TOW #24 - Dispatches from the Edge: A Memoir of War, Disaster, and Survival (Anderson Cooper) Part II

In his memoir titled, Dispatches from the Edge: A Memoir of War, Disaster, and Survival, Anderson Cooper, a journalist having mostly worked with CNN, recounts the many times that he has been on the scene of, as the title says, war, disaster, and the struggle of people for their survival within these conditions. Writing in order to provide a new first person perspective of these major events to readers, Cooper was inspired to create his memoir after Hurricane Katrina. He is able to provide this perspective through his employment of testimony from others who have experienced the results of storms and personal anecdotes.

Cooper spends a large portion of his memoir talking about his experience surrounding Hurricane Katrina as this was a massive disaster that had major impacts on the lives of thousands of people. He writes of his interactions with a woman named Brandy Farris, a realtor for the company Century 21. She tells Cooper that following Katrina, there was a massive increase in the amount of people looking to buy property in New Orleans, sight unseen, even if the properties were underwater. “I’ve been doing real estate for twenty years, and I’ve never seen anything like it,” (Cooper 178).  Through his inclusion of the testimony from Farris, Cooper is able to show that some people unfortunately will take advantage of those who are affected. This is a side of a disaster that most people probably would not think of or consider. As a result, Cooper is able to provide an entirely new perspective to the reader, one that shows the destructiveness of storms and other disasters, not just to the physical world, but to the people there as well.

Nearing the end of the memoir, Cooper begins to wrap up his stories from Katrina. He speaks of walking through the streets and seeing the progress that had been made on the revival of New Orleans. He writes, “I head over to the house where a month ago they found the bodies of Edgar and Christina Bane and their two sons, Carl and Edgar Junior.” (Cooper 198). While this statement, may merely seem grim, it reveals a significant aspect of the results of a major disaster. Cooper obviously has been exposed to many disasters in his time as a reporter and this sort of occurrence, the discovery of dead, is likely a frequent occurrence. His nonchalant reaction to returning to the site however reveals that he has essentially been desensitized. This is why he is able to continuously visit the site of disaster. He shows the reader that these disasters also affect others indirectly through emotional damage, as seen with himself.

Overall, I very much enjoyed reading Cooper’s memoir as it provided me with a newfound perspective on major natural and manmade disaster in a sense that I would not have thought before. As a result, I would absolutely recommend this book to anyone that is interested in memoirs or autobiographies and especially anyone who is a fan of Anderson Cooper in particular. I am glad that I had the chance to read this book and am looking forward to my next IRB.