[HN Gopher] Hiroshima (1946)
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Hiroshima (1946)
Author : pseudolus
Score : 20 points
Date : 2025-08-02 10:59 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.newyorker.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.newyorker.com)
| pseudolus wrote:
| https://archive.ph/N672J
| _rm wrote:
| Interesting to see the difference in writing style back then.
| Lots of long sentences. Kind of the opposite to the LinkedIn-
| style writing we see today, spitting out as many sentences and
| paragraphs as possible. Like you can see the generations'
| attention spans in their form of writing.
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| Been watching some old movies lately and its amazing to watch
| simple scenes stretch on for five minutes or more. Its almost
| like there was nothing else to do.
| avhception wrote:
| At first I'm irritated by this, but once I adapt I actually
| like the time it gives me as a viewer to appreciate the
| subtleties of what's the characters and what they're up to.
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| Agreed, though I feel they went overboard during the
| seventies. On the other hand, modern movies make me
| desperate for a breather.
| defrost wrote:
| A surprising number of the people of Hiroshima remained more or
| less indifferent about the ethics of using the bomb.
|
| Unsurprising for the time given the context.
|
| While people far from Japan made much of the uniqueness and power
| of a single bomb destroying a single city for those on the ground
| it was just another single city destroyed overnight by bombing ..
| the 73rd such city destroyed in a relatively short duration of
| time.
|
| The destruction and death in Hiroshima was on par with the
| destruction and death in Tokyo when that was firebombed.
| eschulz wrote:
| This piece made a big impact on me when I read it like five
| years ago, and if I recall correctly there was a young doctor
| there who was one of the few interviewed who stated that the
| bomb's use was possibly a war crime. He did like 48 hours in
| the hospital as thousands upon thousands of burned and dying
| walked from afar to the completely overrun clinic.
| slibhb wrote:
| There was no nuclear taboo in 1945. Looking back, people forget
| that.
| Synaesthesia wrote:
| The singular horror of this event really is so difficult to
| describe, definitely one of the low points of human history which
| we must vow to never again repeat, under any circumstances.
| OgsyedIE wrote:
| I totally disagree about the difficulty of describing horror,
| since the linked article is one of many to have received
| critical acclaim for providing quality descriptions of WW2
| experiences (my recommendation is 1952's The Naked Island).
|
| Agree about the necessity of the never again stuff though, even
| though we've been failing at that continuously.
| jwilber wrote:
| Well, op may be making the point that even the best
| description of horror is little compared to experiencing it.
| Watching a video of the horror itself (e.g. combat footage, a
| beheading, open-heart surgery) pales in comparison to
| experiencing it firsthand.
| zzzbra wrote:
| I just bought this paperback.
| jmclnx wrote:
| Verg good read
|
| Linked there is also a related article from 1985
|
| https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1985/07/15/hiroshima-the-...
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