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Lost in the Juice Not the Sauce



Sheerag Berejiklian


Flags of our Fathers

By James Bradley


“These boys were bonded by feelings as strong or stronger than they would have for any other humans in their life ”(Bradley 60).



Violence has been part of human nature since the dawn of time: from cavemen fighting over a piece of meat, to President Truman ordering the U.S. Air Force to drop atomic bombs on hundreds of thousands of people in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Despite having different reasons for fighting and coming from different paths of life, they selflessly fought for their country, sacrificing everything for what they believed in. The father of the author, James Bradley, was a veteran of WWII. He was one of the brave men who hoisted the flag on the small island of Iwo Jima; this sparked Bradley to research the men in the photo, and attempt to reconnect with his father’s story. As a result, his sense of pride compelled him to write Flags of our Fathers, and as a result my love for history took a hit because the book was as dry as the Sahara Desert.


He started his research off because his father left behind a box filled with artifacts from the war after he passed away; this gave him the idea to research the background of the men in the iconic photo - later to be turned into a statue commemorating WWII veterans. James Bradley set out on a quest to determine the backstory of these young men. Bradley's story telling skills made me wonder how he got this book published. He wrote this description about Rene Gognan, “Strikingly handsome with his lean Galic face and dark hair and brows …”  (Bradley 23). I appreciate Bradley trying to put an image in my head, but I can’t imagine something when I am falling asleep due to his monotonous writing style. These biographies should have been filled with more interesting descriptions and I understand that he did not want to cut out people’s backstories just because they were boring, but he should have shortened them. I have only listened to 3 hours of the book, so don’t take my word if you are on the brink of reading it. If the book continues at this pace I would not recommend checking it out, but I will be updating this once I finish the the book.


I love to read books about American history, but I think he went about writing this book in the wrong way. Bradley should have added more graphic scenes about the war and talked less about his own experience with his father. His father ended up fighting in the war and surviving, and told his children that "Your teacher said something about heroes... I want you to always remember something. The heroes of Iwo Jima are the guys who didn't come back" (Bradley 343). The respect I have for the author's father is tremendous, too bad the apple fell far from the tree. The concept that I grasped from the book is that despite the different upbringings of these men, they all decided to fight for what they believe in. I wish this book was written by another person, however, I do recommend this book for people conducting research papers because research papers are boring.
http://100photos.time.com/photos/joe-rosenthal-iwo-jima-flag-raising

Work Cited
  1. Bradley James and Powers Ron. Flags of Our Fathers, 2000.
  2. “See The Story Behind The Iconic ‘Flag Raising On Iwo Jima.’” 100 Photographs | The Most Influential Images of All Time, http://100photos.time.com/photos/joe-rosenthal-iwo-jima-flag-raising. Accessed 16 Jan. 2019.
  3. Editors, History com. “Iwo Jima.” HISTORY, https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/battle-of-iwo-jima. Accessed 16 Jan. 2019. (Editors, History com. “Iwo Jima.” HISTORY, https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/battle-of-iwo-jima. Accessed 16 Jan. 2019.)

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