The Fall Of Baghdad

(Paperback)

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For every great historical event, at least one reporter writes an eye-opening account of such power and literary weight that it becomes joined with its subject in our minds - George Orwell's Homage to Catalonia and the Spanish Civil War; John Hersey's Hiroshima and the dropping of the first atomic bomb; Philip Gourevitch's We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed with Our Families and the Rwandan genocide. Whatever else is written about the Iraqi people and the fall of Saddam, Jon Lee Anderson's The Fall of Baghdad will remain the classic book about the Iraq War. No subject has become more hotly politicized than the toppling of Saddam Hussein's regime, and so a thick fog of propaganda has obscured the reality of what the Iraqi people have endured and are enduring, under Saddam Hussein and now. Jon Lee Anderson has created an astonishing portrait of humanity in extremis, a work of great wisdom, human empathy, and moral clarity. In channelling a tragedy of epic dimensions through the stories of real people caught up in the whirlwind of history, Jon Lee Anderson has written a book of timeless significance.

Reviews

'THE FALL OF BAGHDAD demonstrates -- like Anderson's incisive books on the war in Afghanistan, contemporary guerrilla movements and Che Guevara -- his knack for interviews, observations and finely crafted, powerful narratives. The great value of this book is that Anderson takes us beyond sound bites or official statements to hear the authentic voices of thoughtful, educated Iraqi civilians in interviews and vignettes that capture the chaos of wartime and its aftermath . . . The haunting intenstisy of Anderson's vibrant account of his experiences is reminiscent of the best war literature . . . indispensable for understanding what is going on inside Iraqi society today' WASHINGTON POST 'Mr Anderson continues his brave reporting for THE NEW YORKER . . . In this measured, keenly descriptive account, hindsight gives way to horror as the early rumblings of war become reality and the city of Baghdad is changed beyond recognition . . . THE FALL OF BAGHDAD is as current as it is important' NEW YORK TIMES 'A searing portrait of a people and a city under fire . . . Anderson is a fine reporter who writes like a dream' EVENING STANDARD '[Anderson's] articles in the NEW YORKER are often admired by other journalists for their easy flow, colour and interviews, and he has successfully translated this into book form . . . but he also writes movingly about the general population and suffering' GUARDIAN 'Anderson takes a reflective and rounded approach . . . Anderson reinforces the point that the war must now offer as recompense not just the absence of Saddam but the opportunity for Iraqis to run their own affairs' SUNDAY BUSINESS POST 'First-hand view of Iraq before, during and after the US-led invasion' VENUE 'Anderson follows a tragedy of epic proportions through a succession of personal stories of ordinary people immersed in the maelstrom of history. In his measured, keenly-observed account, partly an insightful journal, and partly a profoundly disturbing travelogue, Anderson gives an in-depth picture of turbulent social change in Iraq' WESTERN DAILY PRESS 'The great strength of Jon Lee Anderson's eyewitness account, THE FALL OF BAGHDAD, is that he never lets his opinion obscure that of those who really count: the Iraqi people . . . Anderson's detached, grass-roots perspective provides a refreshingly non-judgmental portrait of a city under siege' METRO LONDON 'The prose is plain and excellent. The greatest virtue of many is this book, though, is its even-handedness... he tells it as he found it. He draws the interesting analogies, deals with the geopolitics, but always finds the personal pathos under the news. Amid the ephemeral, he has found that which endures.' THE TIMES 'This is a brilliantly sharp and incisive portrait of the Iraq war from the inside.' OBSERVER 'Classic reportage, written with a novelist's skill.' SUNDAY TIMES

Author Bio

Jon Lee Anderson is the author of Guerrillas: Journeys in the Insurgent World, Che Guevara: A revolutionary Life, The Lions Grave: Dispatched from Afghanistan, and, with his brother Scott Anderson, War Zones and Inside the League. A regular contributor to The New Yorker, he lives in Dorset, England, with his wife and three children.