"FINDING IRIS CHANG"

• Author: Paula Kamen
• Publisher: Da Capo Press
• Publication date: Oct. 22, 2007
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 281
• Price: $26

AFTER IRIS CHANG committed suicide in November 2004, Gargoyle reporter Matthew Freeman contacted one of Chang's closest friends, the writer Paula Kamen, to find out more about the brilliant 1985 Uni graduate and best-selling author of "The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II."

Three years later, Kamen has written a book about her friend, whom she met in the late 1980s when they were students at the University of Illinois.

Published this fall by Da Capo Press, "Finding Iris Chang: Friendship, Ambition, and the Loss of an Extraordinary Mind" combines personal reminiscence with interviews and archival research to create a portrait of a young woman who seemed to have everything: a successful writing career, a loving husband and son, a supportive social network of friends, colleagues, and family.

So why did she decide to end her life?

That question drove Kamen to learn all she could about Chang. This included returning to the Illinois campus, where among other things she visited Uni High. Kamen did research in the Uni library and interviewed several of Chang's former teachers, in particular English teacher Adele Suslick and history teacher Chris Butler.

Kamen tells the story of Chang's Uni days primarily in the book's fourth chapter, "Why in the World Did She Run for Homecoming Court?," which looks at Chang's years at both Uni and the University of Illinois (where she was in fact a member of the homecoming court in 1988).

Butler recalls Chang as a target of school bullies (p. 86), who teased and mocked her, an account backed up by recollections from several of Chang's fellow students, including Nina Paley and Daniel Kolodziej.

Suslick, on the other hand, recalls a young woman who had no trouble standing up for herself.

"I never saw her as a weakling," Suslick says on p. 91. "I honestly didn't. She was so able to do verbal judo, and she was not shy. She was straightforward, up-front, honest, and she may have been feeling that she was bullied. But she did not act as if she was fearful, and in fact she often times looked to be the stronger of the two in any altercation."

"Finding Iris Chang" is available for purchase online and at local bookstores, including Pages for All Ages in Savoy.

For more about Chang, we are publishing online for the first time Matthew Freeman's article written in the aftermath of her death. This story was originally published in the Dec. 2, 2004, print issue of the Gargoyle.

FROM THE GARGOYLE ARCHIVES

IRIS CHANG, 1968-2004
Uni High loses one of its most revered graduates. As a writer and activist, Iris Chang made a difference.

By Matthew Freeman (Class of 2006)
Gargoyle assistant editor
Story published Dec. 2, 2004

PAULA KAMEN SPOKE with Iris Chang three days before the 1985 Uni High graduate died. Kamen met Chang her junior year at the University of Illinois and had been close friends with her ever since.

“She was like an entirely different person,” Kamen told the Gargoyle in a phone interview from her home in Chicago. “She was just drained of all energy. She sounded so bad; I was gonna call to follow up but she had already died.”

Even after speaking with her, however, Kamen felt “she’s the last person I could see giving up.”

On Nov. 9, Iris Chang was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound in her car south of Los Gatos, Calif. The best-selling author, historian, and human rights activist was 36. Chang was a resident of Champaign-Urbana for 20 years. She is survived by her husband and 2-year-old son.
Uni High will co-host a remembrance celebration in Chang’s honor at 4 p.m. today in the Spurlock Museum’s Knight Auditorium, 600 S. Gregory St., Urbana.

PASSION AND INTENSITY

The news of Chang’s death sent shockwaves throughout the Uni community.

“Between classes some students came in and said, ‘Iris Chang committed suicide,’ ” remembered history teacher Chris Butler. “It really blind-sided me.”

English teacher Adele Suslick was listening to local radio on her way to school when she heard the news.

“I pulled off the road and called my husband because I needed to talk about what I had just heard,” Suslick said.

Both Butler and Suslick taught Chang during her time at Uni.

“She was one of the most passionate individuals I have ever known,” Suslick recalled. “Very intense. Very focused. Fully committed to the cause at hand.”

Chang had recently been hospitalized for a breakdown and treated for depression.

Although reasons for her suicide aren’t entirely known, Kamen and others speculate that her work on tragic stories may have been the basis of her depression. Most notable was her second book, “The Rape of Nanking,” the story of Japanese atrocities against the Chinese in the capital city of Nanking during World War II.

The bestseller brought fame to the young writer and continues to stir up controversy to this day. But the horrific tales certainly took a toll on Chang, who told the Gargoyle in a phone interview last year, “My health suffered greatly while writing ‘The Rape of Nanking.’ ”

She spoke in the context of her latest book, “The Chinese in America,” which she found “psychologically much easier” to write than “The Rape of Nanking.”

