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mads_jpg's review against another edition
dark
informative
reflective
medium-paced
3.75
After seeing so many haunting images from Gaza of Palestinians either dead or dying, many of them children, I wanted to understand it all better. Whether violent imagery creates lasting pathos, whether we should look or if it's just self flagellation, and whether images like these can actually make significant change.
These are admittedly very complicated questions to answer, so Sontag's ideas have left me feeling both less and more confused. Maybe it's harder to compare the almost real-time images from Motaz's Instagram stories to the war images filtered through television companies and journalists. Maybe it's a whole different beast seeing images of death through the eyes of someone you have a parasocial relationship with.
But I did leave this book feeling like I understood the desire to document and witness these atrocities, despite all the complications that come along with it. And all the emotions that can come up for people for different reasons, how sympathy can turn to apathy when someone feels hopeless to stop the suffering.
These are admittedly very complicated questions to answer, so Sontag's ideas have left me feeling both less and more confused. Maybe it's harder to compare the almost real-time images from Motaz's Instagram stories to the war images filtered through television companies and journalists. Maybe it's a whole different beast seeing images of death through the eyes of someone you have a parasocial relationship with.
But I did leave this book feeling like I understood the desire to document and witness these atrocities, despite all the complications that come along with it. And all the emotions that can come up for people for different reasons, how sympathy can turn to apathy when someone feels hopeless to stop the suffering.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Death, Genocide, Gore, Misogyny, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual violence, Slavery, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Blood, Antisemitism, Grief, Colonisation, War, and Injury/Injury detail
flara's review against another edition
challenging
dark
informative
slow-paced
3.5
I had a love-hate relationship with this text and having finished the book 2 months prior, I still can't quite decide whether I liked it or not.
I was put off at the very beginning by Sontag's argument that wars have always belonged to men, and that women would not choose violence to resolve their power struggles (I don't have my copy of the book at the moment, I am relying solely on my memory; and so I might be mis-remembering some of the nuances). I could go on a tangent here, but that would be an entirely different discussion. I'm choosing to concentrate on what these essays entail, rather than what they're missing.
Throughout her essays, Sontag points at things that are fairly obvious, but yet I have never thought of them? This is a book about war and war photography; and the fact that the majority of famous war photographs of 19th and early 20th century were completely staged shouldn't surprise us - and yet I have never questioned their authenticity? We expect drawings/paintings/etc. to take artistic liberties, perhaps to make the real event seem more dramatic and shocking than it actually was. But we don't always hold photographs to the same standard (obviously I am not talking about studio photography here). After all, they are real-time snapshots, they should be trust-worthy. I found this especially relevant in regards to what is currently happening in Ukraine.
I really enjoyed Sontag's observations on how as a humankind we have become immune to the shocking nature of news and yet we are obsessed with gory images. We have become disengaged from the suffering of people paraded to us daily on evening news, we don't even flinch when we hear the mention of armed conflict/natural disaster/etc. At the same time, images circulating around the world are getting gorier by the minute. They are sensational. Those are the ones that grab our attention (for what could be argued are the wrong reasons). We latch onto the shocking nature of these images, rather than on the human element.
Sontag uses several war conflicts as her case studies. The one that stood out was Crimean War; if I remember correctly, this was the first war to be documented in photography. I would prefer if discussed photographs were included in the book, rather than having to look them up (was there a copyright issue?). In conclusion, I found this to be an enjoyable read. However, the opening chapter really annoyed me. Sontag certainly pointed out the obvious, even if the obvious wasn't so obvious after all. For this selfish reason I struggle to give her enough credit.
I was put off at the very beginning by Sontag's argument that wars have always belonged to men, and that women would not choose violence to resolve their power struggles (I don't have my copy of the book at the moment, I am relying solely on my memory; and so I might be mis-remembering some of the nuances). I could go on a tangent here, but that would be an entirely different discussion. I'm choosing to concentrate on what these essays entail, rather than what they're missing.
Throughout her essays, Sontag points at things that are fairly obvious, but yet I have never thought of them? This is a book about war and war photography; and the fact that the majority of famous war photographs of 19th and early 20th century were completely staged shouldn't surprise us - and yet I have never questioned their authenticity? We expect drawings/paintings/etc. to take artistic liberties, perhaps to make the real event seem more dramatic and shocking than it actually was. But we don't always hold photographs to the same standard (obviously I am not talking about studio photography here). After all, they are real-time snapshots, they should be trust-worthy. I found this especially relevant in regards to what is currently happening in Ukraine.
I really enjoyed Sontag's observations on how as a humankind we have become immune to the shocking nature of news and yet we are obsessed with gory images. We have become disengaged from the suffering of people paraded to us daily on evening news, we don't even flinch when we hear the mention of armed conflict/natural disaster/etc. At the same time, images circulating around the world are getting gorier by the minute. They are sensational. Those are the ones that grab our attention (for what could be argued are the wrong reasons). We latch onto the shocking nature of these images, rather than on the human element.
Sontag uses several war conflicts as her case studies. The one that stood out was Crimean War; if I remember correctly, this was the first war to be documented in photography. I would prefer if discussed photographs were included in the book, rather than having to look them up (was there a copyright issue?). In conclusion, I found this to be an enjoyable read. However, the opening chapter really annoyed me. Sontag certainly pointed out the obvious, even if the obvious wasn't so obvious after all. For this selfish reason I struggle to give her enough credit.
Content Warnings
Graphic: War
Moderate: Body horror, Death, Torture, Violence, Blood, Grief, and Murder
orndal's review against another edition
challenging
informative
reflective
slow-paced
3.5
Leste denne på jobb. Noen av essayene er bedre enn andre, men Sontag i Balkan er ... opp til hver enkelt leder, vil jeg si. Ikke hopp over etterordet, der var det mye interessant om Sontag i sin samtid!
Content Warnings
Moderate: Body horror, Confinement, Genocide, Blood, Colonisation, and Classism