DEATH IN LIFE: Survivors of Hiroshima

by Robert Lifton ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 29, 1967

Dr. Lifton wanted to determine what effect Hiroshima, that overwhelming encounter with death, had on the survivors of the atomic blast. He has transcribed and interpreted from extensive interviews in a brilliant, objective, compassionate study. Through his subjects, he relives the experience of the atomic bomb, the physical and psychic aftermath, complex of survival guilt, fear or actuality of A-bomb disease, the spectrum of reactions that make an A-bomb man or leader. How the survivors perceive themselves, how they struggle to incorporate their experience, how they perceive America, and further nuclear testing, how they respond in literature, art, drama, form the contents of the study. Dr. Lifton considers us all survivors of the holocausts characteristic of the twentieth century, a time when unlimited technical violence and absurd death defy but demand engagement. ""We do well to name the threat and to analyze its components,"" he says, looks further ahead to new psychic and social forms to serve the continuity of life. He has done well to assay the full significance in all its complexities of the atomic bomb experience, as a long-standing student of Japan and an outstanding psychiatrist. While accessible, the extension and depth of the report, and its subject, predicate a more than casual readership.

Pub Date: Jan. 29, 1967

ISBN: 080784344X

Page Count: -

Publisher: Random House

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1967

Categories: NONFICTION