Regarding the Pain of Others

By: Susan Sontag

Narrated by: Jennifer Van Dyck

Twenty-five years after her classic On Photography, Susan Sontag returned here to the subject of visual representations of war and violence in our culture. How does the spectacle of the sufferings of others (via television or newsprint) affect us? Are viewers inured - or incited - to violence by the depiction of cruelty?

In Regarding the Pain of Others, Susan Sontag takes a fresh look at the representation of atrocity - from Goya's The Disasters of War to photographs of the American Civil War, lynchings of Blacks in the South, and the Nazi death camps, and to more contemporary horrific images of Bosnia, Sierra Leone, Rwanda, Israel, and Palestine, as well as New York City on September 11, 2001.

Sontag once again changes the way we think about the uses and meanings of images in our world, and offers an important reflection about how war itself is waged (and understood) in our time.

©2003 Susan Sontag (P)2011 Audible, Inc.

Critic reviews

" Regarding the Pain of Others bristles with a sense of commitment - to seeing the world as it is, to worrying about the ways it is represented, even to making some gesture in the direction of changing it... the performance is thrilling to witness." ( The New York Times Magazine)

"A timely meditation on politics and ethics.... Sontag's insight and erudition are profound." ( The Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

"A fiercely challenging book.... immensely thought-provoking." ( The Christian Science Monitor)

not very insightful

Many worthwhile thoughts are presented here but nothing particularly original. Sontag presents a somewhat obvious and cynical case for our relationship with war and war photography; and how it distorts, fictionalizes, romanticizes and detaches us from the suffering of others. The tired implication of war belonging solely in the domain of men and boys is almost laughable at times. But it's short and well written.

The reading was way too fast, not pleasant

Intersting,
Still thinking about it.
Don't know if I like it or disappointed that it felt like a mirror of history events throght a lens with no filter or a conclusion.
The reading was way too fast and not pleasant.

susaniana sontagrande

on a sontag journey and havent been too disappointed thusfar, she always teaches me something new and interesting to think about.

Dope read.

This was a dope read. a nice juxtaposition with Bourdieu's work. Really dug her use of Ernst Junger, too.

Profound analys on war photographs

As someone else wrote, this audiobook is trash if listened at "normal speed" I had to listen to it at 0.8x and it surprisingly worked marvels. The story is really good, however it is not the kind of literature I enjoy.