Tales of the great American victory : World War II in politics and poetics / edited by Diederik Oostdijk and Markha G. Valenta.

Based on papers presented at the conference "The Stories of World War II," held June 21-23, 2004 at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Tales of the great American victory : an introduction / Diederik Oostdijk -- Counter-memory in American poetry / Steven Gould Axelrod -- "His eyes remained wide open on his world" : John Berryman and World War II / Philip Coleman -- World War II and the gender of history : the poetry of Sylvia Plath / Lisa Katz -- Silence and speech : phased memory in Elie Wiesel and Ruth Kluger / Lorrie Goldensohn -- The race war at home : youth culture, and the the transformation of the color line on the homefront / Andrew J. Diamond -- The noir war : American narratives of World War II and its aftermath / Jeremiah B.C. Axelrod -- The veteran, his wife, and their mothers : prescriptions for psychological rehabilitation after World War II / Rebecca Jo Plant -- Poetry on the home front : Lowell, Jarrell, and Berryman / Christopher Moylan -- America versus Europe : emerging divergence in thinking about the Holocaust / G. Jan Colijn -- The reception of Victor Klemperer's Diaries 1933-1945 in contemporary American and German Holocaust scholarship / Arvi Sepp -- "Gallant efforts" : Hollywood's strategic celluloid campaign / Wilfried Wilms -- Memorializing "the good war" and "the greatest generation" on the National Mall / James Deutsch -- World War II and postmodern temporality in Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's rainbow / Paul Crosthwaite -- The Dutch race norm and the American example / Dienke Hondius -- Imperial Japan, imperial America / John W. Dower -- Epilogue : preliminary thoughts on how to believe (in) America / Markha G. Valenta.