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در ارتش فرعون
In This Boy's Life Tobias Wolf created an unforgettable memoir of an American childhood. Now he gives us a precisely and sometimes pitilessly remembered account of his young manhood - a young manhood that become entangled in the tragic adventure that was Vietnam. Mordantly funny, searingly honest, In Pharoah's Army is a war memoir in the tradition of George Orwell and Michael Herr.
237 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 1994
About the author
Tobias Wolff
139 books1,153 followersTobias Jonathan Ansell Wolff is a writer of fiction and nonfiction.
He is best known for his short stories and his memoirs, although he has written two novels.
Wolff is the Ward W. and Priscilla B. Woods Professor in the School of Humanities and Sciences at Stanford University, where he has taught classes in English and creative writing since 1997. He also served as the director of the Creative Writing Program at Stanford from 2000 to 2002.
He is best known for his short stories and his memoirs, although he has written two novels.
Wolff is the Ward W. and Priscilla B. Woods Professor in the School of Humanities and Sciences at Stanford University, where he has taught classes in English and creative writing since 1997. He also served as the director of the Creative Writing Program at Stanford from 2000 to 2002.
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August 10, 2024
M*A*S*H
M.A.S.H. è l’acronimo di Mobile Army Surgical Hospital, cioè Ospedale Militare Chirurgico da Campo.
Non c’entra nulla con questo bel memoir.
Tra l’altro, quelli (il film, e la serie) erano ambientati in Corea, parlavano di quella guerra lì, anche se sono universalmente associati a quella del Vietnam.
La somiglianza però c’è: è nel tono, nell’ironia, nel piglio (apparentemente) cinico e (apparentemente) leggero.
Ma il libro di Wolff non è un delirio di risate come M*A*S*H.
I miei eroi: Elliott Gould e Donald Sutherland. Qui insieme a Bollore, al secolo Sally Kellerman nella parte del maggiore Margaret ‘Hot Lips’ O’Houlihan.
Il titolo scelto da Wolff fa invece riferimento al fatto che l’esercito americano in Vietnam finì come quello del faraone egiziano, inghiottito, uno dalla giungla, l’altro dalle acque del Mar Rosso spalancate per consentire il passaggio degli Ebrei (**).
Il sottotitolo ‘Ricordi della guerra perduta’ sembra intendere che il Vietnam sia la prima guerra persa dall’esercito a stelle e strisce. Come se avessero vinto in Corea. E certo non è stata l’ultima guerra persa dagli yankie.
Il protagonista di questo romanzo memoir dedica quattro preziosi anni della sua vita all’esercito del suo paese.
E credo questo la dica lunga su quanto sia sbandato e perso. Fino al punto da vivere la guerra come maestra di vita.
Fatico a capire cosa la guerra possa insegnare se non dolore, violenza, stupidità, inutilità, insensatezza, ingiustizia, sopraffazione. Mi auguro che la vita sia qualcosa d’altro. Ben altro.
L’esercito del faraone in azione.
Addestramento, corso allievo ufficiale, un anno in Vietnam (1967-68). Riesco a vedere molto chiaramente il braccio piegato a ombrello disegnato nella sua mente quando l’ufficiale che gli prepara le carte del congedo, gli propone di prolungare la ferma: col cazzo, risponderebbe Toby, se non preferisse sempre il silenzio (la stessa risposta che avrei dato io, ma io invece l’avrei lasciata squillare).
Eh, sì, Toby è uno di quelli che preferisce rispondere col silenzio in un mondo di prolissi ridondanti loquaci logorroici chiacchieroni urlatori.
Toby ha circa vent’anni quando si arruola, e dopo il lungo training parte per il Vietnam col grado di tenente. Ma è il primo a essere consapevole della sua inabilità al comando.
Mentre invece è molto abile, e fortunato, nell’imboscamento: appena mette piede in Asia, lo spediscono sul Delta a far da consigliere militare a una postazione dell’esercito sud-vietnamita in quanto il nostro Toby speaka una manciata di parole della lingua locale.
Silenzio, medici al lavoro!
Uno dei suoi compiti principali sarebbe mantenere i rapporti con la popolazione locale: nel corso della narrazione Toby esplicita quanto concreto e sincero fosse l’interesse degli americani per gli indigeni (sotto zero).
Il Delta del Mekong è una zona lontana dai combattimenti, è una specie di palude della sopravvivenza. Ma anche qui esistono cecchini e mine. Fino all’offensiva del Tet che scatenò una carneficina senza precedenti, in questa parte del paese.
Wolff nei suoi tredici eccellenti capitoli intervalla e incrocia il racconto di guerra a quello dell’addestramento, agli incontri col padre a Berkeley, che ha appena scontato due anni di galera, al difficile rapporto con una fidanzata. E poi, dopo il congedo, il rientro in abiti da ‘civile’, il taglio con tutto e tutti per trasferirsi in Inghilterra e finire a Oxford per quattro anni, dove si laurea cum laude.
Divertente, godibile, appassionante, coinvolgente…
Frederick Arthur Bridgman: L’esercito del Faraone inghiottito dal Mar Rosso. 1900. Collezione privata.
(**)
Purtroppo scienziati esperti e menti illuminate hanno voluto rovinarci anche la splendida e suggestiva vicenda raccontata dall’Esodo. Le acque del mare (che in quel punto, 40 km a nord di Suez, praticamente a Porto Said, erano all’epoca una specie di laguna) si aprirono per lasciar passare gli ebrei in fuga dall’Egitto diretti nel Sinai non per miracolo divino ma per leggi della fisica e della dinamica dei liquidi: un vento proveniente da est, regolare e con una velocità di 100 km/h, dopo 12 ore avrebbe potuto creare un corridoio (o ponte) lungo 5 km e largo 3 per circa 4 ore, il tempo sufficiente per il passaggio dell’esercito di Mosè, ma non abbastanza per quello dell’esercito del faraone, che infatti finì sommerso, e annegato.
Quando la storia non è ambientata in Vietnam, si svolge su queste sponde, la Bay Area, il posto più bello del mondo.
M.A.S.H. è l’acronimo di Mobile Army Surgical Hospital, cioè Ospedale Militare Chirurgico da Campo.
Non c’entra nulla con questo bel memoir.
Tra l’altro, quelli (il film, e la serie) erano ambientati in Corea, parlavano di quella guerra lì, anche se sono universalmente associati a quella del Vietnam.
La somiglianza però c’è: è nel tono, nell’ironia, nel piglio (apparentemente) cinico e (apparentemente) leggero.
Ma il libro di Wolff non è un delirio di risate come M*A*S*H.
I miei eroi: Elliott Gould e Donald Sutherland. Qui insieme a Bollore, al secolo Sally Kellerman nella parte del maggiore Margaret ‘Hot Lips’ O’Houlihan.
Il titolo scelto da Wolff fa invece riferimento al fatto che l’esercito americano in Vietnam finì come quello del faraone egiziano, inghiottito, uno dalla giungla, l’altro dalle acque del Mar Rosso spalancate per consentire il passaggio degli Ebrei (**).
Il sottotitolo ‘Ricordi della guerra perduta’ sembra intendere che il Vietnam sia la prima guerra persa dall’esercito a stelle e strisce. Come se avessero vinto in Corea. E certo non è stata l’ultima guerra persa dagli yankie.
Il protagonista di questo romanzo memoir dedica quattro preziosi anni della sua vita all’esercito del suo paese.
E credo questo la dica lunga su quanto sia sbandato e perso. Fino al punto da vivere la guerra come maestra di vita.
Fatico a capire cosa la guerra possa insegnare se non dolore, violenza, stupidità, inutilità, insensatezza, ingiustizia, sopraffazione. Mi auguro che la vita sia qualcosa d’altro. Ben altro.
L’esercito del faraone in azione.
Addestramento, corso allievo ufficiale, un anno in Vietnam (1967-68). Riesco a vedere molto chiaramente il braccio piegato a ombrello disegnato nella sua mente quando l’ufficiale che gli prepara le carte del congedo, gli propone di prolungare la ferma: col cazzo, risponderebbe Toby, se non preferisse sempre il silenzio (la stessa risposta che avrei dato io, ma io invece l’avrei lasciata squillare).
Eh, sì, Toby è uno di quelli che preferisce rispondere col silenzio in un mondo di prolissi ridondanti loquaci logorroici chiacchieroni urlatori.
Toby ha circa vent’anni quando si arruola, e dopo il lungo training parte per il Vietnam col grado di tenente. Ma è il primo a essere consapevole della sua inabilità al comando.
Mentre invece è molto abile, e fortunato, nell’imboscamento: appena mette piede in Asia, lo spediscono sul Delta a far da consigliere militare a una postazione dell’esercito sud-vietnamita in quanto il nostro Toby speaka una manciata di parole della lingua locale.
Silenzio, medici al lavoro!
Uno dei suoi compiti principali sarebbe mantenere i rapporti con la popolazione locale: nel corso della narrazione Toby esplicita quanto concreto e sincero fosse l’interesse degli americani per gli indigeni (sotto zero).
Il Delta del Mekong è una zona lontana dai combattimenti, è una specie di palude della sopravvivenza. Ma anche qui esistono cecchini e mine. Fino all’offensiva del Tet che scatenò una carneficina senza precedenti, in questa parte del paese.
Wolff nei suoi tredici eccellenti capitoli intervalla e incrocia il racconto di guerra a quello dell’addestramento, agli incontri col padre a Berkeley, che ha appena scontato due anni di galera, al difficile rapporto con una fidanzata. E poi, dopo il congedo, il rientro in abiti da ‘civile’, il taglio con tutto e tutti per trasferirsi in Inghilterra e finire a Oxford per quattro anni, dove si laurea cum laude.
Divertente, godibile, appassionante, coinvolgente…
Frederick Arthur Bridgman: L’esercito del Faraone inghiottito dal Mar Rosso. 1900. Collezione privata.
