The article proposes a comparative reading and analysis of fictional works about the so-called War on Terror, focusing in particular on the ways in which narratives by former soldiers such as ...Redeployment by Phil Kley, The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers and the short stories collected in Fire and Forget edited by Roy Scraton and Matt Gallagher represent a problematic attempt to fictionalize traumatic experiences. In fact, on the one hand, following the reflections on the idea of derealization as theorized by philosophers and thinkers such as Jacques Baudrillard or Slavoj Žižek, I will argue that novels about the Iraq and Afghanistan wars show an ambiguous relationship to the reality they depict. On the other hand, these novels and stories offer a possible counter-narrative of the events and may function as a potential re-instantiation of the experience itself for the soldiers/writers, who, in recounting or "inventing" their own experience, relive and re-enact the traumatic facts, thus allowing the reader to enter these facts from a challenging position.
One of the most recurrent tropes in the US fiction emerging out of the experience of the war in Vietnam is the description of the feeling of estrangement of the soldiers. Up against a hostile and ...unreadable background, deprived of the tools to read the geographical and human landscapes, most returning veterans describe their feelings of alienation and constant fear. Once back in the US, most found that their feeling of unease and estrangement did not subside. Because of this, most of the fiction written by veteran soldiers directly or indirectly tackles the issues of home, homesickness, homelessness, and being unhomed. I argue that the centrality of these issues can be read as a commentary on the strategies of inclusion and exclusion which characterize the definition of the nation as home. One of the ways Vietnam War fiction has represented the issue of homelessness and estrangement from the homeland has been to resort to one of the most pervasive metaphors in US literature: that of the imperfect, crumbling haunted house. A great number of the houses featured in Vietnam War literature are imperfect and uncanny. The main aim of this article is the contextualization and analysis of the “queer” houses in Tim O’Brien’s fiction as a trope that allows the author to build a “poetics of uprootedness.”
An image in technicolor. Fifty years of wars in Vietnam 1940-1990 gives a broad and innovative interpretation of the history of Vietnam between 1940 and 1990. Black and white characterisations, ...one-sided interpretations and prevailing myths are debunked. Instead, a nuanced and multifaceted picture is given in which the United States is less prominent. History is not only written by the victors and, in this case too, the history of Vietnam during this period cannot be attributed solely to Ho Chi Minh and the success of the Communists in 1975. The internal losers, that is, the other political movements and their leaders, must also be given a crucial place in Vietnam’s history. For example, the civil wars that took place between 1940 and 1990 played an unmistakable role. The older, idealised image of North Vietnam is inaccurate. This country was a dictatorial and oppressive police state. After 1954, the North Vietnamese leaders were embroiled in a fierce power struggle and were largely responsible for the war in South Vietnam. The answer to the question of who the legitimate representatives of the Vietnamese nation were also requires a more balanced judgment of non-Communist politicians, such as Bao Dai, Ngo Dinh Diem and Nguyen Van Thieu. As for the role of international players, initially, it was the Cold War that determined the United States' interference; later, it was American credibility. In the end, it was the support from China and the Soviet Union that was the deciding factor for North Vietnam’s victory. Important new perspectives are given on the role of minorities, the meaning of ‘a third way’, the devastating effects of the strategy, the role of women and girls, and the mental and cultural aspects of the wars.
Under beredskap och krig Järvstad, Kristin
I nationens tjänst? Beredskap, folkhem, kön och nationell identitet i svensk 1940-talslitteratur,
2022
Book
Odprti dostop
Military preparedness and war have so far been regarded as the domain of male authors in Swedish literature, especially at the time of the Second World War. But what happens if we turn our attention ...to the female authors of the 1940s? Kristin Järvstad’s study shows how their texts as well focus to a large extent on subjects related to military preparedness and war.
A variety of topics can be found in the novels by the female writers, ranging from stories about female air guards who protect the Swedish border to female pacifists who find it necessary to kill for the sake of peace. The soldier figure in these texts also takes a radical stand when he as a deserter lays down his arms to protest against the war. In addition, one of the most charged subjects of the time linked to gender is treated from a unique perspective: the women who consort with the occupying enemy are pictured without the condemning attitude that characterizes the period in general. The most urgent question, however, concerns alienation, linked to race: who is actually included in the Swedish nation? Here, the texts display a scathing critique of the narrow-minded Swedes and the anti-Semitism that flourishes at that time.
