November 21, 2009

Hans Durrer, a German essayist, interpreter, and photography critic based in Brazil – whom I don’t know -- just posted a review of Watching the World Change on his blog, which has been picked up on several other blogs.

Durrer writes: "This is absolutely singular journalism (well-told, detailed, and with a keen sense for narrative flow). . . . [a] great book....He is a good writer, a tireless journalist, and, very probably, a workaholic - the research alone that went into this book is immense and impressive.” By all means, check out the full posting, HERE.

And this, from Louis Masur, the renowned historian and scholar of photography, American history, baseball, and Bruce Springsteen (no joke!), who is teaching Watching the World Change this semester at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut:

“I taught your book last night and it was the best discussion yet. A student started by asking if it was too soon for us to be 'studying' the images of 9/11. This led us on a path to discuss the role of photographs in our lives, how the images of 9/11 provided not only 'evidence' but also for some solace, how it is that we can look without feeling voyeuristic or complicit, which led us to making connections to a book about lynching photographs that we read earlier this semester.

“A lot of time was spent on the photo of Mike Kehoe, and on 'Falling Man,' and the controversy over the publication of Hoepker’s photograph. And also on how we think in terms of photographs (that amazing comment by [Tom] Brokaw about Sebastio Salgado), about just what a digital revolution means, and about the outrage of workers on the site about you and Harry Benson being there taking photos.

“We move next week to Art Spiegelman's In the Presence of No Towers and then we end with Phil Gourevitch's Standard Operating Procedure and Errol Morris’ film. It’s been a great semester and, on behalf of our seminar, thank you again for writing such a passionate, engaging, caring, eye-opening book.”