(**)
Purtroppo scienziati esperti e menti illuminate hanno voluto rovinarci anche la splendida e suggestiva vicenda raccontata dall’Esodo. Le acque del mare (che in quel punto, 40 km a nord di Suez, praticamente a Porto Said, erano all’epoca una specie di laguna) si aprirono per lasciar passare gli ebrei in fuga dall’Egitto diretti nel Sinai non per miracolo divino ma per leggi della fisica e della dinamica dei liquidi: un vento proveniente da est, regolare e con una velocità di 100 km/h, dopo 12 ore avrebbe potuto creare un corridoio (o ponte) lungo 5 km e largo 3 per circa 4 ore, il tempo sufficiente per il passaggio dell’esercito di Mosè, ma non abbastanza per quello dell’esercito del faraone, che infatti finì sommerso, e annegato.
Quando la storia non è ambientata in Vietnam, si svolge su queste sponde, la Bay Area, il posto più bello del mondo.
October 2, 2020
The Soul of America
Many reasons have been given for the failure of the US in its war Vietnam and the significance of that event: misunderstood interests, cultural arrogance, silly military strategies, ill-informed tactics, and adverse domestic politics, among others. But Wolff provides a far more compelling reason and more profound meaning: the spiritual corruption of the US Army, a condition which likely reflected that of the country as a whole.
By any standard the country of South Vietnam was a materially corrupt place. All the governments since the time of separation of the country after the defeat of the French were venal and nepotistic in the extreme. The situation of the average South Vietnamese citizen after the French departure, if anything deteriorated substantially. This was apparent even to ambassadorial staff and reported to US authorities very early in the conflict. (See: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...)
This condition of material corruption was probably sufficient on its own to provoke the eventual victory of the North with or without the assistance of the US military. But that assistance added a dimension to the conflict which was a gift to the North, a gift not only in terms of morale, but also in substantive military advantage. This latter negative contribution to the prosecution of the war is the substance of Wolff’s utterly fascinating memoir. (A comparison with the equivalent from the North Vietnamese side is informative: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...)
All first person accounts by Americans involved in the war in Vietnam share stories, anecdotes, and complaints about the existential distance between men on the ground and their commanders, about the failure of commanders to comprehend the basic facts of life of the South Vietnamese Army, about the racism of American soldiers toward each other as well as toward the Vietnamese, and about the pervasive deceit practiced by commanders among their own troops. (See for example: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...)
But in almost all these accounts, these conditions are treated as anomalous, not because they were uncommon but because they were considered as errors created by inexperience, miscommunication, or the occasional naked ambition of individuals. (Even those most critical of the war do this implicitly: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...) What Wolff suggests is that not only were these conditions the rule rather than the exception, but that they were as intentional as the material bribery, trading with the enemy, and avoidance of responsibility of the South Vietnamese. The difference was that the Americans’ were symptoms of a spiritual void, a moral ennui which was both pervasive and infectious.
Wolff’s technique of moving fluidly from description of the external reality he experienced to his reflections on his own internal reactions to them is an outstanding way of making his point. His own spiritual corruption is simply an instance of the whole. And it takes on the shape of the whole as a matter of survival - in terms of personal identity as well as bodily existence - within the military culture.
Wolff realizes that the cash-based corruption of the South Vietnamese at least allows them to maintain a sense of purpose, even if that purpose is entirely selfish. The American corruption is more fundamental and involves the abandonment of intention, even thought about intention, entirely. His descriptions of this mass spiritual emptying are compelling:
During the era of Vietnam, everyone in the US government - the Presidents, The Secretaries of Defense, their various advisors, and both houses of Congress - lied to each other, to their constituents and to the soldiers who were sent off to fight. This is well documented in many written and filmed histories and personal memoirs. But rarely are the implications of this pervasive ethos of deception so clearly stated as in Wolff’s straightforward memoir. The result is not merely de-moralizing, it is universally destructive of the very instinct of rationality:
The relationship between seniors and subordinates in military life is obviously central to their joint ability to act effectively, however that is defined. But as Wolff points out, that relationship was fundamentally flawed. Officers and men did not fight for each other; they did not even pretend to protect each other; and they, too, continuously lied to each other right along with their government masters. The consequence was not just a feeling of gnostic dread but also of a loss 0f any sense of the future:
An empty spirit is a vacuum which is impossible to maintain. It is necessary that something replace the absent contents - call it a moral code or fundamental drive, or culture, it doesn’t matter all that much - and with these new contents a new soul is effectively created. The process is both gradual and sudden, the malady both chronic and acute. The open, verbalized response to the Tet offensive of 1968 was a recognition of what had been the case all along and experienced as such by the Vietnamese:
In my experience of reading about Vietnam, Wolff is unique in a remarkable respect. Despite the snafu’s, apparent irrationalities, possible incompetencies, mendacity, and what most of us would think of as screw-ups, Wolff doesn’t attribute anything to error. What is done is intentional, strictly purposeful, even when those taking action are unconscious of the purpose involved. This stance then provokes the question ‘What was the real purpose of the war in Vietnam?’ Not its stated military or political objectives, which in any case were never clear and shifted continuously. Nor its strategic rationale about Asian dominoes and American honour. But the actual unstated purpose of everything that was done, the net collective intent as it were of everyone involved.
As I read Wolff, the purpose of the Vietnam war was to show America to itself, a purpose which it accomplished exceptionally well. America was a moral desert. Only its exposure to itself had any chance of establishing a consciousness of this condition. The fact that all sorts of explanations and theories have been put forward to obscure and qualify this revelation is to be expected given the desolate barrenness that the country had shown itself to be in a time of great stress. Wolff’s witness to this spiritual desolation is moving as well as important. Only upon his return to ‘the world,’ did he recognize his own transformation within the military:
That the consciousness of an objective achieved was too much for America to bear is obvious. The country has yet to come to terms with the real horror of its own intentions in Vietnam. More generally, it has really never been that New England Congregational ‘house on a hill,’ a place of spiritual realization. It has always been an oppressive, self-rationalizing and violent place in which the natives distrust and con each other as a matter of principle. Am I too hopeful to suggest that with Donald Trump America is giving itself a second chance to see itself for what it actually is?
Many reasons have been given for the failure of the US in its war Vietnam and the significance of that event: misunderstood interests, cultural arrogance, silly military strategies, ill-informed tactics, and adverse domestic politics, among others. But Wolff provides a far more compelling reason and more profound meaning: the spiritual corruption of the US Army, a condition which likely reflected that of the country as a whole.
By any standard the country of South Vietnam was a materially corrupt place. All the governments since the time of separation of the country after the defeat of the French were venal and nepotistic in the extreme. The situation of the average South Vietnamese citizen after the French departure, if anything deteriorated substantially. This was apparent even to ambassadorial staff and reported to US authorities very early in the conflict. (See: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...)
This condition of material corruption was probably sufficient on its own to provoke the eventual victory of the North with or without the assistance of the US military. But that assistance added a dimension to the conflict which was a gift to the North, a gift not only in terms of morale, but also in substantive military advantage. This latter negative contribution to the prosecution of the war is the substance of Wolff’s utterly fascinating memoir. (A comparison with the equivalent from the North Vietnamese side is informative: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...)
All first person accounts by Americans involved in the war in Vietnam share stories, anecdotes, and complaints about the existential distance between men on the ground and their commanders, about the failure of commanders to comprehend the basic facts of life of the South Vietnamese Army, about the racism of American soldiers toward each other as well as toward the Vietnamese, and about the pervasive deceit practiced by commanders among their own troops. (See for example: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...)
But in almost all these accounts, these conditions are treated as anomalous, not because they were uncommon but because they were considered as errors created by inexperience, miscommunication, or the occasional naked ambition of individuals. (Even those most critical of the war do this implicitly: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...) What Wolff suggests is that not only were these conditions the rule rather than the exception, but that they were as intentional as the material bribery, trading with the enemy, and avoidance of responsibility of the South Vietnamese. The difference was that the Americans’ were symptoms of a spiritual void, a moral ennui which was both pervasive and infectious.
Wolff’s technique of moving fluidly from description of the external reality he experienced to his reflections on his own internal reactions to them is an outstanding way of making his point. His own spiritual corruption is simply an instance of the whole. And it takes on the shape of the whole as a matter of survival - in terms of personal identity as well as bodily existence - within the military culture.
Wolff realizes that the cash-based corruption of the South Vietnamese at least allows them to maintain a sense of purpose, even if that purpose is entirely selfish. The American corruption is more fundamental and involves the abandonment of intention, even thought about intention, entirely. His descriptions of this mass spiritual emptying are compelling:
“At Dong Tam I saw something that wasn’t allowed for in the national myth—our capacity for collective despair. People here seemed in the grip of unshakable petulance. It was in the slump of their shoulders and the plodding way they moved. A sourness had settled over the base, spoiling and coarsening the men. The resolute imperial will was all played out here at empire’s fringe, lost in rancor and mud. Here were pharaoh’s chariots engulfed; his horsemen confused; and all his magnificence dismayed.
A shithole”
During the era of Vietnam, everyone in the US government - the Presidents, The Secretaries of Defense, their various advisors, and both houses of Congress - lied to each other, to their constituents and to the soldiers who were sent off to fight. This is well documented in many written and filmed histories and personal memoirs. But rarely are the implications of this pervasive ethos of deception so clearly stated as in Wolff’s straightforward memoir. The result is not merely de-moralizing, it is universally destructive of the very instinct of rationality:
“In a world where the most consequential things happen by chance, or from unfathomable causes, you don’t look to reason for help. You consort with mysteries. You encourage yourself with charms, omens, rites of propitiation. Without your knowledge or permission the bottom-line caveman belief in blood sacrifice, one life buying another, begins to steal into your bones.”
The relationship between seniors and subordinates in military life is obviously central to their joint ability to act effectively, however that is defined. But as Wolff points out, that relationship was fundamentally flawed. Officers and men did not fight for each other; they did not even pretend to protect each other; and they, too, continuously lied to each other right along with their government masters. The consequence was not just a feeling of gnostic dread but also of a loss 0f any sense of the future:
“The ordinary human sensation of occupying a safe place in a coherent scheme allowed me to perform, to help myself as much as I could. But at times I was seized and shaken by the certainty that nothing I did meant anything, and all around me I sensed currents of hatred and malign intent. When I felt it coming on I gave a sudden wrenching shudder as if I’d bitten into something sour, and forced my thoughts elsewhere. To consider the reality of my situation only made it worse.”
