1958 by Carl Van Vechten
Carl Van Vechten Collection, Library of Congress
John Hersey (1914-1993)
Hiroshima
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1985
(Originally published 1946)
John Hersey was a World War II correspondent for Life magazine and he completed the book after a trip to Japan in 1945-46. Hiroshima is an account of six survivors of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima -- two doctors, a widow with two children, a German priest, a Japanese pastor, and a woman clerk. Their experiences become personal events for the reader. This work was originally printed as the August 31, 1946 issue of The New Yorker and later read in its entirety on ABC radio. Norman Cousins, in The Saturday Review of Literature, said Hersey was highly regarded for: "compassion without sticky sentimentality, an almost monumental integrity, an eloquent simplicity, a basic respect for his craft."
Sources:
"Hersey, John Richard." The Columbia Encyclopedia.
Sixth Edition. New York: Columbia University Press, 2001. <http://www.bartleby.com/65/he/Hersey-J.html>.
Jones, Dan R. "John
Hersey." Dictionary of Literary Biography, Volume 185: American
Literary Journalists, 1945-1995. Detroit: Gale, 1997.
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