“The Chinese in America” is also of great historical value; it chronicles 150 years of the Chinese immigrating to and living in the United States.

NATURAL TALENT AND HARD WORK

But Chang was a determined writer long before she was a best-selling author. She started her career at a young age and wrote for the Yankee Ridge Elementary School newsletter before becoming a student at Uni High.

Suslick, who taught Chang for senior English, said the aspiring writer “had an innate talent for argumentation and could nail an argument with compelling evidence. She always looked you directly in the eye when she spoke; there was no doubt that she believed what she had to say and that she wanted you to believe it, too.”

Suslick also sponsored the Unique literary magazine, which Chang contributed to and edited. Daniel Kolodziej, Uni graduate of 1986, co-edited Unique with Chang her senior year.

“She was stubborn, but she had a soft side, and her writing reflected that thoughtfulness and humor,” he said.

Kolodziej viewed Chang as “awkward” in high school and recalled her being an “easy target” for torment by bullies. He felt she expressed this somewhat through her writing but was internalizing it for the most part.

“When she gained success, I think that her inner beauty radiated more visibly through her outer appearance,” he said.

After graduating from Uni she went to the U of I, where she met Kamen her junior year. Kamen edited some of Chang’s work for The Daily Illini and recalls not having to change a single aspect of the articles. “Her writing came in perfect,” she said.

MAKING AN IMPACT

Chang gained valuable experience as an intern at The New York Times and at the Chicago Tribune and went on to get her master’s degree from the writing program at Johns Hopkins University. During her time at Johns Hopkins she was introduced to New York editor Barbara Culliton, who put her in touch with Susan Rabiner.

Rabiner, an editor at Basic Books who would become Chang’s literary agent, introduced her to the topic of her first book, “The Thread of the Silkworm.” The book is a biography of Dr. Tsien Hsue-shen, who created China’s ballistic missile program. The book had modest success, but it was her next book that would put her on the map as a groundbreaking historian.

Chang never predicted “The Rape of Nanking” to be a commercial success. “I let my passion and curiosity determine which stories I will write,” she told the Gargoyle.

And it was this that led her to write her second book out of what she told Time magazine was “a sense of rage.” After the book became a widely publicized best seller, Chang continued to fight against what she described as “a second rape”: the Japanese cover-up of the war crimes. In her role as an activist committed to keeping alive the memory of Japanese atrocities, she became a heroine in some circles and a villain in others, especially in Japan.

After the success of her book, Chang came back to Uni in 1998 to receive the University High School Max Beberman Distinguished Alumni Award.

“I would say that the environment at Uni High was very supportive of the creativity and independence of the students,” Chang said to the Gargoyle. She especially mentioned Suslick and Butler as having an influence on her in their styles of teaching. But perhaps the biggest influence was that of Chang on Uni. Suslick and Butler both use Chang’s books in their classes.

Chang was at work on her fourth book, about U.S. soldiers who fought the Japanese in the Philippines, in the months before her death.

“I hope Iris is remembered for what she accomplished and not how she died,” Suslick said. “She achieved so much in 36 years.”

Chang’s influence goes far beyond Uni. Included in that is another best-selling author, James Bradley, who gives credit to Chang for the idea of his latest book, “Flyboys.”

As an author who writes on feminist topics, Kamen was also inspired by Chang. An enthusiastic Chang encouraged her to submit an article to The New York Times just out of college, a move that Kamen viewed as naïve. But her story was accepted. “She really thought big,” Kamen said of Chang. “When I meet writing students I use her name as a verb. ‘You have to Iris Chang it.’ ”

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, approximately 600 people attended her memorial service several weeks ago in Los Altos. Kamen spoke at the service and was most impressed by the large support of Asian Americans from the community. One group held up a poster with a large quote from “The Chinese in America.”

A memorial fund in Chang’s name has been set up at the U of I for journalism students. Kolodziej plans to create a scholarship for Uni High students in her memory. Although not yet set in stone, his current plans are to create an essay-writing contest in which students would be graded, and top essays would be awarded a prize according to donation. For more information or to make a donation, he can be reached by e-mail at kolojlaw@yahoo.com.

[Note: As a result of Daniel Kolodziej's efforts, the Iris Chang and Peter Kolodziej Writing Awards were established in 2006, honoring both Chang and Daniel's older brother, Peter, a scientist who died in 2005.]