"And, as if nature were protecting man against his own ingenuity, the reproductive processes were affected for a time; men became sterile, women had miscarriages, menstruation stopped"
About this Quote
The subtext is not mystical nature-worship but a brutally pragmatic irony. Nature isn’t actually shielding anyone; the “protection” is sterilization, miscarriage, the suspension of menstruation - a catalogue of intimate systems hijacked by radiation. By choosing reproductive language, Hersey forces the reader to feel the bombing not only as mass death, but as an attack on continuity, inheritance, the ordinary assumption that tomorrow contains children. It’s genocide reframed as biology: the future canceled at the cellular level.
In context, Hersey’s Hiroshima journalism was built to puncture abstraction. Postwar audiences could discuss “the bomb” in strategic or scientific terms; he insists on consequences that refuse patriotic distance. The sentence also quietly expands culpability: “man” is generic, not a named enemy. The weapon is a human achievement, and the damage reads like a verdict on the species that built it.
Quote Details
| Topic | Health |
|---|---|
| Source | John Hersey, Hiroshima (1946). Passage describing post-bomb radiation effects on reproduction: "men became sterile, women had miscarriages, menstruation stopped". |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Hersey, John. (2026, January 15). And, as if nature were protecting man against his own ingenuity, the reproductive processes were affected for a time; men became sterile, women had miscarriages, menstruation stopped. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/and-as-if-nature-were-protecting-man-against-his-157146/
Chicago Style
Hersey, John. "And, as if nature were protecting man against his own ingenuity, the reproductive processes were affected for a time; men became sterile, women had miscarriages, menstruation stopped." FixQuotes. January 15, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/and-as-if-nature-were-protecting-man-against-his-157146/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"And, as if nature were protecting man against his own ingenuity, the reproductive processes were affected for a time; men became sterile, women had miscarriages, menstruation stopped." FixQuotes, 15 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/and-as-if-nature-were-protecting-man-against-his-157146/. Accessed 12 Feb. 2026.
