Slightly Out of Focus by Robert Capa: book review

Slightly Out of Focus (1947, this edition 2001) is the memoir of war photographer Robert Capa from 1942 to 1945 on his work for Collier’s and Life magazines during World War II.

Robert Cape (1913-1954) writes of his work in London, Algiers, Tunis, Sicily, and Naples in 1943; London, Normandy, Cherbourg, and Paris in 1944; and Germany in 1945 – as well as the ship journeys to these locations.

With simple and direct language, Capa writes of his relationship with Ernest Hemingway, soldiers, nurses, and other war photographers. Most poignant are the excerpts about Omaha Beach during the D-Day landings.

Much of the book – and its focus – is the selection of Robert Capa’s black-and-white photographs. Capa has been called ‘the century’s greatest battlefied photographer’ so his writing is secondary, but just as interesting.

Although anyone who is a Robert Capa fan has probably seen most of the photographs before, having the background behind the photographs makes them more fascinating. The saying, ‘behind every photogragh is a story’ is true in this case, making Capa a delight to read.

MARTINA NICOLLSis an international aid and development consultant, and the authorof:- Similar But Different in the Animal Kingdom(2017), The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).

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