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20 Must-Read Books on the Vietnam War - The New York Times
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From: Paul Mooney <pjmooney@me.com>
Date: Fri, Sep 15, 2017 at 3:43 PM
To: VSG <Vsg@u.washington.edu>
Also likely related to the Burns’s series, another list of must-read books on the Vietnam War. I’m sure some of you will see some books missing and others that don’t deserve to be on this list. But of course this is a list for the non-specialist. Paul
Paul
20 Must-Read Books on the Vietnam War
20 Must-Read Books on the Vietnam War
By SUSAN ELLINGWOODSEPT. 15, 2017
What’s your favorite book about the Vietnam War? Horst Faas/Associated Press
On Sunday, Sept. 17, PBS will begin airing “The Vietnam War,” a 10-part, 18-hour documentary by Ken Burns and his creative partner Lynn Novick. For those of you interested in books about Vietnam, here’s a list, along with clips and links to The Times Book Review’s assessment of each publication. Also, be sure to check out Vietnam ’67, a series by our colleagues on Opinion that features essays by historians, veterans and journalists recalling a year that changed the war and America.
Fiction
‘The Quiet American,’ by Graham Greene
The Times review in 1956 called “The Quiet American” a “political novel — or parable — about the war in Indochina, employing its characters less as individuals than as representatives of their nations or political factions.” The book’s thesis: “America is a crassly materialistic and ‘innocent’ nation with no understanding of other peoples.”
‘The Sorrow of War,’ by Bao Ninh
“Sorrow of War” offers the North Vietnamese perspective by tracing the “war-haunted life of Kien, a former infantryman turned writer, as he struggles to overcome his terrifying memories of combat and salvage the wreck that his life has become.”
‘The Things They Carried,’ by Tim O’Brien
“The Things They Carried,” which came out in 1990, is more than a book about the horror of fighting. It examines “with sensitivity and insight the nature of courage and fear, by questioning the role that imagination plays in helping to form our memories and our own versions of truth.”
Nonfiction
‘The Best and the Brightest,’ by David Halberstam
In “The Best and the Brightest,” Halberstam sets out to discover how the United States got involved in Vietnam. It is a “valuable contribution to the literature not only on Vietnam but on the way Washington and our foreign policy establishment work,” showing us how “bureaucratic considerations triumphed over ideological or even common-sense ones.” According to The Times 1972 review, the “book’s main and most remarkable contribution is to introduce us in depth to the architects of America’s involvement in Vietnam.”
‘Bloods: An Oral History of the Vietnam War by Black Veterans,’ by Wallace Terry
For black soldiers, fighting in Vietnam was especially bad. “Not only were they dying at a disproportionate rate — they made up 23 percent of the fatalities during the early years of the war — but they also faced discrimination within the military in terms of decorations, promotions and duty assignments.” This oral history gives the “reader a visceral sense of what it was like, as a black man, to serve in Vietnam and what it was like to come back to ‘the real world’.”
‘Born on the Fourth of July,’ by Ron Kovic
The Times described “Born on the Fourth of July” as a memoir about “killing and being killed on the battlefields of Southeast Asia.” Kovic came back “to a town built by veterans of a prouder war who didn’t understand the veterans of Vietnam. It is an account of one man and one community, but it could be the account of a whole generation and a whole country.”
‘A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America in Vietnam,’ by Neil Sheehan
The power of this book “lies in its anger” as it showcases the “confused or venal men in Washington and Saigon.” According to the 1988 Times review, “if there is one book that captures the Vietnam War in the sheer Homeric scale of its passion and folly, this book is it.”
‘Dereliction of Duty: Lyndon Johnson, Robert McNamara, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies That Led to Vietnam,’ by H. R. McMaster
McMaster’s book looks at the “human failures” of President Lyndon Johnson and his advisers. “What gives ‘Dereliction of Duty’ its special value,” according to the Times review, “is McMaster’s comprehensive, balanced and relentless exploration of the specific role of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.”
‘Dispatches,’ by Michael Herr
Here’s what the 1977 Times review had to say about this book: “If you think you don’t want to read any more about Vietnam, you are wrong. ‘Dispatches’ is beyond politics, beyond rhetoric, beyond ‘pacification’ and body counts and the ‘psychotic vaudeville’ of Saigon press briefings. Its materials are fear and death, hallucination and the burning of souls. It is as if Dante had gone to hell with a cassette recording of Jimi Hendrix and a pocketful of pills: our first rock-and-roll war, stoned murder.”