By analysing female authors’ depictions of the 1940s, During Military Preparedness and War deepens the previous picture of this period in Swedish literature. The writers explored in this investigation express a profound and often critical commitment to the issue of war and violence, linked to gender and alienation. The most radical literary message of the period can also be found among their novels: the demand for the dissolution of the militaristic and patriarchal nation which strives to expand its territory without regard for human life.
Beredskap och krig har hittills betraktats som manliga författares domän i svensk litteratur, särskilt vid tiden för andra världskriget. Men vad händer om blickarna riktas mot de kvinnliga 1940-talsförfattarna? Kristin Järvstads studie visar hur även deras texter i hög grad fokuserar beredskaps- och krigsrelaterade ämnen.
I en mängd romaner gestaltas allt från kvinnliga luftbevakare ”någonstans i Sverige” till kvinnliga pacifister som ser sig tvungna att döda för fredens skull. Soldatfiguren i dessa verk får också inta en radikal position när han som desertör lägger ner sina vapen i protest mot kriget. Dessutom behandlas ett av tidens mest laddade ämnen knutet till kön ur ett unikt perspektiv: ”tyskjäntorna” och deras relationer med ockupanter skildras utan den fördömande inställning som präglar samtiden i övrigt. Den mest brännande frågan rör dock främlingskap, kopplat till ras: vem är egentligen inkluderad i den svenska nationen? Här uppvisar texterna en svidande kritik mot de trångsynta svenskarna och den antisemitism som florerar i samtiden.
Genom analyser av kvinnliga författares samtidsskildringar fördjupar Under beredskap och krig den tidigare bilden av svenskt litterärt 1940-tal. De författare som utforskas här uttrycker ett djupt och ofta kritiskt engagemang i frågan om krig och våld, länkat till kön och främlingskap. Periodens mest radikala litterära budskap finner vi också bland deras romaner: kravet på upplösning av den militaristiska och patriarkala nationen, med dess strävan att utöka sitt territorium utan hänsyn till människoliv.
Studien kan laddas ner från Kriteriums hemsida: https://kriterium.se/site/books/m/10.22188/kriterium.35/
Military preparedness and war have so far been regarded as the domain of male authors in Swedish literature, especially at the time of the Second World War. But what happens if we turn our attention ...to the female authors of the 1940s? Kristin Järvstad’s study shows how their texts as well focus to a large extent on subjects related to military preparedness and war. A variety of topics can be found in the novels by the female writers, ranging from stories about female air guards who protect the Swedish border to female pacifists who find it necessary to kill for the sake of peace. The soldier figure in these texts also takes a radical stand when he as a deserter lays down his arms to protest against the war. In addition, one of the most charged subjects of the time linked to gender is treated from a unique perspective: the women who consort with the occupying enemy are pictured without the condemning attitude that characterizes the period in general. The most urgent question, however, concerns alienation, linked to race: who is actually included in the Swedish nation? Here, the texts display a scathing critique of the narrow-minded Swedes and the anti-Semitism that flourishes at that time. By analysing female authors’ depictions of the 1940s, During Military Preparedness and War deepens the previous picture of this period in Swedish literature. The writers explored in this investigation express a profound and often critical commitment to the issue of war and violence, linked to gender and alienation. The most radical literary message of the period can also be found among their novels: the demand for the dissolution of the militaristic and patriarchal nation which strives to expand its territory without regard for human life.
War, like other stressful situations and experiences, entails a threat to one’s subjective well-being, and war fiction for children represents this threat in different ways: some narratives minimise ...it, and others do not. War fiction, then, provides material for a case study of war and its impact on representations of subjective well-being (SWB), and how this is communicated to children in the stories they read. This article examines representations of SWB in the context of Australia’s involvement in World War I in two recently published picture books:
Midnight: The Story of a Light Horse
(2014) by Mark Greenwood and Frané Lessac and
One Minute’s Silence
(2014) by David Metzenthen and Michael Camilleri. These picture books invite young readers into conflicting views of war and its impact on SWB. On the one hand, in
Midnight
schemas and scripts construct the belief that war is a glorious event that has a positive impact on SWB. On the other hand, in
One Minute’s Silence
schemas and scripts challenge the view that war is a viable means of solving national problems and enhancing SWB, and remembers its war heroes as tragic participants in a violent and senseless war.
