Hiroshima Bombing John Richard Hersey Summary

John Richard Hersey was a writer and journalist. He was born in Tientsin, China then relocated at the age of ten to United States. A year later after graduating the University of Cambridge, Hersey was employed for Time magazine. After writing articles for American magazines on wars fought in Europe and Asia Hersey was reporting in Japan for The New Yorker magazine. As he was documenting the cities tragic damages he found a document from a survivor. After meeting some of the survivors he talked to an editor from The New Yorker about writing an article explaining the bombing through the survivors’ testimonies. He spent a couple of weeks researching and interviewing several survivors. Hersey then returned to America, and a couple of months later …show more content…
He used real life experiences from six different people who survived the Hiroshima bombing. Hersey did not want to tell his audience the surface story and facts about the nuclear bomb. He wanted to leave an indentation in the readers mind about the effects and coping capabilities these people possessed. Hersey narrated the survivors’ testimonies in a way the readers’ could picture the horrific events. For example the descriptions’ of a bright light beaming through everyone’s eyes with the following of the dark mist that covered everything they knew to be home. Was just one of the few captivating moments that gave agony to the readers. This event was something these people did not expect to happen yet they still managed to survive when all was lost including their health, their possessions, their homes, and their …show more content…
The injured people in the park did not scream in pain. The children did not cry from confusion and despair. There was not an angry mob raging through the streets against their defenseless emperor. Instead these people were at ease by just hearing their emperor speak to them through a broadcast “What a wonderful blessing it is that Tenno himself call on us and we can hear his own voice in person. We are thoroughly satisfied in such a great sacrifice” (89). This was the first occurrence in the history of modern warfare in which deadly weapons such as nuclear bombs were used in order to achieve or define a turning point in a war. The United States successfully carried out this attack, and they successfully ignited a definite blow to the Japanese military. This came in itself not through the destruction of the Japanese military but through the demolition of the Japanese citizens. Millions of citizens died during the point of attack. But, the aftermath of the Hiroshima bombing were the real eye opener. When the Japanese citizens looked at their imperial government at an hour of need soon after the bombings, the Imperial army did not show a sense of