Books: The Ashes of 0 Warsaw

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Time & Changes. In Hiroshima, Author Hersey turned in one of the best pieces of factual reporting in many a day and in his earlier novel, A Bell for Adano, he achieved a considerable success in the field of fictional treatment of fact in which The Wall is a failure. Comparison of the three gives some measure of his gifts and shortcomings. A Bell for Adano's strength was its immediate relevance to a situation faced by the Allied Military Government in Italy. Time and changes in the situation have worn much of the book's luster away. Author Hersey's gift is that of the true newspaperman: the ability to report, on the scene and under pressure, the feelings, happenings, circumstances and significance of the moment.

Working over the cold ashes of Warsaw, on what is in the news sense a dead story, Author Hersey is venturing into the medium of another kind of writer altogether. He is not the first highly skilled reporter to stumble when he tries to create human characters on the correspondent's trusty typewriter.