo ...

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. The book was published by the

Japanese Communist Party The is a left-wing to far-left political party in Japan. With approximately 270,000 members belonging to 18,000 branches, it is one of the largest non-governing communist parties in the world. The party advocates the establishment of a democr ...

in 1948. The book was translated by Andrew Y. Kuroda of the Japanese Section, Orientalist Division, the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...

. In 1951, the book was a subject during the "Hearings before the Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and Other Internal Security Laws of the Committee on the Judiciary". ''Eighteen Years in Prison'' has been cited as a reference for the books ''The Japanese Communist Party 1922-1945'' by George M. Beckmann, Genji Okubo and ''Janus-Faced Justice: Political Criminals in Imperial Japan'' by Richard H. Mitchell.

Bibliography

References

1947 non-fiction books Japanese autobiographies {{poli-bio-book-stub