‘Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America’s Vietnam,’ by Fredrik Logevall
Fredrik Logevall’s book focuses on the French conflict in Vietnam at the end of World War II and the beginning of the American one in 1959. The Times review called the book “excellent” and “comprehensive,” and a “powerful portrait of the terrible and futile French war from which Americans learned little as they moved toward their own engagement in Vietnam.”
‘Ending the Vietnam War: A History of America’s Involvement in and Extrication From the Vietnam War,’ by Henry Kissinger
In “Ending the Vietnam War,” Kissinger offers “no great revelations” and “no personal mea culpas.” Still, “he is a deft portrayer of his allies and adversaries,” as he tries to get the United States out of Vietnam, and “he knows how to make the driest diplomacy surprisingly suspenseful.”
‘Father, Soldier, Son: Memoir of a Platoon Leader in Vietnam,’ by Nathaniel Tripp
“Father, Soldier, Son” is a “searing memoir of Vietnam by a veteran who fought honorably but without patriotism or illusions.” The Times review called it a “moving story” about the author’s “efforts to find solace through love and family.”
‘Fire in the Lake: The Vietnamese and the Americans in Vietnam,’ by Frances Fitzgerald
According to the 1972 Times review, “Fire in the Lake” is a “compassionate and penetrating account of the collision of two societies that remain untranslatable to one another, an analysis of all those features of South Vietnamese culture that doomed the American effort from the start, and an incisive explanation of the reasons why that effort could only disrupt and break down South Vietnam’s society — and pave the way for the revolution that the author sees as the only salvation.”
‘Hue 1968: A Turning Point of the American War in Vietnam,’ by Mark Bowden
Bowden “applies his signature blend of deep reportage and character-driven storytelling to bring readers a fresh look at the 1968 battle in the Vietnamese city of Hue.” The Times review praised it for bringing “an old war to life for young Americans” that may “prompt a wider reflection on how to apply the lessons of Vietnam to our wars of today.”
‘In Retrospect: The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam,’ by Robert S. McNamara with Brian VanDeMark
The Times review of “In Retrospect” opens like this: “In his 79th year, Robert S. McNamara at long last offers the public a glimpse of his aching conscience.” McNamara tries to “prove that the mistakes were ‘mostly honest,’ even if traceable to a ghastly ignorance of the Vietnamese people, culture and terrain, and the historical forces of that time.” The review found “McNamara’s unwillingness to explore the human tragedies and political legacies” of the Vietnam War disappointing.
‘Reporting Vietnam,’ by the Library of America
The Times 1999 review of this two-volume collection of writing and reporting on the Vietnam War chronicles the “war of soldiers in the field, not the one at home, or the one described in Saigon by American military spokesmen at a daily briefing reporters called ‘the 5 o’clock follies’ — a war of units, numbers, objectives, initiatives, programs, targets, enemy body counts given in exact numbers and American casualties described as ‘light’ or ‘moderate.’”
‘A Rumor of War,’ by Philip Caputo
In “A Rumor of War,” Philip Caputo forces the reader to “see and feel and understand what it was like to fight in Vietnam,” The Times Book Review wrote. ” He does this by “placing himself as a Marine lieutenant directly before the reader and giving the American involvement a sincere, manly, increasingly harrowed American face.”
‘Vietnam: A History,’ by Stanley Karnow
The Times Book Review described Stanley Karnow’s “Vietnam” as a “less dogmatic, more objective” historical account “that leaves no reasonable questions unanswered.” Because Mr. Karnow “has a sharp eye for the illustrative moment and a keen ear for the telling quote, his book is first-rate as a popular contribution to understanding the war.”
‘We Were Soldiers Once … And Young: Ia Drang — The Battle That Changed the War in Vietnam,’ by Harold G. Moore and Joseph L. Galloway
“We Were Soldiers Once … And Young” centers on “four days and nights in November 1965, when American soldiers in the central highlands of Vietnam endured what proved to be the bloodiest campaign of the war.” The 1992 Times review said it “goes as far as any book yet written toward answering the hoary question of what combat is really like.”
‘When Heaven and Earth Changed Places: A Vietnamese Woman’s Journey From War to Peace,’ by Le Ly Hayslip with Jay Wurts
Hayslip’s account offers a rare view of “growing up in the shadow of war.” The book, an “intensely intimate portrait,” is a “human account of Vietnam’s destruction and self-destruction.” She “begins with the war’s corruption of family and community life in her village” and “then moves to the hard, impure compromises of survival as she becomes a teenage refugee in Saigon” among South Vietnamese and American soldiers.
