Letters to the Editor

Military voices at UM

Re the Oct. 8 article announcing the 2015 Nobel Prize winner for Literature:

Despite the naysayers who claim the Nobel Prize for Literature should not have been given to a writer of nonfiction, the rest of the world cheered the decision to award it to Svetlana Alexievich.

One of her books, Zinky Boys, is about the Soviet soldiers of Afghanistan. She interviewed many mothers of soldiers who returned home in zinc coffins, exposing the gravitas of war through the voices of these ordinary women. She listened closely.

The University of Miami’s Otto Richter Library was also listening closely when it recently created the StoryCorps/Warmamas Community Archive, a repository for all military voices in South Florida and beyond, focusing especially on mothers of soldiers.

These interviews document the experiences of those mothers whose children deployed to a war zone. There are 2 million of these women in the United States.

Bravo to UM for offering a place where these stories can begin to be documented, preserved and honored for decades to come.

Patricia Figueroa Sowers, director, Warmamas, Coral Gables

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