Hiroshima John Hersey Analysis

Hiroshima The novel Hiroshima by John Hersey depicts a tragedy of mass human suffering when the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. Hersey tells many stories that actually happened of people dying painful deaths and suffering for long periods of time. I believe that Hersey was against the dropping of the bomb because of his vivid descriptions, personal stories from the victims, and the concern for the future of the survivors. “He reached down and took the woman by the hands, but her skin slipped off in huge, glove like pieces” (45). This gruesome scene is just one of the many vivid descriptions that are seen throughout the story. Hersey really tries to capture the attention and use shock to instill sympathy and sorrow into the reader to get his point across that he is against the dropping of the bomb. He uses very detailed, precise words to describe most of the scenes in the book, and the shock is constant. Sentence after sentence, a different bloody, gory scene is described with painful detail. Hersey also connects the mass destruction of buildings with
This helps the reader develop an emotional connection to the people in the story, causing them to feel sympathy for the victims of the bomb. For example, Hersey tells the story of Dr. Sasaki, a young surgeon at the Red Cross Hospital, who is left as one of the only people able to help all of the wounded that flooded to the hospital. “Dr. Sasaki worked without method, taking those who were nearest him first, and he noticed soon that the corridor seemed to be getting more and more crowded. Mixed in with the abrasions and lacerations which most people in the hospital had suffered, he began to find dreadful burns” (25). This makes the victims of the bomb more like actual people instead of numbers and statistics on a paper, the way the US Government saw it. This convinces people that the US should not have dropped the