Hiroshima - John Hersey - 1946
Introduction
Hiroshima is nonfiction, portraying the stories of six people who survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, Japan, on August 6, 1945. These survivors, six people from all walks of life, share their experiences from the moments after the bomb dropped to forty years after that dreadful day.
The first military use of an atomic bomb caused immense human suffering. The United States used its newly developed atomic bomb against the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to force an end to the lingering war with Japan. This tactic proved as horrifying as it was decisive. In Hiroshima, the bomb killed more than one hundred thousand people immediately and wounded one hundred thousand more. Most of the victims were civilians. Hersey's account describes the graphic results of nuclear warfare and reports the grim ordeal of the survivors.
In addition to its terrifying content, the work cultivates a new journalistic technique. Hersey tells the stories of six survivors in separate, alternating sections, using suspense, characterization, and plot in such a way that the work as a whole feels more like a novel than nonfiction. The events of the narrative are a reconstruction of what Hersey, working as a reporter, discovered through interviews with survivors of the blast.
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