A Henry Holt and Company não tem planos de “imprimir, corrigir ou distribuir” outras cópias do livro The last train from Hiroshima, informou à Associated Press essa semana. A decisão foi tomada depois da polêmica com a falsa fonte usada por Charles Pellegrino. A Leya Brasil, editora do livro aqui, vai se reunir com os representantes do autor na próxima semana e só então decidirá o futuro do livro.
Enquanto isso, James Cameron, o festejado diretor de Avatar, sai em defesa do autor e avisa que não vai desistir da história. Em carta enviada à Leya Brasil ontem, ele diz: “Eu trabalhei com Charles Pellegrino em diversos projetos incluindo Titanic e Avatar. Charlie é um caçador da verdade e já está corrigindo os erros de seu poderoso livro”.
Escreve ainda: “A verdade prevalecerá e o livro de Charlie, uma vez corrigido, será um dos mais importantes e convincentes registros sobre um dos principais acontecimentos do século 20”.
Confira a mensagem de James Cameron na íntegra:
“I have worked with author/scientist/historian Charles Pellegrino on several projects including Titanic and Avatar. Charlie is a seeker of truth and he is already working to correct the errors that were included in his powerful book "Last Train from Hiroshima". Charlie has introduced me personally to survivors of the bombings, and his diligence in interviewing these last connections with living history is beyond dispute. It would be a shame if the resulting book, which is a valuable historical resource, is dismissed or overtly blocked from wide dissemination due to inaccuracies resulting from a single unreliable source. Charlie's faulty source clearly used elaborate deception to create a false account. On our numerous projects together, I have known Charlie to be a diligent and thorough researcher, who always does his best to cross-reference testimony. In this case he was clearly the victim of a convincing fraud. Charlie is currently doing all that is humanly possible to correct the resulting errors in his book, as any responsible writer would. I have wanted to do a film on the general subject of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings for years, and still intend to do so, although I currently do not have a shooting script and no decision has been made to proceed in the short term. My decision criteria for the project are not in the least influenced by the issue of a single flawed source out of the scores who contributed to Charlie's book. When I do go forward with a film, I would be a fool to ignore the rich vein of eyewitness testimony, so painstakingly gathered, that exists in "Last Train from Hiroshima," and I will preserve my option on the book accordingly. The truth will prevail, and Charlie's book, once corrected, will stand as an important and compelling account of one of the most important events of the 20th century”. James Cameron
