Tu n’as rien vu à Hiroshima

Hiroshima mon amour, a founding myth of the New Wave in French cinema, the novel by Marguerite Duras, the movie by Alain Resnais… and the photos by Emmanuelle Riva. Half a century after it was shot, the interpreter who so intimately incarnated the heroine unveils another aspect of herself. That of a sensitive photographer, one who wandered the streets of the martyred city with her Ricohflex and seized the new-found life. Images of children bathing or fishing, artisans, water being pumped, women with parasols, wood floating on the water, the construction of the base-ball stadium: it is September 1958, 13 years after the explosion of the bomb of 6 August 1945. As to demonstrate the excellence of the shooting team, and the emotion it carries, the book also includes excerpts from the diary of the movie’s script-girl, Sylvette Baudrot, full of drawings and collages, photos, texts and Air France menus… A travel log we would love to read in its entirety.

• Tu n’as rien vu à Hiroshima, (You saw nothing in Hiroshima) photos by Emmanuelle Riva, Gallimard, 2009, 128 p., 26 €, ISBN : 978-2-07-012298-1