134 Bettina Kaibach
38. Mikhail Matusovskii, Izbrannye proizvedeniia v dvukh tomakh. Tom 1-yi: Stikhotvoreniia, poėmy, pesni (Moskva: Khudozhestvennaia literatura, 1982), p. 189.
39. Matusovskii, Izbrannye proizvedeniia, p. 329.
40. In a similar vein, in Mark Donskoi’s 1962 film Hello, Children (Zdravstvuite deti),
the death of a Japanese girl from radiation sickness is integrated into the vision
of a brighter future safeguarded by the Soviet Union (see Renata von Maydell,
“Hiroshima and Artek,” in Images of Rupture in Civilization between East and West:
The Iconography of Auschwitz and Hiroshima in Eastern European Arts and Media,
eds. Urs Heftrich, Robert Jacobs, Bettina Kaibach, and Karoline Thaidigsmann
(Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2016), pp. 229–238).
41. In the poem Глыба купола взлетает в небо косо: “Перед всем, что здесь
убито и разбито, / Стиснув зубы, мы в молчании стоим. / Значит, все-таки у
мира есть защита, / Чтоб спасти его от новых Хиросим. / С той порой, как
ты пылаешь негасимо, / Человечество не знает забытья. / Хиросима [...] / Не
слабеет радиация твоя“ (Matusovskii, Izbrannye proizvedeniia, p. 333).
42. Both in Matusovskii’s poetry on Hiroshima and in Donskoi’s film Hello, Children (Zdravstvuite deti, 1962), the paper cranes that made Sadako Sasaki worldfamous figure in connection with a dying hibakusha girl. For Donskoi’s film, see
von Maydell, “Hiroshima and Artek.”
43. For a detailed history of the “Hiroshima Maidens,” see Robert Jacobs, “Domesticating Hiroshima in America in the Early Cold War,” in Images of Rupture in Civilization between East and West: The Iconography of Auschwitz and Hiroshima in Eastern
European Arts and Media, eds. Urs Heftrich, Robert Jacobs, Bettina Kaibach, and
Karoline Thaidigsmann (Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2016), pp. 83–97.
44. Kaibach, “Abel,” p. 195.
45. Kim, “Devushka iz Khirosimy,” 8, p. 32.
46. “В небе над Хиросимой началась цепная реакция, которая теперь никогда
не кончится и будет вызывать все новые и новые взрывы. Пикадоны теперь
будут повторяться так же, как повторяются землетрясения и тайфуны.
Будущее человечества—это огромное радиоактивное облако. И в этом
облаке исчезнет наша проклятая планета.” (Kim, “Devushka iz Khirosimy,”
8, p. 32). As a consequence of these ideas, the student proclaims the futility of all
human endeavor.
47. Kim, “Devushka iz Khirosimy,” 8, p. 32. Kim could be referring to Albert Camus’
famous Combat editorial Between Hell and Reason, written August 8, 1945, two days
after the dropping of the nuclear bomb on Hiroshima. The Japanese student’s views
seem to echo both Camus’ abhorrence at the celebration of technical progress prevalent in the first media responses to Hiroshima (“technological civilization has just
reached its final degree of savagery”) and his apocalyptic forebodings (“Humanity is
probably being given its last chance.” “Faced with the terrifying perspectives which
are opening up to humanity, we can perceive even better that peace is the only
battle worth waging. It is no longer a prayer, but an order […], the order to choose
finally between hell and reason,” Albert Camus, “Between Hell and Reason,” in
Hiroshima’s Shadow, eds. Kai Bird and Lawrence Lifschultz (Stony Creek, CT: The
Pamphleteer’s Press, 1945), pp. 260–261. Other than Kim’s student, Camus does
not succumb to doom but appeals to humanity to perceive Hiroshima as a moral
wake-up call. According to Vladimir Gakov, the denunciation of literary depiction
of nuclear war as defeatist and “Western” was a common one in the Soviet Union
(Gakov and Brians, “Nuclear-War Themes,” p. 68).
48. Kim, “Devushka iz Khirosimy,” 8, p. 32.
49. As late as 1982, Evgenii Dolmatovskii, in his essay on The Writer and Responsibility,
in evoking the danger of wholesale nuclear war, felt compelled to add the phrase:
“But we are not cowards and are no pessimists” (Evgenii Dolmatovsky, “Concern
and Responsibility,” Soviet Literature, 2, 407 (1982): pp. 144.)
