John Hersey

An item at American Writers Museum

At 32, John Hersey was a veteran journalist and a Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist-for A Bell for Adano (1944), about an Italian town during World War Il-when he published Hiroshima (1946). This gripping work of nonfiction detailed the horrifying human cost of the U.S. dropping atomic bombs on Japan.

Hersey's total immersion as a reporter and his novelistic approach would influence the "new journalism" of the 1960s and 1970s-works like Truman Capote's In Cold Blood (1965) owe much to Hiroshima. Hersey's influence also extended to students at Yale, where he taught writing for 18 years. The university bestows an annual award to the undergraduate who best reflects Hersey's "engagement with moral and social issues, responsible reportage, and consciousness of craftsmanship."

AMERICAN VOICES

An exhibit at American Writers Museum

American writing is distinctive, diverse, and comes in many forms from across the nation. The 100 authors featured here represent the evolution of American writing. Learn more about each writer on the timeline by turning the panels below their portraits. Explore centuries of writing by pulling, turning, and touching the interactive elements on the counter.

This is not meant to be a list of the greatest or most influential writers. Instead, we present authors and works as part of the American story as it grows and changes. Taken together, this rich literary heritage reflects America in all of its complexity: its energy, hope, conflict, disillusionment, and creativity.

American Writers Museum