Paul Mooney | Freelance Journalist | Berkeley (510) 984 8780 | pjmooney@me.com | www.pjmooney.com | Twitter @pjmooney | Skype pjmooney
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From: Catherine Karnow <catherinekarnow@yahoo.com>
Date: Fri, Sep 15, 2017 at 4:16 PM
To: Paul Mooney <pjmooney@me.com>, VSG <Vsg@u.washington.edu>
Good list, Paul, and happy to see my father's book in there!
Based in San Francisco
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From: Ben Quick <bnquick74@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, Sep 15, 2017 at 5:02 PM
To: Catherine Karnow <catherinekarnow@yahoo.com>
Cc: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
I would add Home to War: A History of the Vietnam Veterans Movement by Gerald Nicosia to the list, since it's definitely heavy on American authors and a bit lacking in Vietnamese authors. I've found it essential to understanding the diverse experiences, responses and ideological persuasions of vets.
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From: Deo Huu <deochienhuu@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, Sep 15, 2017 at 5:09 PM
To: Paul Mooney <pjmooney@me.com>, VSG <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Wow.... so many books, yet so many about personal experiences, not about the background, causes, conduct, and real results of the war. And none by historians like Sorley, Moyar, Summers, or VN authors like Doan Van Toai or Tran Van Nhut. Yes, I must agree that many will find really serious fault with this particular list. Books like "The Sorrow of War" are like the movie "Saving Private Ryan", just incredible portraits of the human experience of men in war, but not informative about the actual history. Understanding some of the human experience is worthwhile, but understanding the flow of the history is what is more desirable.
R J Del Vecchio
Independent Researcher
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From: Shawn McHale <mchale@gwu.edu>
Date: Fri, Sep 15, 2017 at 5:49 PM
To:
Cc: VSG <vsg@u.washington.edu>
A "safe" list, heavily focused on Americans and their experience, that seems stuck in time. But the writers on it write well.
Re: Fitzgerald in particular -- Can't we just have a little ceremony, commend Frances Fitzgerald for having a book that has been on these lists for so long, and then just politely bury the book, never to be seen again? It may sound terrible for a historian to recommend such a fate to a book, but this book has done as much harm as good in understanding Vietnam. its simplification of the Vietnamese -- what we in the academy would call essentialism and racism -- has pervaded many treatments of the war. It reminds me of reading Jean-Paul Sartre on the Algerian War -- you just cringe, at times, at the simplistic nonsense flowing from the pen.
Sigh . . .
Shawn McHale
George Washington University
--
Shawn McHale
Associate Professor of History
George Washington University
Washington, DC 20052 USA
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From: Tuan Hoang <tuannyriver@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, Sep 15, 2017 at 6:12 PM
To: Shawn McHale <mchale@gwu.edu>
Cc: VSG <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Re: FitzGerald... It's the end of a long work week; kindly forgive me for self-quoting instead of writing a specific response. By "familiar contempt" and "cynicism," I meant the views expressed in Fire in the Lake.
From several sources in English, including a long piece from the New York Times, I learned that [Fr. Khoát] became a leader of many Catholic refugees, especially fishermen, during their stay at Fort Chaffee in Arkansas. (The author of the piece is Frances FitzGerald, whose shabby and very questionable perspective on Vietnamese history didn’t prevent her book on the Vietnam War from winning the Pulitzer among other awards. The NYT article was published at the end of 1975. It is informative and interesting in some respects, but it also reeks of FitzGerald’s familiar contempt for South Vietnam and cynicism towards the South Vietnamese.)
Tuan Hoang
Pepperdine University
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From: Worthen, Helena Harlow <hworthen@illinois.edu>
Date: Fri, Sep 15, 2017 at 7:38 PM
To: Deo Huu <deochienhuu@gmail.com>
Cc: VSG <vsg@u.washington.edu>
I don’t see either of Christian Appy’s books, either Patriots or American Reckoning on this list. Did I miss something?
Helena
Helena Worthen
Phone in VN: 0168 4628562
skype: helena.worthen1
Blog US/VN: helenaworthen.wordpress.com
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From: Joe Berry <joetracyberry@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, Sep 15, 2017 at 8:36 PM
To: Helena Worthen <hworthen@illinois.edu>
Cc: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Also, the non-fiction is all virtually from one side only. The field needs someone who speaks and is fully literate in Vietnamese to spend some time in the archives and museums (like the War Remnants Museum in HCMC) in VN and write it up and then publish it in both languages. Just a thought.
Joe
_______________________
Joe Berry
510-527-5889 phone/fax landline
21 San Mateo Road,
Berkeley, CA 94707
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