Significance of The People of Hiroshima

Despite the heinous acts of their leaders, the residents of Hiroshima – Nagasaki’s residents receive much less in-depth depictions – are shown as common people with regular jobs and interests, and some of whom are not even supporters of their government’s wartime decisions (namely closing schools so the young can build weapons). The survivors depicted in the book largely survive through happenstance, namely surroundings that protected them from the full effect of the blast, and they bear emotional scarring from what they saw after the explosion for the rest of their lives.