Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster (Russian: Чернобыльская молитва, romanized: Chernobylskaya molitva, lit. 'Chernobyl Prayer'), published as Chernobyl Prayer: A Chronicle of the Future in the United Kingdom, is a book about the Chernobyl disaster by the Belarusian Nobel Laureate Svetlana Alexievich. At the time of the disaster (April 1986), Alexievich was a journalist living in Minsk, the capital of what was then the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic. Alexievich interviewed more than 500 eyewitnesses, including firefighters, liquidators (members of the cleanup team), politicians, physicians, physicists, and ordinary citizens over a period of 10 years. The book relates the psychological and personal tragedy of the Chernobyl accident, and explores the experiences of individuals and how the disaster affected their lives.^[1]

Chernobyl Prayer was first published in Russian in 1997; a revised, updated edition was released in 2013. The American translation was awarded the 2005 National Book Critics Circle Award for general non-fiction.^[2]

Adaptations

The HBO television miniseries Chernobyl often relies on the memories of Pripyat locals, as told by Svetlana Alexievich in her book.^[3]

Editions

• Alexievich, Svetlana (2016). Chernobyl Prayer: A Chronicle of the Future. Translated by Bunin, Anna; Tait, Arch. Penguin Modern Classics. ISBN 978-0241270530.
• Alexievich, Svetlana; Gessen, Keith (2005). Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of the Nuclear Disaster. Dalkey Archive Press. ISBN 1-56478-401-0.