Sunday, November 27, 2011

Hiroshima

When I read true stories, such as Hiroshima I can never really say what doesn’t work for me in the book. I want the story to be told however the journalist experienced the situation whether that is uncomfortable for me to hear about or not. It doesn't matter if some situations are hard to take in, too gruesome, or graphic because these true stories are not about the reader but about the people who were there. I don’t want to be sheltered as a reader or spared from anything. I’m reading for the truth.

“Of a hundred and fifty doctors in the city, sixty-five were already dead and most of the rest were wounded. Of 1780 nurses, 1654 were dead or too badly hurt to work.”


I would have appreciated more dialogue throughout the book to be able to get more in touch with how the people were acting amongst one another. Although this may have been impossible given the circumstances, but theoretically it’d be interested to know more about the inner conversations. Were people talking? Were people praying? Were people saying good byes?


"They said they would, but the little, broken man got away from them, and the last priests could see of him, he was running back towards the fire."

There is a real art of story telling in this book due to the fact that it feels like very little story telling is happening, if that makes sense? The book flows naturally. One moment, followed by another. Not exaggerating any moment, or expressing opinion but just letting the story be the story. And I appreciate the lack of emotion that was used in the story telling. It’s emotional for the reader to read, but on their own terms.


The whole way, Father Kleinsorge was oppressed by the thought that all the damage he saw had been done in one instant by one bomb.

Like Alyssa mentioned in class, this book was hard to read. I’m not a naive person but when you sit down and just read this book it feels like a story. And then when you shake your head and think this isn’t a story this is humanity, you totally get taken a back. It's important to understand history and if we don’t learn from it as a whole, as a country then at least take your own message from it and keep those morals and live your life accordingly.