“He had to literally collect pieces of his men from the ground after an ambush”: Joshua Ferris inter

[unhappycamper]

http://www.salon.com/2014/10/08/he_had_to_literally_collect_pieces_of_his_men_from_the_ground_after_an_ambush_joshua_ferris_interviews_paolo_giordano/

"The Human Body" is a brilliant new addition to modern war literature. Joshua Ferris gets the story of its creation

“He had to literally collect pieces of his men from the ground after an ambush”: Joshua Ferris interviews Paolo Giordano
Joshua Ferris
Wednesday, Oct 8, 2014 06:59 PM EST

Joshua Ferris: You’ve written a novel about the war in Afghanistan, “The Human Body.” What interested you? Did you go to Aghanistan?

Paolo Giordano: Yes, I went to Afghanistan twice, both times as an embedded journalist in the Italian Army. I had no idea I would write a novel about it. The first time I only had in mind an article for Vanity Fair, which I later published. The second time, one year later, I had half of the book done.

I know that you’ve had a general interest in war for a long time, and in what art can be made from the material of war. What compels you toward war as a subject matter? Does art redeem some measure of war’s misery?

I’m not sure it can redeem it. I’m afraid not. But there seems to be a deep connection between war and literature. Somehow, narration as we know it started with war. Think of Homer, for instance. But what mattered most for me was my personal attraction to it. Most of the novels of the last century which I loved are strongly related to war. I couldn’t really understand why, so I thought I should find out. The one book that eventually pushed me to search for a “living” war was Norman Mailer’s The Naked and the Dead. After I read it and felt so personally and mysteriously shaken, I decided to go to Afghanistan.

..

War has always been in the human DNA. Read some history.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peloponnesian_War

[dixiegrrrrl]

1. "War has always been in the human DNA"

It took me wayyy too long to realize this.

The other part of history is that the women, generally, have been against war..Lysistrata, anyone???....and innocent civilians have suffered much.