Ask any two people if they remember where they were on 9/11 and you will receive a stunningly detailed description. However, if you ask those same two people for a detailed account of what happened that day you would receive two vastly different stories. Why is that? Well, memory is a very subjective thing. Public memory is subject to even more hazy recollections. Scholars, witness, and government officials all have different versions about the details. Often times it is artists who bring together these accounts by creating work which encourages public discussion. Two such artists are Isabelle Gardner, writer of the poem "Children Are Game " and Andy Warhol, painter of "Atomic Bomb". These two artists contribute to the collective memory of the atomic bomb by helping us grapple with its meaning. They do this by reflecting back on society the struggle of exact memory, which any society faces when dealing with such traumatic events, into their work by using cycles of memory and forgetting. Through this process Warhol and Gardner create a venue through which significant public discussion can occur about the bomb and people can discern for themselves the accuracy of the generally accepted public memory of the bomb.
In Edward Brunner's book Cold War Poetry he writes "to live in the Atomic Age is to acknowledge the citizen is much as a target as any military base" (224). However, with the Cold War looming in the distance some people forgot the human cost of using these weapons and the public memory of the bomb changed. The bomb was now seen as a weapon which would keep people safe. In Isabella Gardener's poem "Children Are Game" she describes a narrator who hears children "skating the thin ice of the pond" (Line 17). These children ar...
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...ry. [Normal, Ill.]: Dalkey Archive, 2003. 186-94. Print.
Prosise, Theodore O.. "The collective memory of the atomic bombings misrecognized as objective history: The case of the public opposition to the national air and space museum's atom bomb exhibit" Western Journal of Communication 62.3 (1998): 316-47. 05 Aug. 2010< http://www.informaworld.com/10.1080/10570319809374613 >
Tucson Museum of Art and Historic Block. "Andy Warhol Portfolios: Life & Legends - Tucson Museum of Art." Tucson Museum of Art :: 140 N. Main Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85701. Web. 07 Aug. 2010. .
Warhol, Andy, and Pat Hackett. POPism: the Warhol '60s. San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1990. Print.
Warhol, Andy. The Philosophy of Andy Warhol: (from A to B and Back Again). Orlando: Harcourt, 2006. Print.
Andy Warhol was a graphic artist, painter, and film maker, amoung other things, also associated with Pop Art. He moved to New York, around 1950, where he did his first advertisements as a comercial artist and, later, began showing in expositions. One technique employed by Warhol involved repeditive silk screen prints on canvas. He used this method to produce many series of prints with various, easily reconizable images. Between 1962 and 1964 in his self titled studio “The Factory”(Phaidon 484), Warhol produced over two thousand pictures. One of these, Lavender Disaster, was made in 1963 and belonged to a series of pictures all including the same image of an electric chair.
In John Hersey's book, Hiroshima, he provides a detailed account of six people and how the bombing of Hiroshima affected their lives. John Heresy felt it was important to focus his story on six individuals to create a remembrance that war affects more than just nations and countries, but actual human beings. Moreover, the book details the effect the bomb had on the city of Hiroshima. “Houses all around were burning, and the wind was now blowing hard.” (Hersey, 27).
