Freedom: Stories Celebrating the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Customer Reviews

In December 1948, after the horrors of World War II, The United Nations adopted The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in the hope that people could be free without suffering denial of their individual rights. “Freedom Stories Celebrating the Universal Declaration of Human Rights” is an attempt by Amnesty International to explain each of the thirty statements that constitute the declaration. Amnesty International chose to communicate the thirty declarations with thirty short stories.

Most of the stories are interesting and well written. I discovered that many of the authors are universally acclaimed writers and most of the rest are famous diplomats and leaders in their countries. These stories illustrate why we should not take our “rights” for granted.

Several stories were especially noteworthy. One, written about freedom of Conscience, is poignant. It tells of a woman locked up in a prison and kept in a deprived state to persuade her to renounce her faith. The story, “Where I Keep my Faith”, is graphic and persuasive. The main character is so realistic that I wanted to talk to her.

Another story, written to support the premise that “All Are Born Free and Equal”, seems to not actually relate to the statement of that right. The tale, however, is fascinating. This absorbing tale quickly immersed me in the life of an old woman living alone in a humble house by the sea.

This book is much better than I expected. The stories are interesting and enriching. For anyone interested in human rights this is a must read. I highly recommend “Freedom Stories Celebrating the Universal Declaration of Human Rights” to anyone who likes short stories.

This book offers stories from Amnesty International, an organization dedicated to protecting the basic human rights of all people, and gives you a glimpse at just how far we are as a globe from respecting our basic rights as a species. I’ve volunteered for them in the past because I do beleive that that all of us on this planet need to respect one another and that our basic right to freedom is the most important one we need to honor. These stories will make you mad, sad and ever more respectful of the foundations of our country is based upon.

Ultimately, I hope the book makes you take action and that you find out what YOU can do instead of just sitting back and taking life in the US for granted!

the author james baldwin wrote that you can only know that you are safe if someone else is in trouble. that statement rings clear while reading Freedom’s stories, each story concerned with a separate human right as listed as the articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

the thirty six writers, the contributors to the anthology, are mostly prize winners, some like paulo coelho, walter mosley, nadine gordimer, and Ishmael beah, are known names, some famous. the anthology is a brief introduction to their work. unfortunately, there are a few disappointments. the story by david mitchell, for one, falls far short of his talent as a novelist as the story reads like it was forced to fit the specific right.

other stories fit a specific right by being felt by the author as heard at first hand or witnessed or experienced. there are stories of imprisonment and detainment, the illusion of movement to a safe place that is not safe, as in the story by mohammed naseehu ali, and stories where the persecuted dream, as part of their survival, of fleeing, hoping to reach safe harbor, as written by ali smith.

in yann martell’s story, The Moon Above his Head, the narrator is on a skiing vacation in the canadian rockies with his wife. he hears the hilarious telling of a story of a skier who fell in the septic tank of the portable latrine and spent the night there. the narrator tracks down the butt of the joke, abdikarim ghedi hashi, from somalia, who reluctantly tells selected parts of his event. he concludes his personal account with a recollection: `I remember something from my night in that stinking pit of filth. The hole above me, the toilet hole, the way the light was shining through it, it reminded me of full moons over the ocean in Mogadishu when I was a child. My grandmother used to tell me the moon was a hole in the night sky and that’s where God came in. She would hold me in her arms and we’d look at the moon together. I kept hoping to catch God sneaking into the world. … You ask about my family? I have no family. They all died in Mogadishu in the civil war, all of them.’ that is the tone, and a good metaphor, for most of these stories.