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helizaams's review against another edition
5.0
Powerful book. I’ve never seen actual perspectives other than some American books in school. Devastating read but important to know about. Real, horrifying and moving stories of these people who went through the unimaginable
thaurisil's review
4.0
John Hersey tells the story of six survivors of the atomic bomb explosion in Hiroshima. They comprise Toshimi Sasaki, a clerk who was buried in the rubble, broke her leg, developed a severe near-fatal infection and became a cripple, Masakazu Fujii, a semi-retired hedonistic doctor whose house fell into the river, Hatsuyo Nakamura, a tailor's widow with three children who developed radiation sickness and had lifelong recurring fatigue, Father Wilhelm Kleinsorge, a German Jesuit priest who, despite being ill, did his best to help those around him, Dr Terufumi Sasaki, a young surgeon who was uninjured and spent sleepless days and nights after the bomb dressing a never-ending slew of injuries, and Reverend Kiyoshi Tanimoto, a Methodist pastor who tirelessly and energetically helped other survivors.
These accounts were published as an editorial in the New Yorker in 1946, and are joined by a final chapter written 40 years after the bomb in which Hersey follows up with the subsequent stories of these six survivors. The editorial format results in this being concise and readable.
The stories are raw, emotional, and heart-wrenching. The stories are told in a matter-of-fact way, with all gory detail, the struggles across the boundary of life and death, and the fears, worries, and plain courage of the survivors laid out plainly. To the world, the atomic bomb ended a war. To the people who lived through the bomb, the bomb was another incomprehensible part of war, an object they did not have the scientific minds to understand nor the emotional capacity to learn about. Their lives were turned upside down, and they did their best to keep moving forward, live through the initial terrible days, weeks, and months, and rebuild their lives.
The last chapter, written 40 years later, shows the differing fates of the characters. Nakamura lived a long life of poverty struggling with fatigue and pains due to radiation sickness, rarely able to see a doctor, and probably represented the majority of the poor who lived through the atomic bomb. The doctors, on the other hand, became prosperous, and Tanimoto even became semi-famous, conducting multiple speaking tours in the USA. They all tried to live their lives normally, avoiding reference to them being hibakusha, or atomic bomb survivors, and yet all of their lives were changed, irrevocably, by the bomb.
These accounts were published as an editorial in the New Yorker in 1946, and are joined by a final chapter written 40 years after the bomb in which Hersey follows up with the subsequent stories of these six survivors. The editorial format results in this being concise and readable.
The stories are raw, emotional, and heart-wrenching. The stories are told in a matter-of-fact way, with all gory detail, the struggles across the boundary of life and death, and the fears, worries, and plain courage of the survivors laid out plainly. To the world, the atomic bomb ended a war. To the people who lived through the bomb, the bomb was another incomprehensible part of war, an object they did not have the scientific minds to understand nor the emotional capacity to learn about. Their lives were turned upside down, and they did their best to keep moving forward, live through the initial terrible days, weeks, and months, and rebuild their lives.
The last chapter, written 40 years later, shows the differing fates of the characters. Nakamura lived a long life of poverty struggling with fatigue and pains due to radiation sickness, rarely able to see a doctor, and probably represented the majority of the poor who lived through the atomic bomb. The doctors, on the other hand, became prosperous, and Tanimoto even became semi-famous, conducting multiple speaking tours in the USA. They all tried to live their lives normally, avoiding reference to them being hibakusha, or atomic bomb survivors, and yet all of their lives were changed, irrevocably, by the bomb.
rh2riordan's review against another edition
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
4.25