Barnes, Michael. "Arguments Against the Atomic Bomb." 13 January 2013. Authentic History. 20 November 2013 . (For picture and information)
In the article “My Son, You Must Remember: Hiroshima and Nagasaki in William Styron’s Lie Down in Darkness” by Virginia Nickels, she reflects on William Styron who was a Marine officer during World War II. Remembering his fear approaching the Japanese invasion and recalling that 17,000 of American soldiers have already died. Nickels uses the book Lie Down in Darkness to show how not only the Japanese felt about the bombing on Hiroshima but also how the Americans felt. This show a very large difference because some Americans at the time didn’t even know that this atomic bomb had been built while others perceived the atomic bomb as the most versatile tool of the 20th century. For example, “Winkler cites one farmer’s letter inquiring as to where he could purchase a small atomic bomb to remove tree stumps from his fields, as a dynamite proved unsatisfactory” (Nickels 8). This is showing how some Americans are taking the bomb as almost a joke. Whereas, on the other hand, “particularly Berger’s identification of the inherent evil in mankind and Harry’s regret over the loss of Japanese lives”(Nickels 6). This is showing how some Americans post war did feel a sense of guilt for all the lives lost and how their attacks no longer held to their original innocence. Due to such a difference in feelings
The development of the atomic bomb and chemical warfare forever changed the way people saw the world. It was a landmark in time for which there was no turning back. The constant balancing of the nuclear super powers kept the whole of humankind on the brink of atomic Armageddon. Fear of nuclear winter and the uncertainty of radiation created its own form of a cultural epidemic in the United States. During these tense times in human history officials made controversial decisions such as the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Dangerous biological experiments and bombs tests were carried out in the name of the greater good and national defense. Some historians and scientists argue that the decisions and acts carried out by the U.S. during World War II and the Cold War were unethical because of the direct damage they did. The United States' decisions were moral because it can be proven their actions were aimed at achieving a greater good and those that were put in potential danger volunteered and were informed of the risk.
...e atomic bomb on Japan was extremely controversial it ultimately ended in America’s favor when Japan surrendered. According to Karl Compton, “it was not one atomic bomb, or two, which brought the surrender; it was the experience of what an atomic bomb will actually do to a community, plus the dread of many more, that was effective.” Hiroshima and Nagasaki will always serve as a reminder of the tremendous effects powerful weapons can have on a country. America consciously decided to seize Japanese lives in order to save American lives. The attack effected Japan in a massive amount of negative ways but the outcome of the atomic bomb did create positive effects for America. The devastation generated by the atomic bomb will never be forgotten by citizens worldwide. “The atomic bomb was more than a weapon of terrible destruction; it was a psychological weapon.” (Stimson)
John Hersey shows that the atomic bomb is merciless by explaining the effect of the bomb on children. Hersey describes a mother’s search for her children to do so, “She heard a child cry, ‘Mother, help me,’ and saw her youngest, Myeko… buried up to her breast and unable to move. As Mrs. Nakamura started frantically to claw her baby, she could see or hear nothing of her other children” (Hersey 10, 11). He uses an example of children in danger because they are usually perceived as vulnerable, which helps Hersey make his point. Consequently, the reader undergoes feelings of sorrow because those who are attacked are not capable of defending themselves. Hersey is able to easily prove his case by illustrating the suffering of the most vulnerable of victims.
As World War 2, came to a close, The United States unleashed a secret atomic weapon upon the enemy nation of Japan that was quickly recognized as the most powerful wartime weapon in human history. They completely destroyed the entire Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and essentially vaporized countless innocent Japanese lives. Some historians believe that it was a foolish, brutal decision to use the atomic bomb on a weakened Japan, and that the civilians of the country did not deserve that kind of mass-annihilation. On the opposite side, other historians assert that dropping the bomb saved countless American and Japanese lives by ending the war faster than a regular invasion would have. What is undisputed is that this sad event dramatically changed the course of human history.
However, as time passed and more information about the bombings was given, Americans began to have mixed feelings and different thoughts about how this should have been handled. Scholars at that time found that Americans began feeling a sense of terror since they wondered what more could be done with nuclear weapons. They believed that even though the war was over, these kinds of weapons could come back to hurt them and that no one can really know what can happen to them or the rest of the world after creating the atomic bomb. Americans felt that the weapons that had been used to end war with Japan could be the beginning of the end and that no one was safe anymore. Hanson W. Baldwin, a writer for The New York Times once wrote, "much of our bombing through this war-like the enemy's--has been directed against cities, and hence against civilians. . . Americans have become a synonym for destruction. And now we have been the first to introduce a new weapon of unknowable effects which may bring us victory quickly b...
