Product Description

Hiroshima is the story of six human beings who lived through the greatest single manmade disaster in history. With what Bruce Bliven called "the simplicity of genius," John Hersey tells what these six -- a clerk, a widowed seamstress, a physician, a Methodist minister, a young surgeon, and a German Catholic priest -- were doing at 8:15 a.m. on August 6, 1945, when Hiroshima was destroyed by the first atomic bomb ever dropped on a city. Then he follows the course of their lives hour by hour, day by day.

The New Yorker of August 31, 1946, devoted all its space to this story. The immediate repercussions were vast: newspapers here and abroad reprinted it; during evening half-hours it was read over the network of the American Broadcasting Company; leading editorials were devoted to it in uncounted newspapers.

Almost four decades after the original publication of this celebrated book John Hersey went back to Hiroshima in search of the people whose stories he had told. His account of what he discovered about them -- the variety of ways in which they responded to the past and went on with their lives -- is now the eloquent and moving final chapter of Hiroshima.

"At exactly fifteen minutes past eight in the morning, on August 6, 1945, Japanese time, at the moment when the atomic bomb flashed above Hiroshima, Miss Toshiko Sasaki, a clerk in the personnel department of the East Asia Tin Works, had just sat down at her place in the plant office and was turning her head to speak to the girl at the next desk. At that same moment, Dr. Masakazu Fujii was settling down crosslegged to read the Osaka Asahi on the porch of his private hospital, overhanging one of the seven deltaic rivers which divide Hiroshima; Mrs. Hatsuyo Nakamura, a tailor's widow, stood by the window of her kitchen, watching a neighbor tearing down his house because it lay in the path of an air-raid-defense fire lane; Father Wilhelm Kleinsorge, a German priest of the Society of Jesus, reclined in his underwear on a cot on the top floor of his order's three-story mission house, reading a Jesuit magazine, Stimmen der Zeit; Dr. Terufumi Sasaki, a young member of the surgical staff of the city's large, modern Red Cross Hospital, walked along one of the hospital corridors with a blood specimen for a Wassermann test in his hand; and the Reverend Mr. Kiyoshi Tanimoto, pastor of the Hiroshima Methodist Church, paused at the door of a rich man's house in Koi, the city's western suburb, and prepared to unload a handcart full of things he had evacuated from town..."

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #326012 in Books
• Published on: 1985-08-12
• Released on: 1985-08-12
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 208 pages

From Amazon.com
When the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, few could have anticipated its potential for devastation. Pulitzer prize-winning author John Hersey recorded the stories of Hiroshima residents shortly after the explosion and, in 1946, Hiroshima was published, giving the world first-hand accounts from people who had survived it. The words of Miss Sasaki, Dr. Fujii, Mrs. Nakamara, Father Kleinsorg, Dr. Sasaki, and the Reverend Tanimoto gave a face to the statistics that saturated the media and solicited an overwhelming public response. Whether you believe the bomb made the difference in the war or that it should never have been dropped, "Hiroshima" is a must read for all of us who live in the shadow of armed conflict.

From Library Journal
On the basis of a return visit 40 years after the dropping of the bomb, Hersey has written a ``final chapter'' to one of the most important books to come out of World War II. The new chapter follows a reprint of the original text on the dropping of the first atomic bomb, and is written in the same spare, objective style. In it, Hersey brings up to date the lives of six survivors he covered so brilliantly in 1946. Once again he evokes the humdrum and the surreal elements in the aftermath of the bomb, and with eloquent simplicity he includes statements of other nations' nuclear tests. Compelling, unforgettable, and more timely than ever, this is absolutely essential for collections from junior high on. Robert H. Donahugh, Youngstown and Mahoning Cty. P.L., Ohio
Copyright 1985 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From AudioFile
The fates of six victims are portrayed vividly in Hersey's classic account of the first atomic bomb. This edition contains a final chapter, written 40 years later, in which Hersey follows up on these six "Hibakusha," or "explosion-affected persons." Edward Asner speaks for many characters, yet his voice is that of the Hiroshima citizen caught up in day-to-day survival. He conveys the fear, confusion, pain and resignation of individuals dealing with a cataclysmic force. With subtle, understated delivery, Asner powerfully evokes the time, place and plight of these people. J.H.L. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine

Customer Reviews

Excellent Book
This is an excellent book. It puts a face on the horrors of the atomic bomb. You can feel the revulsion of atomic warfare. It was quite unfortunate that it was dropped. If you believe it was right to drop it, this is the one book that could very well change your mind.

The problem with this book
...is that teachers usually give it as an assigned read to their students without balancing it with other realities of WWII. Hiroshima is an accurate account of the after effects of atomic weaponry - however, it must not be forgotten that Japan was the agressor in the Pacific war. When teachers assign this book to their students, they should also give them an assigned reading that puts into perspective this event in the context of that era. I suggest that students be able to read something on the Nanjing Massacre, The Thai-Burma Death Railway, the Bataan Death March, the plight of "comfort women", the colonization of Korea by Japan, the forced starvation of Vietnam, or any other event connected to Japanese aggression. Too often, the facts get lost in the effort to portray Japan as "victim" of the war. One really interesting topic to research might be Japan's race to build an atomic bomb, as illustrated by the book "Japan's Secret War: Japan's Race Against Time to Build Its Own Atomic Bomb". Japan was a highly feared and brutal empire - after the bombing they all suddenly became experts on peace. Does this make any sense at all?

I lived in Japan for nearly a decade and was astounded at how little the average Japanese knew about Japan's wartime atrocities. This is due, no doubt, in part to the fact that the war is little mentioned in Japanese school textbooks. Moreover, the Hiroshima "Peace" Museum has absolutely no information on Japan's aggressive actions during the war. While I feel for the victims of the bomb, I also feel for the victims of the Japanese Army. It saddens me that the average Japanese has forgotten the victims of Japan's war campaign and instead chooses to wallow in self-pity over losing the war.

DRAMA AND EXCITEMENT
A stunning and compelling (MUSTREAD) story of 6 different people (Toshinki Sasaki, Masakzu Fujii, Hatsuyo Nakamura, Wilhelm Kleinsorge, Terufumi Sasaki, and Kiyoshi Tanimoto) who's lives are heavily affected by the atomic bomb USA dropped on the city of Hiroshima on August 6 1945. World War II was a war not to be forgotten and niether will this book when you read it. A little hard to follow however, when you get it, a wonderfully written story. John Hershy gives very factual details of the war, and handles the characters point of view well. He is a genious.