An empty spirit is a vacuum which is impossible to maintain. It is necessary that something replace the absent contents - call it a moral code or fundamental drive, or culture, it doesn’t matter all that much - and with these new contents a new soul is effectively created. The process is both gradual and sudden, the malady both chronic and acute. The open, verbalized response to the Tet offensive of 1968 was a recognition of what had been the case all along and experienced as such by the Vietnamese:
“As a military project Tet failed; as a lesson it succeeded. The VC came into My Tho and all the other towns knowing what would happen. They knew that once they were among the people we would abandon our pretense of distinguishing between them. We would kill them all to get at one. In this way they taught the people that we did not love them and would not protect them; that for all our talk of partnership and brotherhood we disliked and mistrusted them, and that we would kill every last one of them to save our own skins. To believe otherwise was self-deception. They taught that lesson to the people, and also to us.”
In my experience of reading about Vietnam, Wolff is unique in a remarkable respect. Despite the snafu’s, apparent irrationalities, possible incompetencies, mendacity, and what most of us would think of as screw-ups, Wolff doesn’t attribute anything to error. What is done is intentional, strictly purposeful, even when those taking action are unconscious of the purpose involved. This stance then provokes the question ‘What was the real purpose of the war in Vietnam?’ Not its stated military or political objectives, which in any case were never clear and shifted continuously. Nor its strategic rationale about Asian dominoes and American honour. But the actual unstated purpose of everything that was done, the net collective intent as it were of everyone involved.
As I read Wolff, the purpose of the Vietnam war was to show America to itself, a purpose which it accomplished exceptionally well. America was a moral desert. Only its exposure to itself had any chance of establishing a consciousness of this condition. The fact that all sorts of explanations and theories have been put forward to obscure and qualify this revelation is to be expected given the desolate barrenness that the country had shown itself to be in a time of great stress. Wolff’s witness to this spiritual desolation is moving as well as important. Only upon his return to ‘the world,’ did he recognize his own transformation within the military:
“In Vietnam I’d barely noticed it, but here, among people who did not take corruption and brutality for granted, I came to understand that I did, and that this set me apart.”
That the consciousness of an objective achieved was too much for America to bear is obvious. The country has yet to come to terms with the real horror of its own intentions in Vietnam. More generally, it has really never been that New England Congregational ‘house on a hill,’ a place of spiritual realization. It has always been an oppressive, self-rationalizing and violent place in which the natives distrust and con each other as a matter of principle. Am I too hopeful to suggest that with Donald Trump America is giving itself a second chance to see itself for what it actually is?
February 29, 2020
In Pharaoh’s Army: Memories of the Lost War, Tobias Wolff
In Pharaoh's Army: Memories of the Lost War is the second memoir by American writer Tobias Wolff. The book was originally published on October 4, 1994.
The book chronicles the author's experiences as an US Army officer in the Vietnam War. Before beginning his year tour of duty proper in Vietnam, Wolff spent a year in Washington, D.C. learning the Vietnamese language; prior to that he had been trained as a paratrooper with Special Forces. Wolff was stationed with South Vietnamese Army soldiers near My-Tho (is the center of economics, education and technology of Tien Giang Province, located in the Mekong Delta region of South Vietnam) and he was present during the Communists' Tet Offensive (The General Offensive and Uprising of Tet Mau Than 1968). The memoir includes a recollection of that battle as well as vignettes of various personal experiences, both in and out of Vietnam.
تاریخ خوانش روز دوازدهم ماه اکتبر سال 2011 میلادی
عنوان: در ارتش فرعون؛ نویسنده: توبیاس وولف؛ مترجم منیره شاخساری؛ تهران، چشمه، 1389؛ در 237 ص؛ شابک 9789643626709؛ چاپ دوم 1393؛ موضوع سرگذشتنامه نویسندگان ایالات متحده آمریکا - سده 20 م
داستان و سرگذشت «در ارتش فرعون» یادمانهای شخصی «توبیاس وولف»، در جنگ ویتنام، که با زبانی طنزآمیز روایت شده است. رودررویی جالب توجه نیروهای «ویتنام جنوبی» با نیروهای آمریکایی است. دوست و دشمن و جبهه ی خودی و غیرخودی، با طنزی تاثیرگذار، معنای خود را از دست میدهند، و تنها گفتمان جنگ است که در این میان معنای خود را نگاه میدارد. این اثر بیش از آنکه ساختار رمان داشته باشد، یک مجموعه داستان پیوسته از یادمانها است. ا. شربیانی
In Pharaoh's Army: Memories of the Lost War is the second memoir by American writer Tobias Wolff. The book was originally published on October 4, 1994.
The book chronicles the author's experiences as an US Army officer in the Vietnam War. Before beginning his year tour of duty proper in Vietnam, Wolff spent a year in Washington, D.C. learning the Vietnamese language; prior to that he had been trained as a paratrooper with Special Forces. Wolff was stationed with South Vietnamese Army soldiers near My-Tho (is the center of economics, education and technology of Tien Giang Province, located in the Mekong Delta region of South Vietnam) and he was present during the Communists' Tet Offensive (The General Offensive and Uprising of Tet Mau Than 1968). The memoir includes a recollection of that battle as well as vignettes of various personal experiences, both in and out of Vietnam.
تاریخ خوانش روز دوازدهم ماه اکتبر سال 2011 میلادی
عنوان: در ارتش فرعون؛ نویسنده: توبیاس وولف؛ مترجم منیره شاخساری؛ تهران، چشمه، 1389؛ در 237 ص؛ شابک 9789643626709؛ چاپ دوم 1393؛ موضوع سرگذشتنامه نویسندگان ایالات متحده آمریکا - سده 20 م
داستان و سرگذشت «در ارتش فرعون» یادمانهای شخصی «توبیاس وولف»، در جنگ ویتنام، که با زبانی طنزآمیز روایت شده است. رودررویی جالب توجه نیروهای «ویتنام جنوبی» با نیروهای آمریکایی است. دوست و دشمن و جبهه ی خودی و غیرخودی، با طنزی تاثیرگذار، معنای خود را از دست میدهند، و تنها گفتمان جنگ است که در این میان معنای خود را نگاه میدارد. این اثر بیش از آنکه ساختار رمان داشته باشد، یک مجموعه داستان پیوسته از یادمانها است. ا. شربیانی
April 23, 2023
رفتم چک کردم، دیدم که کتاب قبلی وولف رو سال ۲۰۱۶ خوندهم. کتاب مدرسه قدیم منظورمه. اگه اون رو خونده باشید موقع خوندن این کتاب یه چیزهایی براتون جذابتر میشه. مثلاً اینکه نویسنده گاهوبیگاه از علاقهاش به همینگوی میگه یا اینکه چطور بعد از تجربه جنگ میره سراغ نوشتن. اون فصلهایی که نویسنده یادش میره داره واقعیت رو روایت میکنه و جوری همهچیز سروشکل داستان میگیره برای من جذابتر بود. جاهایی که بدون رعایت خط زمانی، تجربه تبدیل به قصه میشه.
August 22, 2009
In this extraordinary memoir of Wolff’s Vietnam experience, there is a haunting scene that reveals the major cultural differences between the American soldiers and Vietnamese culture. Wolff was a first lieutenant (he was a special forces member) assigned as an adviser to a South Vietnamese unit. He had spent a year at language school in the United States and was fluent in Vietnamese. He and some ARVN (Army of the Republic of Vietnam) soldiers are hanging out when two of the ARVN find a small puppy wandering around. Wolff watches, annoyed, as one of the soldiers swings the puppy by a leg around his head and then ties it to a tree. Wolff wanders over and asks what they intend to name the dog. The Vietnamese laugh bemusedly at this remark, but when Wolff persists, they laugh maliciously and reply, “dog stew.” The sergeant grabs the dog and, knowing it will drive Wolff nuts, swings the puppy slowly over the fire. Wolff tries to get them to stop, knowing they are playing with his mind, but the cultural reality and his whiteness prevent his interference.
Racial issues pervade the story. Wolff was attacked by a group of Vietnamese outside a bar. He keeps yelling he must be the “wrong man,” but they continue until another American steps out of the bar and the attackers realize they have the wrong person. Wolff realizes that to them all white people look the same. When he tries to explain it to his black sergeant, the sergeant understands him immediately and simply says, “You nigger.” The analogy to his experience in the United States is unmistakable.
Wolff's analysis of the Tet offensive is striking. "As a military project Tet failed; as a lesson it succeeded. The VC came into My Tho and all the other towns knowing what would happen. They knew that once they were among the people we would abandon our pretense of distinguishing between them. We would kill them all to get at one. [Iraq come to mind, anyone?:] In this way they taught the people that we did not love them and would not protect them; that for all our talk of partnership and brotherhood we disliked and mistrusted them, and that we would kill every last one of them to save our own skins. . . .They taught that lesson to the people, and also to us. At least to me."
Racial issues pervade the story. Wolff was attacked by a group of Vietnamese outside a bar. He keeps yelling he must be the “wrong man,” but they continue until another American steps out of the bar and the attackers realize they have the wrong person. Wolff realizes that to them all white people look the same. When he tries to explain it to his black sergeant, the sergeant understands him immediately and simply says, “You nigger.” The analogy to his experience in the United States is unmistakable.
Wolff's analysis of the Tet offensive is striking. "As a military project Tet failed; as a lesson it succeeded. The VC came into My Tho and all the other towns knowing what would happen. They knew that once they were among the people we would abandon our pretense of distinguishing between them. We would kill them all to get at one. [Iraq come to mind, anyone?:] In this way they taught the people that we did not love them and would not protect them; that for all our talk of partnership and brotherhood we disliked and mistrusted them, and that we would kill every last one of them to save our own skins. . . .They taught that lesson to the people, and also to us. At least to me."
