Synopsis
Strength and Compassion brings together the best of Eric Greitens' award-winning international humanitarian photography work with a striking series of essays. Engaging photographs from Rwanda, Cambodia, Albania, Mexico, India, the Gaza Strip, Croatia, and Bolivia, are combined with bold, intelligent essays on strength, pity, dignity, courage, faith, time, hope, and compassion.
Though the photographs for this book were taken in different countries and amid different struggles, a common theme emerges: even in times of great hardship and in the face of great evil, people with strength and compassion can live with courage. We see the unmistakable, sometimes irreparable consequences of violence and war, yet we also see the unmistakable, always inspiring power of men, women, and children who live through these trials with dignity and emerge with hope.
Ideas and images come together to touch the reader directly. Holocaust survivor Nesse Godin says of Strength and Compassion, "Eric Greitens' photographs and essays help us all to see that, even in the most difficult circumstances, we can act with kindness. We can make a difference...I love Eric's book because it helps us to remember, but more importantly, it teaches us how to act."
Greitens has worked with and photographed some of the world's most vulnerable populations in situations of great suffering, yet his images and essays stand as a tribute to the dignity and strength of human beings.
Strength and Compassion is both brutal and beautiful. We emerge from it wiser, connected to our compassion, and prepared to live with courage.
About the Author
Eric Greitens was born and raised in Missouri, where he was educated in the public schools. He was an Angier B. Duke Scholar at Duke University, where he studied ethics, philosophy, and public policy. Selected as a Rhodes and a Truman Scholar, he attended the University of Oxford from 1996 through 2000. There he earned a master's degree in 1998 and a Ph.D. in 2000. He has worked as a humanitarian volunteer, documentary photographer, and researcher in Rwanda, Cambodia, Albania, Mexico, India, Bosnia, and Bolivia.
Eric also served as a United States Navy SEAL officer and deployed four times during the Global War on Terrorism to Afghanistan, Southeast Asia, the Horn of Africa, and Iraq. In 2005, he was appointed by the President to serve as a White House Fellow, and in 2011 the Association of the United States Navy named him the Navy Reserve Junior Line Officer of the Year. His military awards include the Combat Action Ribbon, the Purple Heart, and the Bronze Star.
After returning from Iraq in 2007, Eric donated his combat pay to found The Mission Continues, a national nonprofit organization that challenges veterans to serve and lead in communities across America.
A photographer and writer, Eric is the author of two books. Strength and Compassion is a collection of photographs and essays that was recognized as ForeWord Magazine's Photography Book of the Year, and as the Grand Prize Winner of the 2009 New York Book Festival. The Heart & the Fist: The Education of a Humanitarian, the Making of a Navy SEAL, relates Eric's story of leadership and service as a humanitarian and a warrior, and was a 2011 New York Times Bestseller.
His work has been covered by national media outlets including NPR, CNN, NBC Nightly News, Fox, CBS, MSNBC, The Colbert Report, the TODAY Show, USA Today, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post.
Eric currently serves as CEO of The Mission Continues and lives in St. Louis, Missouri with his wife, Sheena.
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