Lynsey Addario Book Report

In Lynsey Addario’s book, “It’s What I Do”,  she brings in the raw footage of what an average day in a war zone looks like. Addario does not just take pictures of beautiful sceneries or wide open landscapes, in fact most of her photos are the complete opposite. Her pictures capture a story, a story that would make most people run home and never leave, because of the pure horror that some human beings around world go through everyday. One of the most graphic parts from the book, was when she was captured by Qaddafi’s soldiers and were beaten, raped, and paraded around town for everyone to see. Many times the soldiers told the journalists that they were going to be killed and insisted that it was going to be their last day. However, shortly after they were transferred into other hands and ultimately were set free to go back to the United States. Stories like this are throughout the book and continue to get more and more violent. What makes Lynsey’s photos so breathtaking is the situations that she captures and how well she shows the pain, suffering, and loss in some parts of the world. An example of this would be the picture of the Kurdish soldiers, who are carrying the bodies of their wounded into a medical vehicle, in Northern Iraq, March 22, 2003. What stood out to me was how traumatic these events must of been, and what passion you would have to have in order to risk your life for photojournalism. In a lot of cases Lynsey would have bullets, bombs, and violence going on all around her, but yet the detail and story that she portrays in her photos lets the viewer see it first hand. I think that is what I admire most about Lynsey’s work is that she did not try to hide anything, she has a passion for telling these peoples stories and knows that there was no other way to tell it. I think many people refrain from even thinking about these events, because of how disturbing it is and what a disgusted feeling it gives you when you see them. One of my favorite Addario photos is the one on page 222, where Bibiane, twenty eight years old, sits in a chair and has tears running down her face. The photo not only makes the viewer feel remorseful, but really feel the pain of what she is going through and hard her life must be. One of my favorite quotes by Lynsey is, “I found that the camera was a comforting companion. It opened up new worlds, and gave me access to people's most intimate moments. I discovered the privilege of seeing life in all its complexity, the thrill of learning something new every day. When I was behind a camera, it was the only place in the world I wanted to be”(12). This quote really stood out to me because going into photojournalism, Lynsey probably had no idea what she was getting into and at many times regretted the decision to do so. However, this thrill of of being behind her camera helped her to be one of the most successful photojournalists of our time.