A Chorus of Stones: The Private Life of WarA brilliant and provocative exploration of the interconnection of private life and the large-scale horrors of war and devastation. A Pulitzer Prize and National Book Critics Circle Award finalist, and a winner of the Bay Area Book Reviewers Association Award, Susan Griffin’s A Chorus of Stones is an extraordinary reevaluation of history that explores the links between individual lives and catastrophic, world-altering violence. One of the most acclaimed and poetic voices of contemporary American feminism, Griffin delves into the perspective of those whose personal relationships and family histories were profoundly influenced by war and its often secret mechanisms: the bomb-maker and the bombing victim, the soldier and the pacifist, the grand architects who were shaped by personal experience and in turn reshaped the world. Declaring that “each solitary story belongs to a larger story”—and beginning with the brutal and heartbreaking circumstances of her own childhood—Griffin examines how the subtle dynamics of parenthood, childhood, and marriage interweave with the monumental violence of global conflict. She proffers a bold and powerful new understanding of the psychology of war through illuminating glimpses into the personal lives of Ernest Hemingway, Mahatma Gandhi, Heinrich Himmler, British officer Sir Hugh Trenchard, and other historic figures—as well as the munitions workers at Oak Ridge, a survivor of the Hiroshima bombing, and other humbler yet indispensible witnesses to history. |
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airplanes army atomic battle battlefield become began begins body bomb brother called cells Charlotte Charlotte’s child childhood command concentration camp course daughter death dreams Enrico Fermi Ernst Jünger existence explosion eyes face father fear February feel felt Fermi fire Gandhi German Gestapo grandfather grandmother grandmother’s Griffin guns hand hear Heinrich Himmler Hemingway Hemingway’s Hermann Göring Hiroshima homosexual Hugh Trenchard imagine Israel Israel Torres Jewish Käthe Kollwitz kind knew learned light lives look masculine memory military mind missile Mohandas Gandhi mother moved never night Ninoshima nuclear once pain Peenemünde perhaps photograph radiation remember Royal Air Force secret sense silence soldier speak story strange suffering SUSAN GRIFFIN tell thought told train trenches V-2 rocket voice wanted weapon Wernher von Braun Wolfsohn woman women words wounded writes young