• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • About
  • Donate

The Arts Fuse

Boston's Online Arts Magazine: Dance, Film, Literature, Music, Theater, and more

  • Podcasts
  • Coming Attractions
  • Reviews
  • Interviews
  • Commentary
  • The Arts
    • Performing Arts
      • Dance
      • Music
      • Theater
    • Other
      • Books
      • Film
      • Food
      • Television
      • Visual Arts
You are here: Home / Books / Book Review: Regarding the Pain of Others

Book Review: Regarding the Pain of Others

March 25, 2003 Leave a Comment

Critic Susan Sontag asks whether repeated exposure to images of violence makes us less sensitive to human suffering.

Regarding the Pain of Others by Susan Sontag. (Farrar Straus & Giroux, 144 pages)

By Bill Marx

The controversy over whether images of American POWs held by Iraqi forces should be broadcast on television testifies to the timeliness of Susan Sontag’s book “Regarding the Pain of Others.” In it, she asks whether graphic images of atrocity and slaughter lose their shock effect over time. Do we become so used to horror that our empathy for the pain of others is dulled? “As one can become habituated to horror in real life,” writes Sontag, “one can become habituated to the horror of certain images.”

At its best, the book supplies an intriguing history of disturbing war photos, beginning in earlier and more innocent times, when viewers were shielded from unbearable battlefield realities. Until the Vietnam War, she claims, photographs of combat were staged to suit the protected sensibilities of the time. Their content and form was influenced by the impressive tradition of religious imagery, where suffering takes place in a context of expiation and transcendence. In a more secular age, though, death becomes an accident, not a part of a process of sin and salivation.

Thus today’s combat photos, such as those from the current Iraq war, minimize human suffering. Taken from thousands of feet above the bombed areas, these images float above the hurt below. Obviously, despite the violence depicted in movies and video games, the government feels that seeing the destruction of others will still move us. In “Regarding the Pain of Others,” Sontag agrees. She used to feel a diet of uncomfortable images dulled us to atrocities and others’ pain. Now she believes graphic photos are valuable, as long as viewing these images leads to action or thought, not passive voyeurism.

But Sontag thinks the fact she has changed her position is more important than presenting a strong argument in support of it. At times, Sontag suggests that women, unlike men, wouldn’t wage war, though the example of Margaret Thatcher testifies to the contrary. She makes the case for building a museum about the history of slavery in Washington D.C., but why just focus on the U.S.?

Sontag also appears unable to anticipate objections. Is there anyone in the media or among the public loudly demanding more graphic images of the destruction in the Iraq war? Since Vietnam, Americans appear to be happy to keep their wars at a visual arm’s length. Would seeing photos of combat horrors necessarily lead someone feeling neutral or pro-war to become antiwar? Atrocity photographs have been used as propaganda tools as early as World War I.

At this moment in history, “Regarding the Pain of Others” asks vital questions. But Sontag, who says she wants Americans to think more about what they see, could do more cogitating herself.

Share
Tweet
Pin
Share

By: Bill Marx Filed Under: Books Tagged: Susan-Sontag, Violence

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Search

Popular Posts

  • Television Review: “Surviving Death” — Probing Death and the Great Beyond Surviving Death's balance between personal experiences... posted on January 11, 2021
  • Jazz Album Review: “El Arte del Bolero” — Passionate Homage to the Era of the Bolero So Miguel Zenón, who on saxophone has the facility of a... posted on January 5, 2021
  • Film/Music Review: The Best Music Documentaries of 2020 — With Some Disppointments Some of the best music documentaries of 2020 - and some... posted on December 29, 2020
  • Theater Review: The Christmas Revels 2020 — A Delightfully Virtual Revelation A 50th anniversary is a wonderful milestone, and I cong... posted on December 23, 2020
  • Opera Preview: Boston Lyric Opera Revamps Philip Glass’s “Fall of the House of Usher” for Today How do you make filmed opera relevant in the Age of COV... posted on January 16, 2021

Social

Follow us:

Follow the Conversation

  • Ron Fernberg January 20, 2021 at 4:54 pm on Film Review: “Pal Joey” — A Memorable Rita HayworthRita Hayworth stole the movie, IMHO. She never looked BETTER! Kim Novak looked like a novice, next to Rita Hayworth!...
  • Daniel Toner January 20, 2021 at 1:56 pm on Commentary/Interview: Boston Globe Union Negotiations — Two Years On, More Anger and ResistanceAll true. In 2010 in a meeting with AEEF/CWA membership in which I was present, Ben Godley, the #2 person...
  • Daniel Toner January 20, 2021 at 11:27 am on Commentary/Interview: Boston Globe Union Negotiations — Two Years On, More Anger and ResistanceAll sadly true. In a meeting in 2010 with AEEF/CWA membership, Ben Godley, who was the #2 person at WGBH...
  • Bill Marx, Editor of The Arts Fuse January 20, 2021 at 9:50 am on Commentary/Interview: Boston Globe Union Negotiations — Two Years On, More Anger and ResistanceI call on WGBH to cover the anti-union strategy of the Boston Globe. But I was around WGBH, contributing to...
  • Bill Marx, Editor of The Arts Fuse January 20, 2021 at 9:07 am on Theater Review: “The Race” — Business as UnusualHi Joan: I did -- linked from the title of the play: https://www.thewilburygroup.org/the-race.html

Footer

  • About Us
  • Advertising/Underwriting
  • Syndication
  • Media Resources
  • Editors and Contributors

We Are

Boston’s online arts magazine since 2007. Powered by 70+ experts and writers.

Follow Us

Monthly Archives

Categories

"Use the point of your pen, not the feather." -- Jonathan Swift

Copyright © 2021 · The Arts Fuse - All Rights Reserved · Website by Stephanie Franz