Andy Warhol was a famous American artist known best for starting the pop art movement during the 1960’s. Born in 1928 in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania Warhol was a quiet sickly child who spend most of 1935 in his bed due to an illness, during this time his mother would give him colouring books to keep him occupied, this is probably when his fascination with colourful art began. Before beginning his career as a pop artist Warhol did commercial art doing illustrations for shoe advertisements and setting up display windows for various shops, this art gained him some fame especially his illustrations which were done in a loose blotted ink style which people liked
When it come to be publicly acknowledged that the United States government planned on using atomic bombs to fight the war against Japan, a group of scientists who had worked on the atomic bomb for many years, felt the need to protest the idea. Leo Szilard who was a head of the group of scientists came up with a petition for the president for his associated scientists to look over. In his petition he asked the President “to rule that the United States shall not, in the present phase of the war, resort to the use of atomic bombs” (Szilard, par. 1). Szilard’s thoughts mentioned in the petition sought the strength and persuasion needed to sway the President that the use of the atomic bomb was uncalled for because of the shortage of facts presented, their poor reasoning found in the writing, and the failure to communicate the significance that their arguments held in the decision.
"Then a tremendous flash of light cut across the sky . Mr. Tanimoto has a distinct recollection that it traveled from east to west, from the city toward the hills. It seemed like a sheet of sun. John Hersey, from Hiroshima, pp8 On August 6, 1945, the world changed forever. On that day the United States of America detonated an atomic bomb over the city of Hiroshima. Never before had mankind seen anything like. Here was something that was slightly bigger than an ordinary bomb, yet could cause infinitely more destruction. It could rip through walls and tear down houses like the devils wrecking ball. In Hiroshima it killed 100,000 people, most non-military civilians. Three days later in Nagasaki it killed roughly 40,000 . The immediate effects of these bombings were simple. The Japanese government surrendered, unconditionally, to the United States. The rest of the world rejoiced as the most destructive war in the history of mankind came to an end . All while the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki tried to piece together what was left of their lives, families and homes. Over the course of the next forty years, these two bombings, and the nuclear arms race that followed them, would come to have a direct or indirect effect on almost every man, woman and child on this Earth, including people in the United States. The atomic bomb would penetrate every fabric of American existence. From our politics to our educational system. Our industry and our art. Historians have gone so far as to call this period in our history the Òatomic ageÓ for the way it has shaped and guided world politics, relations and culture.
It is agreed by many parts of our society that one of the main atrocities done by the human being took place on August 6th and 9th, 1945 in the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. Over 170,000 innocent Japanese individuals died due to the dropping of two atomic bombs created in the United States. This transcendent historical event suddenly ended the bloody Second World War and gave the start to a new one, the cold war , which in fact led to an atomic weapons race between the Soviet Union and the United Sates of North America. It is constantly argued if the effect that the mentioned ending of the war had was positive or not to its resolution, and if the entire world got any benefits from it, but the action of dropping the nuclear weapons on the Japanese cities by the American government was completely unjustified, unnecessary, and unfair.
Maddox, Robert. “The Biggest Decision: Why We Had to Drop the Atomic Bomb.” Taking Sides: Clashing View in United States History. Ed. Larry Madaras & James SoRelle. 15th ed. New York, NY. 2012. 280-288.
On August 6, 1945, a plane called the Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb on the city of Hiroshima. Instantly, 70,000 Japanese citizens were vaporized. In the months and years that followed, an additional 100,000 perished from burns and radiation sickness. Two days later, on August 9, a second atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, where 80,000 Japanese people perished. The bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is one of the most controversial aspects in the history of the United States because many people believe that it wasn't a necessary action to win the war. While others think that using the atomic bombs on Japan was essential because it saved many American lives. The bombing of Nagasaki, caused catastrophic damage to the city and its people, leaving people to question why did this event occur?