38. Mikhail Matusovskii, Izbrannye proizvedeniia v dvukh tomakh. Tom 1-yi: Stikhotvoreniia, poėmy, pesni (Moskva: Khudozhestvennaia literatura, 1982), p. 189.
39. Matusovskii, Izbrannye proizvedeniia, p. 329.
40. In a similar vein, in Mark Donskoi’s 1962 film Hello, Children (Zdravstvuite deti),
the death of a Japanese girl from radiation sickness is integrated into the vision
of a brighter future safeguarded by the Soviet Union (see Renata von Maydell,
“Hiroshima and Artek,” in Images of Rupture in Civilization between East and West:
The Iconography of Auschwitz and Hiroshima in Eastern European Arts and Media,
eds. Urs Heftrich, Robert Jacobs, Bettina Kaibach, and Karoline Thaidigsmann
(Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2016), pp. 229–238).
41. In the poem Глыба купола взлетает в небо косо: “Перед всем, что здесь
убито и разбито, / Стиснув зубы, мы в молчании стоим. / Значит, все-таки у
мира есть защита, / Чтоб спасти его от новых Хиросим. / С той порой, как
ты пылаешь негасимо, / Человечество не знает забытья. / Хиросима [...] / Не
слабеет радиация твоя“ (Matusovskii, Izbrannye proizvedeniia, p. 333).
42. Both in Matusovskii’s poetry on Hiroshima and in Donskoi’s film Hello, Children (Zdravstvuite deti, 1962), the paper cranes that made Sadako Sasaki worldfamous figure in connection with a dying hibakusha girl. For Donskoi’s film, see
von Maydell, “Hiroshima and Artek.”
43. For a detailed history of the “Hiroshima Maidens,” see Robert Jacobs, “Domesticating Hiroshima in America in the Early Cold War,” in Images of Rupture in Civilization between East and West: The Iconography of Auschwitz and Hiroshima in Eastern
European Arts and Media, eds. Urs Heftrich, Robert Jacobs, Bettina Kaibach, and
Karoline Thaidigsmann (Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2016), pp. 83–97.
44. Kaibach, “Abel,” p. 195.
45. Kim, “Devushka iz Khirosimy,” 8, p. 32.
46. “В небе над Хиросимой началась цепная реакция, которая теперь никогда
не кончится и будет вызывать все новые и новые взрывы. Пикадоны теперь
будут повторяться так же, как повторяются землетрясения и тайфуны.
Будущее человечества—это огромное радиоактивное облако. И в этом
облаке исчезнет наша проклятая планета.” (Kim, “Devushka iz Khirosimy,”
8, p. 32). As a consequence of these ideas, the student proclaims the futility of all
human endeavor.
47. Kim, “Devushka iz Khirosimy,” 8, p. 32. Kim could be referring to Albert Camus’
famous Combat editorial Between Hell and Reason, written August 8, 1945, two days
after the dropping of the nuclear bomb on Hiroshima. The Japanese student’s views
seem to echo both Camus’ abhorrence at the celebration of technical progress prevalent in the first media responses to Hiroshima (“technological civilization has just
reached its final degree of savagery”) and his apocalyptic forebodings (“Humanity is
probably being given its last chance.” “Faced with the terrifying perspectives which
are opening up to humanity, we can perceive even better that peace is the only
battle worth waging. It is no longer a prayer, but an order […], the order to choose
finally between hell and reason,” Albert Camus, “Between Hell and Reason,” in
Hiroshima’s Shadow, eds. Kai Bird and Lawrence Lifschultz (Stony Creek, CT: The
Pamphleteer’s Press, 1945), pp. 260–261. Other than Kim’s student, Camus does
not succumb to doom but appeals to humanity to perceive Hiroshima as a moral
wake-up call. According to Vladimir Gakov, the denunciation of literary depiction
of nuclear war as defeatist and “Western” was a common one in the Soviet Union
(Gakov and Brians, “Nuclear-War Themes,” p. 68).
48. Kim, “Devushka iz Khirosimy,” 8, p. 32.
49. As late as 1982, Evgenii Dolmatovskii, in his essay on The Writer and Responsibility,
in evoking the danger of wholesale nuclear war, felt compelled to add the phrase:
“But we are not cowards and are no pessimists” (Evgenii Dolmatovsky, “Concern
and Responsibility,” Soviet Literature, 2, 407 (1982): pp. 144.)