October 13, 2018
As I exited my morning train with what I was reading still reverberating in my head, I realized that despite the obvious and foreboding downpour happening around me, I had forgotten my umbrella on the train. I reproached myself briefly for my carelessness and lack of awareness until I had an epiphany of sorts.
There are some books, the very best books, that take you out of the moment. They absorb you, suffocate you, and leave you feeling that if you read this to the end, you’re not going to be the same person as when you started.
That is “In Pharaoh’s Army” by Tobias Wolff.
These short essays about his time in Vietnam as a young man in his early 20’s are by turns amusing and harrowing, altruistic and spiteful, poignant and petty. More than simply war stories, they are stories about human connection and loneliness, love and the futility of war.
There is nothing I can write here that will do these stories the justice they deserve. Rather than try, I urge you to discover them yourself. It will be one of the most powerful things you’ve read this year.
There are some books, the very best books, that take you out of the moment. They absorb you, suffocate you, and leave you feeling that if you read this to the end, you’re not going to be the same person as when you started.
That is “In Pharaoh’s Army” by Tobias Wolff.
These short essays about his time in Vietnam as a young man in his early 20’s are by turns amusing and harrowing, altruistic and spiteful, poignant and petty. More than simply war stories, they are stories about human connection and loneliness, love and the futility of war.
There is nothing I can write here that will do these stories the justice they deserve. Rather than try, I urge you to discover them yourself. It will be one of the most powerful things you’ve read this year.
April 15, 2021
The boomers who lived through the Vietnam era, this book it’s very close to Nurse and it starts really in accurately underscores the real problem is those days.
Many won’t understand how difficult it is for young man as a second lieutenant and no leader ship skills was put them self in charge of a group Vietnam.
Who is this is very accurate coming away stories for the 60s some parts of the country were highly patriotic and went off to war; some it was a better deal to protest according to their conscience and finally an actual large group for those two children protest didn’t go to war public lives as ordinary American citizens.
Someone who went through these ages I found it to be credibly accurate and stimulating to my memory.
I recommend
Many won’t understand how difficult it is for young man as a second lieutenant and no leader ship skills was put them self in charge of a group Vietnam.
Who is this is very accurate coming away stories for the 60s some parts of the country were highly patriotic and went off to war; some it was a better deal to protest according to their conscience and finally an actual large group for those two children protest didn’t go to war public lives as ordinary American citizens.
Someone who went through these ages I found it to be credibly accurate and stimulating to my memory.
I recommend
May 25, 2020
I returned from 14 months in Vietnam in September, 1969, having served in combat as a Forward Observer with a number of valiant Infantry and Air Cav units of the 9th Infantry Division, our theater being the mud, swamps and jungles of the Mekong Delta. We chased the elusive Victor Charlie (VC) through the mud and the monsoons, rarely seeing him, our buddies falling to his sniper fire, his pungi sticks and booby traps. When I got home, I put the war away and, except for the occasional nightmare creeping into my dream world, I expected to forget all about it, avoiding any reminder in the form of books or movies.
For the next 20 years, I never wore a badge or patch or cap that spoke of my involvement in the war. When a Brother sent me a ball cap with the 9th ID logo, I felt obligated to acknowledge my service and began wearing the cap, out of a sense of obligation to my friend and our fallen Brothers. I began reading the published stories of my Brothers, too. I’ve since read many books about Vietnam: A Bright Shining Star, The Things They Carried, American Soldier, Matterhorn, Steel My Soldiers Hearts, We Were Soldiers Once and many more.
I’ve wanted to read this book, In Pharaoh’s Army, for a long time. I first discovered the author, Tobias Wolff, after seeing the 1993 movie “This Boy’s Life,” starring Ellen Barkin, Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro, a tour de force effort by the budding teenage DiCaprio and Wolff’s own touching memoir. I enjoyed the movie, but even more so, the book. Since then, I’ve read “Collected Stories” and “The Night in Question,” as well as his contributions to The Best American Short Stories.
Most books about Vietnam (and movies, for that matter) are sensationalized accounts of their author’s experiences, sometimes day-to-day, even hour-by-hour glorified, non-stop combat, so highly influenced by the hype of Hollywood (think: Rambo, The Deer Hunter and Apocalypse Now). In reality, the true account would reflect the few minutes (or maybe, few hours) of shear terror, followed by the days and weeks of boredom and tedium (think: Matterhorn). But that wouldn’t sell many books or movies now, would it?
“In Pharaoh’s Army“ is a different kind of “war story,” Wolff’s own personal account of his reluctant service as a 9th ID artillery officer in the Delta region in 1967-68. Surprisingly, Wolff never fires a shot, at least not in the book. He never relates a fire fight in which he saved the day or rescued his brothers, risking his own life and safety for God, Brotherhood and Country. He does tell the story of his boredom, as he tries to hide out with his insecurities in his assignment as an advisor to an obscure South Vietnamese (ARVN) artillery battalion. He mulls over many questions: How did I get here? What am I doing? What’s this war all about? How do I get out of this crazy place? What’s happening back home? What’s this war doing to my psyche? The book explores a lot of his thoughts and misgivings, including an in-depth narration of his complicated relationships with the people back home: his morally bankrupt, jailbird father; Vera, his crazy, Russian fiancé; his best friend Hugh, who dies in Vietnam.
I can relate to Wolff’s experiences. We have much in common. I was adrift, looking for a direction when I discovered and joined the Army, looking for direction and adventure, in spite of there being a war on. We were both enlisted, when someone (our respective Captains) saw promise in us and recommended us to artillery OCS at Fort Sill, OK. We both end up in the sweat and the mud and the jungles of the 9th ID AO (area of operations), each to what we thought were rear-area cushy jobs: Wolff as an ARVN advisor, me as an Executive Officer to Headquarters Battery. And, even though our paths diverged here (I became a Forward Observer assigned to various combat units), we both shared similar self-doubts, questioning of the sense and validity of the war, and a reluctance to dying or watching our buddies die.
Fifty years later, we are both still trying to make sense of it all, still asking “why.” Wolff sums it up for me. After 220 pages, on the last page, in the last 2-3 paragraphs, his story of shattered illusions and personal loss comes to an end:
“Several men I knew were killed in Vietnam. Most of them I didn’t know well and have not thought much about since. But my friend Hugh Pierce was a different one. We were very close, and would have gone on being close, as I am with my other close friends from those years. He would have been one of them, another godfather to my children, another bighearted man for them to admire . . . An old friend, someone I couldn’t fool, who would hold me to the best dreams of my youth as I would hold him to his.
“Instead if remembering Hugh as I knew him, I too think of him in terms of what he never had a chance to be. The things the rest of us know, he will not know. He will not know what it is to make a life with someone else. To have a child slip in beside him as he lies reading on a Sunday morning. To work at, then look back on, a labor of years. Watch the decline of his parents, and attend their dissolution. Loose faith. Pray anyway. Persist. We are made to persist, to complete the whole tour. That’s how we find out who we are.
“I know it’s wrong to think of Hugh as an absence, a thwarted shadow . . . Let me at least remember him as he was.
“He loved to jump (parachute) . . . I do not love to jump, to tell the truth, but I feel better about it when I am connected to Hugh . . . Hugh is singing in falsetto, doing a goofy routine with his hands . . . He yells, Are we having fun (yet)? He laughs at the look on my face, then turns and takes his place in the door, jumps, and is gone.”
On this Memorial Day, May 25, 2020, I remember! Rest In Peace, Brother!
For the next 20 years, I never wore a badge or patch or cap that spoke of my involvement in the war. When a Brother sent me a ball cap with the 9th ID logo, I felt obligated to acknowledge my service and began wearing the cap, out of a sense of obligation to my friend and our fallen Brothers. I began reading the published stories of my Brothers, too. I’ve since read many books about Vietnam: A Bright Shining Star, The Things They Carried, American Soldier, Matterhorn, Steel My Soldiers Hearts, We Were Soldiers Once and many more.
I’ve wanted to read this book, In Pharaoh’s Army, for a long time. I first discovered the author, Tobias Wolff, after seeing the 1993 movie “This Boy’s Life,” starring Ellen Barkin, Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro, a tour de force effort by the budding teenage DiCaprio and Wolff’s own touching memoir. I enjoyed the movie, but even more so, the book. Since then, I’ve read “Collected Stories” and “The Night in Question,” as well as his contributions to The Best American Short Stories.
Most books about Vietnam (and movies, for that matter) are sensationalized accounts of their author’s experiences, sometimes day-to-day, even hour-by-hour glorified, non-stop combat, so highly influenced by the hype of Hollywood (think: Rambo, The Deer Hunter and Apocalypse Now). In reality, the true account would reflect the few minutes (or maybe, few hours) of shear terror, followed by the days and weeks of boredom and tedium (think: Matterhorn). But that wouldn’t sell many books or movies now, would it?
“In Pharaoh’s Army“ is a different kind of “war story,” Wolff’s own personal account of his reluctant service as a 9th ID artillery officer in the Delta region in 1967-68. Surprisingly, Wolff never fires a shot, at least not in the book. He never relates a fire fight in which he saved the day or rescued his brothers, risking his own life and safety for God, Brotherhood and Country. He does tell the story of his boredom, as he tries to hide out with his insecurities in his assignment as an advisor to an obscure South Vietnamese (ARVN) artillery battalion. He mulls over many questions: How did I get here? What am I doing? What’s this war all about? How do I get out of this crazy place? What’s happening back home? What’s this war doing to my psyche? The book explores a lot of his thoughts and misgivings, including an in-depth narration of his complicated relationships with the people back home: his morally bankrupt, jailbird father; Vera, his crazy, Russian fiancé; his best friend Hugh, who dies in Vietnam.
I can relate to Wolff’s experiences. We have much in common. I was adrift, looking for a direction when I discovered and joined the Army, looking for direction and adventure, in spite of there being a war on. We were both enlisted, when someone (our respective Captains) saw promise in us and recommended us to artillery OCS at Fort Sill, OK. We both end up in the sweat and the mud and the jungles of the 9th ID AO (area of operations), each to what we thought were rear-area cushy jobs: Wolff as an ARVN advisor, me as an Executive Officer to Headquarters Battery. And, even though our paths diverged here (I became a Forward Observer assigned to various combat units), we both shared similar self-doubts, questioning of the sense and validity of the war, and a reluctance to dying or watching our buddies die.
