Hersey, John | Bruce Bliven (review date 9 September 1946)
Bruce Bliven (review date 9 September 1946)
SOURCE: A review of Hiroshima, in The New Republic, Vol. 115, No. 10, September 9, 1946, pp. 300-01.
[In the following review, Bliven praises Hiroshima as "true and indescribably tragic."]
By now, you have doubtless heard that last week's New Yorker devoted its entire space to one subject for the first time in the history of that periodical. The subject is the atomic bombing of Hiroshima; the author is John Hersey; and we understand the magazine sold out on most newsstands within a few hours of its appearance. If so, the public showed discernment. Hersey's piece is certainly one of the great classics of the war; if it is eligible for a Pulitzer Prize and doesn't get it, the judges should go and take a Rorschach.
Everyone has read the statistics on what happened at Hiroshima (statistics which Hersey says gravely underestimated the actual damage). But figures have no grappling...
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