4.0
Voices from Chernobyl
ByPublisher Description
Winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature and Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award A journalist by trade, who now suffers from an immune deficiency developed while researching this book, presents personal accounts of what happened to the people of Belarus after the nuclear reactor accident in 1986, and the fear, anger, and uncertainty that they still live with. The Nobel Prize in Literature 2015 was awarded to Svetlana Alexievich "for her polyphonic writings, a monument to suffering and courage in our time."
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Meet readers like you in the Fable For You feed, designed to build bookish communitiesVoices from Chernobyl Reviews
4.0
Daniel Campos
Created 5 days agoShare
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Torie Winters
Created 12 days agoShare
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Amber (holiday edition) 🎄
Created 13 days agoShare
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“Like anyone growing up with a morbid sense of curiosity and free access to Wikipedia, I’ve been fascinated by the Chernobyl disaster since I first heard about it. This collection of real accounts from people affected by it often highlights why. Wives watched their husbands go to the site on a cleanup mission, only to watch them develop cancer shortly after that killed them painfully. People were ripped from homes they’d never left. Children were bullied and feared at their new schools.
The most interesting aspect of this book to me was how several people described the intense patriotism they felt. Despite the fears of radiation sickness, men were often proud to go to the site out of this feeling that they were doing something for their country. It was all misplaced, as the government did not give them proper equipment to protect themselves, and used propaganda to make the situation seem safer than it was. That in particular was sad to read about, just that betrayal after they felt they were doing something heroic.
A lot of the perspectives were pretty rambling and not insightful though. There’s a lot of talk about potatoes and cows, and nonsensical philosophizing. Some of it kinda felt like I was at my old job as a medical receptionist, when I would ask someone’s pain level and get treated to a 5 minute monologue about everything that’s ever happened to them without them ever arriving at a number. Please just say 5, dude.”
siideri
Created 13 days agoShare
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“I don't even know how to express my feelings of this
book. It will be among one of the best books I will ever
read in my lifetime.
When I started reading, after 10 pages I already shed my first tears. Reading about the stories of the people who suffered so much. Men, women, husbands and wives, parents, soldiers, even children. All of their stories were so heartbreaking.
I have talked about this book a lot now. For my friends,
family and everyone close to me. And I will continue to
do so. These peoples stories are so important and they
tell us so much about humanity and history. One of the
things that affected to my way of thinking most, was
when the people described how it felt being in the zone.
After the Second World War they had seen what horrible things war can do to people. They thought that it was the ultimate iniquity. Then happened the reactors explosion.
You can't see, smell or feel radiation, but it affects
everything around us. And in the book they described it like this: Everything is beautiful, it's hot summer day and nature is more beautiful than ever. You can't hear guns or destruction, like in a war. But still, everyone around you keeps dying. It's just so horrifying.
This book taught me so much. In this review I only said
a fragment about things I want to, but l' keep talking
about it. This is why reading has become so important to me. There are infinite amount of stories to be lived and I'm only one person. I read because I want to live other stories too, to step into someone else's shoes and see, even for a brief moment, what they have seen in their life, what they have felt and what they have experienced.
It improves empathy and understanding about other
people and of the world.”
Daniela Alonso
Created 19 days agoShare
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About Svetlana Alexievich
Svetlana Alexievich was born in the Ukraine and studied journalism at the University of Minsk. She has received numerous awards for her writing, including a prize from the Swedish PEN Institute for "courage and dignity as a writer." She won the Nobel Prize for literature in 2015.
Other books by Svetlana Alexievich
Keith Gessen
Keith Gessen was born in Russia and educated at Harvard. He is a founding editor of n+1 and has written about literature and culture for Dissent, The Nation, The New Yorker, and The New York Review of Books. He is the author of the novel All the Sad Young Literary Men.
Other books by Keith Gessen
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