Fifty years later, we are both still trying to make sense of it all, still asking “why.” Wolff sums it up for me. After 220 pages, on the last page, in the last 2-3 paragraphs, his story of shattered illusions and personal loss comes to an end:
“Several men I knew were killed in Vietnam. Most of them I didn’t know well and have not thought much about since. But my friend Hugh Pierce was a different one. We were very close, and would have gone on being close, as I am with my other close friends from those years. He would have been one of them, another godfather to my children, another bighearted man for them to admire . . . An old friend, someone I couldn’t fool, who would hold me to the best dreams of my youth as I would hold him to his.
“Instead if remembering Hugh as I knew him, I too think of him in terms of what he never had a chance to be. The things the rest of us know, he will not know. He will not know what it is to make a life with someone else. To have a child slip in beside him as he lies reading on a Sunday morning. To work at, then look back on, a labor of years. Watch the decline of his parents, and attend their dissolution. Loose faith. Pray anyway. Persist. We are made to persist, to complete the whole tour. That’s how we find out who we are.
“I know it’s wrong to think of Hugh as an absence, a thwarted shadow . . . Let me at least remember him as he was.
“He loved to jump (parachute) . . . I do not love to jump, to tell the truth, but I feel better about it when I am connected to Hugh . . . Hugh is singing in falsetto, doing a goofy routine with his hands . . . He yells, Are we having fun (yet)? He laughs at the look on my face, then turns and takes his place in the door, jumps, and is gone.”
On this Memorial Day, May 25, 2020, I remember! Rest In Peace, Brother!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 25, 2014
Only one of the best short stories writers alive today. This is killer.
July 10, 2012
فصل اول و سوم و موخرهی معرکه. فصل دوم بسیار بسیار ملالآور. توبیاس وولف قلم بسیار بسیار شیوایی داره. کاملا میتونی احساس کنی داری اونچیزی رو میخونی که دقیقا میخواسته بگه. فقط یه ایراد کوچیک به ترجمه.اون هم توی وفاداری بسیار شدید به متن اصلی؛ حتی توی به کار بردن حروف اضافه. قطعا دلیل شاهکار بودن ترجمهی نجف دریابندری از وداع با اسلحه وفاداری به متن اصلیش نبوده
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معمولا نمیتونم هیچ کتابی رو درست و یه شبه و تو یه نشست قورت بدم. اما این کتاب رو در کمترین زمان ممکن خوندم. نتیجه: یه کتاب بسیار بسیار خوشخون
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معمولا نمیتونم هیچ کتابی رو درست و یه شبه و تو یه نشست قورت بدم. اما این کتاب رو در کمترین زمان ممکن خوندم. نتیجه: یه کتاب بسیار بسیار خوشخون
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April 29, 2022
Slick - at times too slick. But for the most part really fucking good. His chapter on Tet, "The Lesson":
https://erenow.net/ww/in-pharaohs-arm...
https://erenow.net/ww/in-pharaohs-arm...
February 18, 2018
Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Been (except me)
Honesty is like "Nude Descending a Staircase". Was she really going down ? Maybe it was only a pose, she was really headed up. And how nude did she get ? Maybe the artist just imagined the last part. But the picture stands as a lasting, but unclear, monument to a certain moment. As we strip away our motivations for doing things, as we take account of all the moods and history that lie behind the smallest of our actions, may we not-----even we------get confused ? Some people delude themselves that they are telling the truth, even as they lie hypocritically yet again. Some people may even think that they ARE telling the truth, they've told those lies so many times already. Others never peer under the surface, truth is a matter of feelings of the moment. Honestly revealing yourself takes a lot of effort. It's a great deal of work and probably very much of an art. If it's an art, then it can't be a science. As Wolff himself says, "Your version of reality might not tally with the stats or the map or the after-action report, but it was the reality you lived in, that would live on in you through the years ahead, and become the story by which you remembered all that you had seen, and done, and been." May I add, humbly, that your version would transform as you got older, as you experienced those subtle, but long-lasting changes creeping into your very memories.
Yeah, well, this book is about a guy's year in Vietnam, the training before, the blankness and partial recovery afterwards. It's about parents, girlfriends, dead comrades, being a stranger in a strange land. If that's all you want to know, though, then this book is not for you. A lot of guys had that kind of experience. But how many of them could write about it in this perfect way? IN PHAROAH'S ARMY is a gem because of the honesty with which Wolff describes every feeling, every nuanced experience, sparing himself nothing, hiding no unpleasantness of character. Moving as it is, I still wondered where honesty and self-revelation can finally be found, since they are so obviously art forms. That's the question that Wolff's book will raise in every reader. It is a most powerful question and this is a most powerful book. I could give it more than 5 stars, but that's all there are.
Honesty is like "Nude Descending a Staircase". Was she really going down ? Maybe it was only a pose, she was really headed up. And how nude did she get ? Maybe the artist just imagined the last part. But the picture stands as a lasting, but unclear, monument to a certain moment. As we strip away our motivations for doing things, as we take account of all the moods and history that lie behind the smallest of our actions, may we not-----even we------get confused ? Some people delude themselves that they are telling the truth, even as they lie hypocritically yet again. Some people may even think that they ARE telling the truth, they've told those lies so many times already. Others never peer under the surface, truth is a matter of feelings of the moment. Honestly revealing yourself takes a lot of effort. It's a great deal of work and probably very much of an art. If it's an art, then it can't be a science. As Wolff himself says, "Your version of reality might not tally with the stats or the map or the after-action report, but it was the reality you lived in, that would live on in you through the years ahead, and become the story by which you remembered all that you had seen, and done, and been." May I add, humbly, that your version would transform as you got older, as you experienced those subtle, but long-lasting changes creeping into your very memories.
Yeah, well, this book is about a guy's year in Vietnam, the training before, the blankness and partial recovery afterwards. It's about parents, girlfriends, dead comrades, being a stranger in a strange land. If that's all you want to know, though, then this book is not for you. A lot of guys had that kind of experience. But how many of them could write about it in this perfect way? IN PHAROAH'S ARMY is a gem because of the honesty with which Wolff describes every feeling, every nuanced experience, sparing himself nothing, hiding no unpleasantness of character. Moving as it is, I still wondered where honesty and self-revelation can finally be found, since they are so obviously art forms. That's the question that Wolff's book will raise in every reader. It is a most powerful question and this is a most powerful book. I could give it more than 5 stars, but that's all there are.
January 29, 2019
Very good memoir that I actually thought was a novel (a friend highly recommended this and I read it on my Kindle without reading the blurb or editorial review) that tells about the narrator's life, decision to join up and his experience in Vietnam and humility, it was honest, self-deprecating, and funny. I enjoyed taking the journey through this point of view because the author is ruthlessly honest about himself and I learned a lot about Vietnam. Fantastic writing that I highlighted a lot, the description was great, and how he showed his friendships, so that I felt them too. No emotional manipulation, and a compelling fast read.
June 28, 2022
Wolff drifted into the army at the age 18 in 1965 after dropping out of school and deserting from the merchant marine after an attempt on his life, having given little real thought to the war. During basic training he found that he was suited to the physical requirements, and he became an idealistic recruit but when he is recommended for officer's training school, he soon realises that he is unsuited to the rank. The US Army progressed him, anyway.
Wolff passes out as a Lieutenant in the Special Forces and spends a year learning Vietnamese before being posted abroad as a military liaison to the South Vietnamese Army. He soon realised that his posting was less hazardous than his fellow boot-camp companions' assignments in the north of the country. He has a couple of close shaves, but his main enemy was boredom.
The book is written with a non-linear narrative but is told in thirteen chapters that read like short stories. There is an economy to the prose, but Wolff still manages to capture the arbitrary nature of life during a war. So why didn't I enjoy it more?
The simple truth is I felt that the events could have taken place anywhere in the world at any time and I didn't really get a feel for the Vietnam War. Equally I didn't really see Wolff as a naive, callow youth heading off to a life altering experience. It was an OK read but I'm sure that there are far better Vietnam War books out there.
Wolff passes out as a Lieutenant in the Special Forces and spends a year learning Vietnamese before being posted abroad as a military liaison to the South Vietnamese Army. He soon realised that his posting was less hazardous than his fellow boot-camp companions' assignments in the north of the country. He has a couple of close shaves, but his main enemy was boredom.
The book is written with a non-linear narrative but is told in thirteen chapters that read like short stories. There is an economy to the prose, but Wolff still manages to capture the arbitrary nature of life during a war. So why didn't I enjoy it more?
The simple truth is I felt that the events could have taken place anywhere in the world at any time and I didn't really get a feel for the Vietnam War. Equally I didn't really see Wolff as a naive, callow youth heading off to a life altering experience. It was an OK read but I'm sure that there are far better Vietnam War books out there.
July 16, 2022
In Pharaoh's Army: Memories of the Lost War by Tobias Wolff (Vintage Books 1994)(Biography).
This tale is about a Wolff in Vietnam as a special forces officer.
DNF. My rating: 4/10, finished 5/23/14.
[7/16/22 Updated review: Until I started to write this review, I had no recollection of ever having read In Pharaoh's Army: Memories of the Lost War by Tobias Wolff. I was surprised to find the short review seen above from 2014, and I was stunned to see the undistinguished rating I assigned to this book back then.
I can’t believe I rated this book so poorly, because upon reflection following my recent reading, I had decided that this book merited four stars on Goodreads, which translates in my system to an 8/10. A rating of 8/10 is an exceptionally high rating for me, but I have come to realize that this is an exceptional memoir.
I have read a number of war stories, but I have never read one that is as reflective as In Pharaoh's Army: Memories of the Lost War by Tobias Wolff. The author’s recounting seems completely devoid of any intent to horrify or to stun the reader. Wolff employs excellent pacing, excellent style, and excellent vocabulary in his telling.
