George Allen wants to insult Jim Webb by calling him a fiction writer. I see Allen's lifelong attempt identify himself with the "real" South and can't help but laugh. When he sneers the phrase "fiction writer", he must believe the people of Virgina are nothing but ignorant crackers. Allen has always embraced nothing but the most dishonest stereotypes of Southern life and his thoughts on fiction writers are as wrong as the noose he kept next to his flag collection.
At their best, fiction writers always tell us the greater truth. Through their books, we see what they saw, feel what they felt, and by reading good fiction, we always come away with a deeper understanding of the human condition.
When I came home from Vietnam, I didn't read novels or non-fiction about the war. I wanted to grow my hair and disappear into the life left four years before. I was behind everyone I knew and was desperate to catch up. Disenchanted and and angry, I put the war in little box in my head and left it there, planning to never open it again.
One day a buddy came by and tossed me a copy of Jim Webb's Vietnam War novel, Fields Of Fire, saying, "I know you don't read this Vietnam stuff, but you gotta read this one. This Webb guy's the real thing." Reluctantly I started reading that same night and soon, I was plunged back into a blast furnace of heat and fear and brotherhood that was the Vietnam War.
Jim Webb's Fields of Fire is the real Vietnam war, an authentic piece of fiction that rings true and may be the most honest book I have ever read. It is the gold standard by which all Vietnam novels are judged and there are none better.
My reading that night prompted me to seek out other veterans, and over time, as we told our stories and a few tall tales over a beer or two, I found myself coming home from the war for the first time. For that, I'll always be especially grateful for Fields of Fire. The reality and truth between those covers helped me more than I could ever explain here.
The current Republican administration and George Allen revel in their anti-intellectual stance, taunting thinkers, disputing science, and teaching our children teaching something ironically called "intelligent design." They cut funding for education, and lowered standards for our military. They don't read newspapers or books, and they're damn proud of it. Their regressive vision of America is one where people blindly swallow lies and propaganda, an uneducated America, gullible and easy to control. They don't want thinkers--they want sheep.
I do not share this twisted vision. I have walked the streets of Paris with Ernest Hemingway, shivered in the freezing Russian night with Leo Tolstoy. I have lived the life of a career soldier thanks to Anton Meyer, witnessed the horror of the Dust Bowl through John Steinbeck's eyes, and gotten blind drunk with Mac and the boys on Cannery Row.
And for one long night, years ago, I was there with Jim Webb and his unforgettable Marines, fighting for my life and my brothers in the Arizona Valley.
Fiction writer? The Jim Webb I know is a truth-teller and nothing less.
Of fiction writers - so many wonderful books that tell us the truth - of war, of politics, of a region. Some that immediately come to mind people might know All Quiet on the Western Front for war, To Kill a Mockingbird and A Gathering of Old Men for the South, All the Kings Men's and The Last Hurrah for politics.
But there are also many profound novels, things that elucidate the deeper truths, which one might not know. One of the most profound things I have ever read on war is a Greek Novel from WWI entitled Life in the Tomb by Stratis Myrilivis - it was translated by Peter Bien, and there is a paperback edition available.
of veterans - we now have a very active Veterans for Webb group in N Virginia, We have veteran specific bumper stickers, veterans for Webb T-shirts, and veteran specific literature. Nelson in hdqtrs has it all, and it is being distributed around the state. Veterans, even those of us who only served stateside, particularly appreciate the different between Jim and his strong support of issues that matter to veterans and active duty personnel, versus Allen who sometimes has not even paid lip service to important issues.
I was also thinking the South is probably the worst region in the country one should impune fiction writers. You can't throw a rock without hitting a good one. James Still, author of River of Earth, a near perfect novel set in the Eastern Kentucky mountains was my liberian in my high school in Hindman, Kentucky. I once had the great honor to adapt Lee Smith's, Saving Grace, for the screen. It was an honor, but I was terrified she wouldn't like what I had done with it. So many great writers from the south and sometimes it has seems half the working writers in New York City have southern roots.
Well, three more members and wine and we'll have a book club.
It would be a good one to write about sometime. Thanks.
Fields of Fire was one of the most disturbing, gripping books I've ever read. It absolutely seizes the reader with its rawness and truth. The characters are multi-dimensional and real. I decided after reading it that this was a man who has great curiosity about and insight into people and what makes them tick. I sensed, too, his outrage at the waste of human lives in war, his feeling that to the politicians running a war the soldiers who are being asked to give their lives are mere cogs in a wheel of policy and not individuals, each suffering in his own way. This book has a deeply anti-war message and calls on the reader to ponder what it is we do when we ask our soldiers to fight. It's not about cutting and running, not about unwillingness to fight, but about the enormous cost of embarking on such a course. War is not the glorious adventure our chicken hawk leadership has promoted. It should never be undertaken unless as a last resort and for clearly defined reasons.
Let's put someone who understands the costs of war into the Senate.
And two veterans: Tom Robbins and William Styron.
If I have to put someone at the top of the list - O'Connor. Sentimental favorite is McCullers who wrote the best single page in American literature ever.
It's been a long time since I read Flannery O'Connor. She was a favorite of my father's, although he used to be more of a Eugene O'Neill fan. I had to give up reading O'Neill because he's enough to make you want to stick your head in the oven and be done with it. Unfortunately, William Styron has the same effect on me.