Strength & Compassion: Photographs and Essays

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.