Wolff does include war stories, but not the kind one would necessarily expect. The last chapter, which is entitled “Last Shot,” is powerfully affecting. The author invokes his lost friend Hugh Pierce as representative of all young men who have gone to war.
Upon returning to the US from overseas, Wolff offers this observation on the question of whether his time in the war changed him: “In Vietnam I’d barely noticed it, but here, among people who did not take corruption and brutality for granted, I came to understand that I did, and that this set me apart.”(p. 195).
Two threads that I will long remember are Wolff’s tales about his adopted puppy Canh Cho and Wolff’s stories about his fellow American officer Captain Kale.
This is an excellent memoir and a brilliant piece of storytelling.
My rating: 8/10, finished 7/16/22 (3661).
PPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP
June 20, 2009
War stories are really my brother's forte, but I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It's a memoir of Vietnam, and because I read it for a Creative Non-Fiction class, I'm left wondering whether a few things actually happened. Is truth crazier than fiction?
I also really loved the interjections of writerly advice within the narrative, and wish Wolff would have given us more. A young man overseas, always with a novel in the back of his head. In many ways, I related. In many ways, I found truth within his words, and I think I may have found my "in" to the novel I started writing.
The format of the book was especially endearing. Each chapter really was its own short story. There is no true linear progression, and yet there is one. We start off in Vietnam, after he and his buddy has just stolen a color TV upon which they're planning to watch the Thanksgiving special of Bonzana. Then we're back in the States, following the author around as he tries to figure out what the hell he's doing with his life. Then back to the war. We are told even before meeting them that some of his buddies are going to die, and yet we watch their relationships unfold ignorant of that fact.
He's funny without trying too hard to be funny, an unique trait among writers nowadays. His humor comes from the mouth of someone real, not merely a vessel for funny sayings. It read, perhaps, like the memoir of someone I might know. A full-timer, down in the dish room, who doesn't talk about it, but it's always there, like the dreams that were so viciously taken away from them and the dreams that they gave up on.
I also really loved the interjections of writerly advice within the narrative, and wish Wolff would have given us more. A young man overseas, always with a novel in the back of his head. In many ways, I related. In many ways, I found truth within his words, and I think I may have found my "in" to the novel I started writing.
The format of the book was especially endearing. Each chapter really was its own short story. There is no true linear progression, and yet there is one. We start off in Vietnam, after he and his buddy has just stolen a color TV upon which they're planning to watch the Thanksgiving special of Bonzana. Then we're back in the States, following the author around as he tries to figure out what the hell he's doing with his life. Then back to the war. We are told even before meeting them that some of his buddies are going to die, and yet we watch their relationships unfold ignorant of that fact.
He's funny without trying too hard to be funny, an unique trait among writers nowadays. His humor comes from the mouth of someone real, not merely a vessel for funny sayings. It read, perhaps, like the memoir of someone I might know. A full-timer, down in the dish room, who doesn't talk about it, but it's always there, like the dreams that were so viciously taken away from them and the dreams that they gave up on.
November 24, 2011
A Gentleman Goes To War.
THIS BOY'S LIFE by Tobias Wolff is a classic. In that book he does a brilliant job capturing the ugliness of class prejudice in America, and the twisted strategems people use to rise in class.
Unfortunately, this book is not so much about Vietnam as it is about Wolff's presence in Vietnam -- in other words, what's really on display is not his courage or patriotism but his, shall we say, genteel powers of detachment. He's always saying, "look, most of the grunts were low class brutes, i was different. Sensitive, perceptive -- I didn't really belong there at all!"
It gets tiresome.
THIS BOY'S LIFE by Tobias Wolff is a classic. In that book he does a brilliant job capturing the ugliness of class prejudice in America, and the twisted strategems people use to rise in class.
Unfortunately, this book is not so much about Vietnam as it is about Wolff's presence in Vietnam -- in other words, what's really on display is not his courage or patriotism but his, shall we say, genteel powers of detachment. He's always saying, "look, most of the grunts were low class brutes, i was different. Sensitive, perceptive -- I didn't really belong there at all!"
It gets tiresome.
July 8, 2018
Interesante biografía del mismo autor narrando su paso por Vietnam, no he acabado de pillarle el hilo ya que es breve y se para poco en cada sitio, eso si, me ha dado ganas de leer más sobre la zona y el periodo. Como punto a su favor decir que el último capítulo me ha llegado mucho, ains los finales.
November 28, 2019
Wolff is one of the acknowledged masters of American short fiction, an award winning author and professor of creative writing, so it is unlikely that his memoir of Vietnam would be anything but good. And it is very good.
Wolff went to war because he had run out of options in civilian life, but out of options in a genteel kind of 1960s way. He was expelled from an elite boarding school in his final semester, signed up a as merchant sailor and then missed his boat, and the Army always needed bodies. Even as a youth, he harbored ambitions of being a writer, and the authors he admired most, especially Norman Mailer and Hemingway, had all served. His grifter father's dereliction during the Second World War provided another example. War would make him a man, one way or another.
Wolff thrived in military life, going from basic to paratrooper training to officer candidate school. He trained as an artilleryman and was mediocre at it, finishing last in his class. In one of the best lines of the book, he describes how he was kept on because OCS at Fort Sill ended with humorous skits and songs, and he was the only one in his training company who could write and organize a play. The Army made him an officer to literally produce a farce. Then it was off to language school to learn Vietnamese, living as a civilian in Washington DC for a year, while undergoing an intense romance with a madwoman named Vera, and finally Vietnam.
Wolff's war was an odd one. He was assigned as an advisor to an ARVN artillery unit outside My Tho, in the Delta. Through 1967 as the war heated up, My Tho existed in a charmed circle of peace. Wolff and his single American comrade, Sergeant Benet, an African-American lifer, set up a comfortable nest trading counterfeit VC items to a nearby American unit for steaks, liquor, and electronics. The artillery unit rarely patrolled. Of course, it was still war, with death by mine, sniper, or accident, but it was as safe a war as one could get.
The Tet Offensive changed everything. Wolff's artillery unit attacked My Tho, punishing guerrillas and civilians alike. The fear, and the massive devastation changed everything. What had once been an oasis of peace was now a charnal house. The American war machine could not save, it could only destroy.
Wolff is a master of short form fiction, and this book excels in brief literary sketches of encounters between Wolff and the illusions of mastery and heroism. Here's Wolff deciding to save a puppy an ARVN sergeant is going to make into stew. Here's Wolff letting a clumsy new Captain wreck a shantytown with helicopter downdraft. Here's Wolff meeting people in Washington DC, San Francisco, and Vietnam, and realizing that above all else, he doesn't want to die in a combat zone.
Wolff lacks the raw intensity of A Rumor of War, Where The Rivers Ran Backwards, or even Tim O'Brien's work. This is war as filtered though the MFA workshop. It's very well crafted, but it's also craft.
Wolff went to war because he had run out of options in civilian life, but out of options in a genteel kind of 1960s way. He was expelled from an elite boarding school in his final semester, signed up a as merchant sailor and then missed his boat, and the Army always needed bodies. Even as a youth, he harbored ambitions of being a writer, and the authors he admired most, especially Norman Mailer and Hemingway, had all served. His grifter father's dereliction during the Second World War provided another example. War would make him a man, one way or another.
Wolff thrived in military life, going from basic to paratrooper training to officer candidate school. He trained as an artilleryman and was mediocre at it, finishing last in his class. In one of the best lines of the book, he describes how he was kept on because OCS at Fort Sill ended with humorous skits and songs, and he was the only one in his training company who could write and organize a play. The Army made him an officer to literally produce a farce. Then it was off to language school to learn Vietnamese, living as a civilian in Washington DC for a year, while undergoing an intense romance with a madwoman named Vera, and finally Vietnam.
Wolff's war was an odd one. He was assigned as an advisor to an ARVN artillery unit outside My Tho, in the Delta. Through 1967 as the war heated up, My Tho existed in a charmed circle of peace. Wolff and his single American comrade, Sergeant Benet, an African-American lifer, set up a comfortable nest trading counterfeit VC items to a nearby American unit for steaks, liquor, and electronics. The artillery unit rarely patrolled. Of course, it was still war, with death by mine, sniper, or accident, but it was as safe a war as one could get.
The Tet Offensive changed everything. Wolff's artillery unit attacked My Tho, punishing guerrillas and civilians alike. The fear, and the massive devastation changed everything. What had once been an oasis of peace was now a charnal house. The American war machine could not save, it could only destroy.
Wolff is a master of short form fiction, and this book excels in brief literary sketches of encounters between Wolff and the illusions of mastery and heroism. Here's Wolff deciding to save a puppy an ARVN sergeant is going to make into stew. Here's Wolff letting a clumsy new Captain wreck a shantytown with helicopter downdraft. Here's Wolff meeting people in Washington DC, San Francisco, and Vietnam, and realizing that above all else, he doesn't want to die in a combat zone.
Wolff lacks the raw intensity of A Rumor of War, Where The Rivers Ran Backwards, or even Tim O'Brien's work. This is war as filtered though the MFA workshop. It's very well crafted, but it's also craft.
December 8, 2018
I've never heard of Wolff's In Pharaoh's Army before. When a friend recommended the book (right after he binged read it) I was interested, but doubtful. However, once I started reading I was pulled into the strong, reminiscent story about the experiences of war.
In Pharaoh's Army reads like a collection of short stories, each one with value. A collection of memories of a young officer's experiences in Vietnam, working as an adviser in the Delta. Each story diverts into a secondary path, then winding back to the chapter's main point. Many of the side routes ending in irony, sadness, or dark comedy.
Wolff's stories also hit home with my experiences in the Army and in war. His chapter describing the Tet offensive perfectly described the powerless feeling you frequently experience as a combat adviser.
His glib, pithy attitude sounds negative, but reading between the lines, is not. A great, fast read that will hit close to home for many combat veterans. My only regret it not reading it sooner. It's now a core member of my professional reading list.
