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moranguinhos's review against another edition
challenging
dark
informative
reflective
sad
slow-paced
still so relevant, 20 years after being published. war and history is cyclical & people are still figuring out ways to compartmentalize the atrocities. Sontag’s predictions about the future of news and online information are spot on.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief, Gun violence, Colonisation, Murder, Body horror, Gore, War, Genocide, Violence, and Injury/Injury detail
pseudolain's review against another edition
challenging
dark
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: War, Violence, Torture, Slavery, Murder, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail, Racism, Genocide, Antisemitism, Rape, Physical abuse, and Gore
Moderate: Body horror, Classism, Fire/Fire injury, and Child death
flara's review
challenging
dark
informative
slow-paced
3.5
I had a love-hate relationship with this text and having finished the book 2 months prior, I still can't quite decide whether I liked it or not.
I was put off at the very beginning by Sontag's argument that wars have always belonged to men, and that women would not choose violence to resolve their power struggles (I don't have my copy of the book at the moment, I am relying solely on my memory; and so I might be mis-remembering some of the nuances). I could go on a tangent here, but that would be an entirely different discussion. I'm choosing to concentrate on what these essays entail, rather than what they're missing.
Throughout her essays, Sontag points at things that are fairly obvious, but yet I have never thought of them? This is a book about war and war photography; and the fact that the majority of famous war photographs of 19th and early 20th century were completely staged shouldn't surprise us - and yet I have never questioned their authenticity? We expect drawings/paintings/etc. to take artistic liberties, perhaps to make the real event seem more dramatic and shocking than it actually was. But we don't always hold photographs to the same standard (obviously I am not talking about studio photography here). After all, they are real-time snapshots, they should be trust-worthy. I found this especially relevant in regards to what is currently happening in Ukraine.
I really enjoyed Sontag's observations on how as a humankind we have become immune to the shocking nature of news and yet we are obsessed with gory images. We have become disengaged from the suffering of people paraded to us daily on evening news, we don't even flinch when we hear the mention of armed conflict/natural disaster/etc. At the same time, images circulating around the world are getting gorier by the minute. They are sensational. Those are the ones that grab our attention (for what could be argued are the wrong reasons). We latch onto the shocking nature of these images, rather than on the human element.
Sontag uses several war conflicts as her case studies. The one that stood out was Crimean War; if I remember correctly, this was the first war to be documented in photography. I would prefer if discussed photographs were included in the book, rather than having to look them up (was there a copyright issue?). In conclusion, I found this to be an enjoyable read. However, the opening chapter really annoyed me. Sontag certainly pointed out the obvious, even if the obvious wasn't so obvious after all. For this selfish reason I struggle to give her enough credit.
I was put off at the very beginning by Sontag's argument that wars have always belonged to men, and that women would not choose violence to resolve their power struggles (I don't have my copy of the book at the moment, I am relying solely on my memory; and so I might be mis-remembering some of the nuances). I could go on a tangent here, but that would be an entirely different discussion. I'm choosing to concentrate on what these essays entail, rather than what they're missing.
Throughout her essays, Sontag points at things that are fairly obvious, but yet I have never thought of them? This is a book about war and war photography; and the fact that the majority of famous war photographs of 19th and early 20th century were completely staged shouldn't surprise us - and yet I have never questioned their authenticity? We expect drawings/paintings/etc. to take artistic liberties, perhaps to make the real event seem more dramatic and shocking than it actually was. But we don't always hold photographs to the same standard (obviously I am not talking about studio photography here). After all, they are real-time snapshots, they should be trust-worthy. I found this especially relevant in regards to what is currently happening in Ukraine.
I really enjoyed Sontag's observations on how as a humankind we have become immune to the shocking nature of news and yet we are obsessed with gory images. We have become disengaged from the suffering of people paraded to us daily on evening news, we don't even flinch when we hear the mention of armed conflict/natural disaster/etc. At the same time, images circulating around the world are getting gorier by the minute. They are sensational. Those are the ones that grab our attention (for what could be argued are the wrong reasons). We latch onto the shocking nature of these images, rather than on the human element.
Sontag uses several war conflicts as her case studies. The one that stood out was Crimean War; if I remember correctly, this was the first war to be documented in photography. I would prefer if discussed photographs were included in the book, rather than having to look them up (was there a copyright issue?). In conclusion, I found this to be an enjoyable read. However, the opening chapter really annoyed me. Sontag certainly pointed out the obvious, even if the obvious wasn't so obvious after all. For this selfish reason I struggle to give her enough credit.
Content Warnings
Graphic: War
Moderate: Torture, Body horror, Murder, Violence, Death, Grief, and Blood
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