The first part of this book consists in the translation of Alojzij Res's diary from Slovenian into Italian language. The author of the diary reported from the Isonzo front of the First World War. The ...second part contains a critical part, which aims to analyse and present the work and the author more in detail.
Der erste Teil dieses Buchs besteht aus der Übersetzung des Tagebuchs von Alojzij Res vom Slowenischen ins Italienische. Der Autor des Tagebuches berichtete von der Isonzo-Front des Ersten Weltkrieges. Der zweite Teil enthält einen analytischen Part, der darauf abzielt, das Werk und den Autor genauer zu begründen und vorzustellen.
The ethics of care is a central element in the novel The Story of a Brief Marriage (2016), written by Anuk Arudpragasam in response to the slaughter which the Tamil community suffered in the final ...months of the Sri Lankan civil war in 2009. This article discusses the novel from this theoretical perspective, positing that care is played out as a strategy to enhance the jeopardised human condition of those involved. The narrative bears witness to the intense suffering of this community at a time when the situation was deadly for civilians, who were confined in the so-called “No Fire Zone.” Paradoxically, this area was systematically shelled, its conditions responding to what Achille Mbembe has described as necropolitics. In the midst of this horror, however, Arudpragasam’s novel finds a deeply moving ethics of care in people’s attitudes to one another, which signals a desperate attempt to keep the bereaved community together or at least maintain an essential sense of humanness. Care is also identified as intentio autoris since the novel becomes a powerful reminder of the huge toll of human lives and the immense pain that occurred in this dark episode, as well as the failure—or lack of interest—of the international community to intervene in order to save thousands of innocent lives.
La ética del cuidado es un elemento central en la novela The Story of a Brief Marriage (2016), escrita por Anuk Arudpragasam en respuesta a la masacre que la comunidad tamil sufrió en los últimos meses de la guerra civil de Sri Lanka en 2009. Este artículo analiza la novela desde esta perspectiva teórica, postulando que el cuidado constituye una estrategia que potencia el sentido de humanidad de los personajes, el cual se encuentra en jaque. La narrativa da testimonio del profundo sufrimiento de esta comunidad en una situación crítica para la población civil, que fue confinada en la llamada “Zona Libre de Fuego,” la cual, paradójicamente, fue bombardeada sistemáticamente. La situación respondía a lo que Achille Mbembe ha descrito como necropolítica. En este brutal contexto, la novela de Arudpragasam retrata cómo una conmovedora ética del cuidado emerge entre los confinados en un intento desesperado de mantener unida a la afligida comunidad o, como mínimo, preservar un sentido elemental de humanidad. La ética del cuidado también se identifica en la intentio autoris, pues la novela constituye un incisivo recordatorio de la pérdida de vidas humanas y del inmenso dolor que ocasionó este oscuro episodio, así como también del fracaso—o la falta de interés—de la comunidad internacional para intervenir y salvar miles de vidas inocentes.
March 1917 Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr; Schwartz, Marian
11/2019
eBook
The Red Wheel is Nobel Prize-winner Aleksandr
Solzhenitsyn's multivolume epic work about the Russian Revolution.
He spent decades writing about just four of the most important
periods, or "nodes." ...This is the first time that the monumental
March 1917-the third node-has been translated into English. It
tells the story of the Russian Revolution itself, during which the
Imperial government melts in the face of the mob, and the giants of
the opposition also prove incapable of controlling the course of
events.
The action of Book 2 (of four) of March 1917 is set
during March 13-15, 1917, the Russian Revolution's turbulent second
week. The revolution has already won inside the capital, Petrograd.
News of the revolution flashes across all Russia through the
telegraph system of the Ministry of Roads and Railways. But this is
wartime, and the real power is with the army. At Emperor Nikolai
II's order, the Supreme Command sends troops to suppress the
revolution in Petrograd. Meanwhile, victory speeches ring out at
Petrograd's Tauride Palace. Inside, two parallel power structures
emerge: the Provisional Government and the Executive Committee of
the Petrograd Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies, which
sends out its famous "Order No. 1," presaging the destruction of
the army. The troops sent to suppress the Petrograd revolution are
halted by the army's own top commanders. The Emperor is detained
and abdicates, and his ministers are jailed and sent to the Peter
and Paul Fortress. This sweeping, historical novel is a must-read
for Solzhenitsyn's many fans, as well as those interested in
twentieth-century history, Russian history and literature, and
military history.
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