In Pharaoh's Army reads like a collection of short stories, each one with value. A collection of memories of a young officer's experiences in Vietnam, working as an adviser in the Delta. Each story diverts into a secondary path, then winding back to the chapter's main point. Many of the side routes ending in irony, sadness, or dark comedy.
Wolff's stories also hit home with my experiences in the Army and in war. His chapter describing the Tet offensive perfectly described the powerless feeling you frequently experience as a combat adviser.
His glib, pithy attitude sounds negative, but reading between the lines, is not. A great, fast read that will hit close to home for many combat veterans. My only regret it not reading it sooner. It's now a core member of my professional reading list.
October 22, 2013
توبیاس وولف در ادبیات از یک جهت یادآورِ هانکه در سینماست برای من . خیلی "ساده" شما رو با چیزی رو به رو می کنه که شوکه می شوید . لحظاتی در داستان های وولف وجود دارند که شما باید کتاب رو بگذارید زمین کمی نفس بکشید و بعد ادامه بدهید ! ادامه دادن خوندن بی فایده است چون آن جملات و تصاویر تمرکز را از شما می گیرند و مجبور می شوید دوباره برگردید و از اول شروع کنید به خواندن آن بخش .
این کتابش درباره جنگِ ویتنام و تجربیاتِ شخصی خودش است . رمانی است که در واقع از مجموعه ایی داستان کوتاه تشکیل شده است . اوایل خیلی نگرفت منُ ولی هرچی جلو رفتم جذاب و جذاب تر و از اون طرف کوبنده تر و تلخ تر - طنز هاش هم گزنده و تلخ است - می شد . خلاصه کلام اینکه باز هم راضی بودم و همچنان پیشنهاد می کنم تجربه وولف خوندن رو از دست ندهید !
این کتابش درباره جنگِ ویتنام و تجربیاتِ شخصی خودش است . رمانی است که در واقع از مجموعه ایی داستان کوتاه تشکیل شده است . اوایل خیلی نگرفت منُ ولی هرچی جلو رفتم جذاب و جذاب تر و از اون طرف کوبنده تر و تلخ تر - طنز هاش هم گزنده و تلخ است - می شد . خلاصه کلام اینکه باز هم راضی بودم و همچنان پیشنهاد می کنم تجربه وولف خوندن رو از دست ندهید !
April 7, 2011
Way too many rewards from reading this book to even mention. His sentences, both in fiction and non fiction, are some of the best I've ever read. It's like listening to a smarter person than you've ever known, speak with a poetic frankness absolutely void of sanctimony. And there are several passages/lines in this one that'll keep you thinking for days.
March 27, 2017
An incredibly honest look of a mans participation in Vietnam and his life before and after his service. While there isnt much focus on descriptions of combat, the authors haunting flow of honest writing makes up for it. He examines the human struggle involved cadidly, the good and the bad. The flux of emotions and the changing of how one views others during combat. Superb but short book.
November 29, 2015
Read this entire book start to finish on Thanksgiving. Beautiful and sad.
September 29, 2024
CRITIQUE:
"The Whole Tour"
This memoir follows Wolff's first memoir, "This Boy's Life".
The first book focuses on Tobias' relationship with his mother, while the second pays much more attention to his divorced father, who was living alone in San Francisco at the time, mostly funded by Tobias' older brother, Geoffrey.
Superficially, the book is a war memoir set in Vietnam. However, it's book-ended by memories of Toby's training and military discharge, followed by his post-war college education, much of which occurred in Oxford (Latin, French, English History, Language and Literature).
He spent his afternoons writing a novel, which became his way of recovering from his family life and military service:
Writing, for him, dispersed the fog of war:
"Finding Out Who We Are"
What Tobias was searching for was a rock or foundation for the rest of his life.
He needed this comfort, whereas one of his friends who had died no longer had any need for it:
Vinh Trang Temple, My Tho, Vietnam Source:
SOUNDTRACK:
"The Whole Tour"
This memoir follows Wolff's first memoir, "This Boy's Life".
The first book focuses on Tobias' relationship with his mother, while the second pays much more attention to his divorced father, who was living alone in San Francisco at the time, mostly funded by Tobias' older brother, Geoffrey.
Superficially, the book is a war memoir set in Vietnam. However, it's book-ended by memories of Toby's training and military discharge, followed by his post-war college education, much of which occurred in Oxford (Latin, French, English History, Language and Literature).
He spent his afternoons writing a novel, which became his way of recovering from his family life and military service:
"In the very act of writing I felt pleased with what I did. There was the pleasure of having words come to me, and the pleasure of ordering them, re-ordering them, weighing one against another. Pleasure also in the imagination of the story, the feeling that it could mean something. Mostly I was glad to find out that I could write at all. In writing you work toward a result you won't see for years, and can't be sure you'll ever see. It takes stamina and self-mastery and faith. It demands those things of you, then gives them back with a little extra, a surprise to keep you coming. It toughens you and clears your head. I could feel it happening. I was saving my life with every word I wrote, and I knew it."
Writing, for him, dispersed the fog of war:
"More and more I had the sense of avoiding some necessary difficulty, of growing in cleverness and facility without growing otherwise. Of being once again adrift."
"Finding Out Who We Are"
What Tobias was searching for was a rock or foundation for the rest of his life.
He needed this comfort, whereas one of his friends who had died no longer had any need for it:
"The things the rest of us will know, he will not know. He will not know what it is to make a life with someone else. To have a child slip in beside him as he lies reading on Sunday morning. To work at, and then look back on, a labor of years. Watch the decline of his parents, and attend their dissolution. Lose faith. Pray anyway. Persist. We are made to persist, to complete the whole tour. That's how we find out who we are."
Vinh Trang Temple, My Tho, Vietnam Source:
SOUNDTRACK:
May 22, 2020
Just like Wolff did in "This Boy's Life," he writes here in language that is direct, sparse, clear, and not in any way to solicit we readers' pity. He's one of the most crisp authors I've encountered, and it's g-damn beautiful. Here's an example, which speaks to what I've noticed while watching like 100 apocalypse movies over the past two months, which is that a single human will do anything to all the other creatures of the world if it helps him survive:
Despite "In Pharaoh's Army" having all the aspects that make books pure gold, I rate it just 3 stars because I couldn't relate to it the way I related to his book about just being a boy. I've never killed and can't imagine doing it.
The end of this book, though, is a treasure. It takes place after Wolff had finished his time in the military. There is one part about the sadness of seeing parents age and die, another part that calls back to the destruction of war, and a couple parts about writing and storytelling, this one being my favorite:
“They knew that once they were among the people we would abandon our pretense of distinguishing between them. We would kill them all to get at one. In this way they taught the people that we did not love them and would not protect them; that for all our talk of partnership and brotherhood we disliked and mistrusted them, and that we would kill every last one of them to save our own skins. To believe otherwise was self-deception. They taught that lesson to the people, and also to us. At least they taught it to me.”
Despite "In Pharaoh's Army" having all the aspects that make books pure gold, I rate it just 3 stars because I couldn't relate to it the way I related to his book about just being a boy. I've never killed and can't imagine doing it.
The end of this book, though, is a treasure. It takes place after Wolff had finished his time in the military. There is one part about the sadness of seeing parents age and die, another part that calls back to the destruction of war, and a couple parts about writing and storytelling, this one being my favorite:
"I couldn’t find the right tone [while retelling a story at a bar]. My first instinct was to make it somber and regretful, to show how much more compassionate I was than the person who had done this thing, how far I had evolved in wisdom since then, but it came off sounding phony. I shifted to a clinical, deadpan exposition. This proved even less convincing than the first pose, which at least acknowledged that the narrator had a stake in his narrative. The neutral tone was a lie, also a bore. How do you tell such a terrible story? Maybe such a story shouldn't be told at all. Yet finally it will be told. But as soon as you open your mouth you have problems. Problems of recollection, of tone. Ethical problems. How can you judge the man you were now that you've escaped his circumstances, his fears and desires, now that you hardly remember who he was? And how can you honestly avoid judging him? But isn't there in the very act of confession an obscene self-congratulation for the virtue required to see your mistake and own up to it? And isn't it just like an American boy to want you to admire his sorrow at tearing other people's houses apart? And in the end who gives a damn who is listening? What do you owe the listener, and which listener do you owe?"
March 23, 2009
Written with the all of the concision and clarity that he brings to his fiction, "In Pharaoh's Army" ascertains Wolff's ability to turn life experiences into dynamic storytelling. Wolff's first memoir - and his most famous book - "This Boy's Life" recounts Wolff's childhood with his itinerate mother and doltishly abusive step-father. And "In Pharaoh's Army" reads as a continuation of "This Boy's Life"; Wolff's feelings of inadequecy and fraudulence appear in their grownup forms in this story as Wolff struggles with the Vietnam war as well as the people he encounters while there.
The memoir picks up where Wolff's novel "Old School" leaves off; and while "Old School" is fiction and thus does not recount Wolff's experiences in prep school with complete accuracy, the themes and characters share an affinity and the story really could be read as one long bildungsroman: starting with "This Boy's Life" continuing with "Old School" and ending with "In Pharaoh's Army". At the end of "Old School" the unnamed narrator enlists in the Army after being expelled for plagiarism, yet "In Pharaoh's Army" begins in Vietnam as Wolff and Sergeant Benet are trying to barter for a color TV for Thanksgiving. However, this is part of the structure of "IPA" which is not chronological, but rather reads like a collection of short stories revolving around one character concerning his experience in the Vietnam War. It reminds one of "The Things They Carried" by Tim O'Brien, another brilliantly heartbreaking collection of stories about Vietnam. Wolff's memoir is not as dark or as painful as O'Brien's, but this might be because O'Brien was in the field more. This isn't to say that Wolff's memoir doesn't contain the horrific stories that seem par for the course when it comes to Vietnam books -especially his descrption of the Tet Offensive - but it seems O'Brien was scarred much more by the memory of the war.
Eventually Wolff does get to the beginning of the story: telling of his experience at the U.S. Army Airborne School: training to be a paratrooper (this section includes the best writing I have ever read about parachuting), graduating 49th out of 49 in Officer Candidate School, and finally attending language school in Washington D.C.: learning Vietnamese. This section offered some levity as we meet Vera and her family, Russian aristocrats with some rather comical peculiarities. Wolff and Vera fight constantly, testing each other's love - pushing the limits. However, the inevitable happens and Wolff is sent to Vietnam assigned to South Vietnam as a U.S. Army consultant to the South Vietnamese Army. Here, Wolff is constantly feeling his ineptitude, failing to believe he is really an officer of the U.S. Army. He also feels the constant fear of death, as most of the time he is the only white person in sight - tall and pale - a perfect target. He relates a few close calls, which in Vietnam means extremely close calls, i.e., shit in your pants kinda close calls (which Wolff actually does, and tells us about it).
This memoir doesn't shed any new light on the already well-lit theme of the Vietnam War, yet as a coming-of-age story (another well-lit theme) it manages to add something. And this really tells of the strength of this book; these themes could easily slide into melodrama, or the alienated cynicism of a young soldier; yet Wolff is a good enough writer, and an honest enough human being to avoid those traps. After returning from the war, Wolff bums around a much-changed San Francisco for a few weeks: drinking and trying to get his bearings back - adjusting to civilian life. He eventually moves in with his father. Oddly, this part of the novel is the most moving (much like the last story in "The Nick Adams' Stories"). As readers of "This Boy's Life" will no doubt remember, Wolff's father is something of a con man. When Wolff arrives, his dad is on parole and has just come down with a cold. Wolff relishes the chance to not only care for his father (who never really cared for him) but also to have a concrete purpose: his first sense of meaning since returning from the war. After his father's convalescence, they begin to hang out, forming a sort of friendly bond - nothing even close to a filial one - drinking and listening to music together arguing about literature. And this seems to suit them best, as it allows them to avoid any sort of responsibility toward the other. Wolff even considers enrolling in school and staying near his father; however, he thinks better of the idea, knowing nothing could come of it except disappointment. But before he leaves, his father reads him the novel "Wind in the Willows" and Wolff immediately recognizes his father in the remorseless protagonist who refuses to live by society's rules, and lies, cheats, and steals to obtain the finer things in life. Wolff allows his father to finish the novel, but leaves soon after.
During another aborted attempt at a relationship with the neurotic Vera, Wolff decides to dedicate himself completely to literature, disciplining himself and learning the sheer dedication needed to become an author. And while Vera doesn't last, his dedication to life as an author does. Through stubborn determination - and a bit of luck - Wolff finds himself attending Oxford in England, where his feelings of inadequacy, that had plagued him since his childhood in "This Boy's Life" surfaces one more time. Yet this time Wolff conquers his fears, beginning with a sense of gratitude, using this as a bose upon which to build a life.
Wolff's writing is not flashy, it's not even difficult, yet to tell this story with this much truth and grace is a feat of near impossibility. The words he uses are not long, and obscure, however, the way he puts them together speaks of a compassion for the human experience. In many ways, Vietnam shaped Wolff; while many soldiers came home scarred and bitter, Wolff found his calling in literature and allowed himself the confidence that came with his gratitude and thanks for the luck he had in surviving such a horrific war. Wolff ends the novel with a last shot: his memories of Hugh Pierce, his irrepressible friend from Jump School. Hugh died in the war, and Wolff knows that in many ways he was given a gift by surviving the war, and that all that he has, and will, experience are things that Hugh was never given a chance to. In this Wolff finally realizes all that he has. And while his childhood was rough and he always yearned to be something bigger and better, he now was okay with just being Tobias Wolff and being alive. So while the Vietnam War took so much from so many - extinguishing lives, crushing dreams - in this case it gave back to one soldier; showing him the true worth of human life, and giving him this rock upon which to build his own.
The memoir picks up where Wolff's novel "Old School" leaves off; and while "Old School" is fiction and thus does not recount Wolff's experiences in prep school with complete accuracy, the themes and characters share an affinity and the story really could be read as one long bildungsroman: starting with "This Boy's Life" continuing with "Old School" and ending with "In Pharaoh's Army". At the end of "Old School" the unnamed narrator enlists in the Army after being expelled for plagiarism, yet "In Pharaoh's Army" begins in Vietnam as Wolff and Sergeant Benet are trying to barter for a color TV for Thanksgiving. However, this is part of the structure of "IPA" which is not chronological, but rather reads like a collection of short stories revolving around one character concerning his experience in the Vietnam War. It reminds one of "The Things They Carried" by Tim O'Brien, another brilliantly heartbreaking collection of stories about Vietnam. Wolff's memoir is not as dark or as painful as O'Brien's, but this might be because O'Brien was in the field more. This isn't to say that Wolff's memoir doesn't contain the horrific stories that seem par for the course when it comes to Vietnam books -especially his descrption of the Tet Offensive - but it seems O'Brien was scarred much more by the memory of the war.
Eventually Wolff does get to the beginning of the story: telling of his experience at the U.S. Army Airborne School: training to be a paratrooper (this section includes the best writing I have ever read about parachuting), graduating 49th out of 49 in Officer Candidate School, and finally attending language school in Washington D.C.: learning Vietnamese. This section offered some levity as we meet Vera and her family, Russian aristocrats with some rather comical peculiarities. Wolff and Vera fight constantly, testing each other's love - pushing the limits. However, the inevitable happens and Wolff is sent to Vietnam assigned to South Vietnam as a U.S. Army consultant to the South Vietnamese Army. Here, Wolff is constantly feeling his ineptitude, failing to believe he is really an officer of the U.S. Army. He also feels the constant fear of death, as most of the time he is the only white person in sight - tall and pale - a perfect target. He relates a few close calls, which in Vietnam means extremely close calls, i.e., shit in your pants kinda close calls (which Wolff actually does, and tells us about it).
This memoir doesn't shed any new light on the already well-lit theme of the Vietnam War, yet as a coming-of-age story (another well-lit theme) it manages to add something. And this really tells of the strength of this book; these themes could easily slide into melodrama, or the alienated cynicism of a young soldier; yet Wolff is a good enough writer, and an honest enough human being to avoid those traps. After returning from the war, Wolff bums around a much-changed San Francisco for a few weeks: drinking and trying to get his bearings back - adjusting to civilian life. He eventually moves in with his father. Oddly, this part of the novel is the most moving (much like the last story in "The Nick Adams' Stories"). As readers of "This Boy's Life" will no doubt remember, Wolff's father is something of a con man. When Wolff arrives, his dad is on parole and has just come down with a cold. Wolff relishes the chance to not only care for his father (who never really cared for him) but also to have a concrete purpose: his first sense of meaning since returning from the war. After his father's convalescence, they begin to hang out, forming a sort of friendly bond - nothing even close to a filial one - drinking and listening to music together arguing about literature. And this seems to suit them best, as it allows them to avoid any sort of responsibility toward the other. Wolff even considers enrolling in school and staying near his father; however, he thinks better of the idea, knowing nothing could come of it except disappointment. But before he leaves, his father reads him the novel "Wind in the Willows" and Wolff immediately recognizes his father in the remorseless protagonist who refuses to live by society's rules, and lies, cheats, and steals to obtain the finer things in life. Wolff allows his father to finish the novel, but leaves soon after.
During another aborted attempt at a relationship with the neurotic Vera, Wolff decides to dedicate himself completely to literature, disciplining himself and learning the sheer dedication needed to become an author. And while Vera doesn't last, his dedication to life as an author does. Through stubborn determination - and a bit of luck - Wolff finds himself attending Oxford in England, where his feelings of inadequacy, that had plagued him since his childhood in "This Boy's Life" surfaces one more time. Yet this time Wolff conquers his fears, beginning with a sense of gratitude, using this as a bose upon which to build a life.
Wolff's writing is not flashy, it's not even difficult, yet to tell this story with this much truth and grace is a feat of near impossibility. The words he uses are not long, and obscure, however, the way he puts them together speaks of a compassion for the human experience. In many ways, Vietnam shaped Wolff; while many soldiers came home scarred and bitter, Wolff found his calling in literature and allowed himself the confidence that came with his gratitude and thanks for the luck he had in surviving such a horrific war. Wolff ends the novel with a last shot: his memories of Hugh Pierce, his irrepressible friend from Jump School. Hugh died in the war, and Wolff knows that in many ways he was given a gift by surviving the war, and that all that he has, and will, experience are things that Hugh was never given a chance to. In this Wolff finally realizes all that he has. And while his childhood was rough and he always yearned to be something bigger and better, he now was okay with just being Tobias Wolff and being alive. So while the Vietnam War took so much from so many - extinguishing lives, crushing dreams - in this case it gave back to one soldier; showing him the true worth of human life, and giving him this rock upon which to build his own.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 1, 2023
500 stars for a bunch of reasons but largely this piece of dialogue: "You are fucking with my shit, Lieutenant. I will not have my shit fucked with." Lol.
October 19, 2018
"Vietnam no fue sólo una empresa absurda e innecesaria, sino predestinada al fracaso, como cuando el faraón lanzó su ejército para perseguir a los judíos y fue tragado por el mar".
Fenomenal crónica del tiempo que pasó el autor en la guerra del Vietnam. Wolff nos narra el sinsentido y la crueldad de la guerra que vivió en primera persona. Pequeñas historias donde la crueldad, la humanidad, el heroismo y la locura del absurdo se dan la mano para narrarnos la peor derrota militar de los EEUU. Un desastre donde perdieron la vida unos 60.000 americanos y cerca de un millón de vietnamitas.
El estilo de Wolff es ágil y entretenido y el libro se me ha pasado en un suspiro. Wolff pudo sobrevivir para contarlo y siguiendo los pasos de sus admirados Hemingway y London partió a una aventura que le cambiaría para siempre.
Fenomenal crónica del tiempo que pasó el autor en la guerra del Vietnam. Wolff nos narra el sinsentido y la crueldad de la guerra que vivió en primera persona. Pequeñas historias donde la crueldad, la humanidad, el heroismo y la locura del absurdo se dan la mano para narrarnos la peor derrota militar de los EEUU. Un desastre donde perdieron la vida unos 60.000 americanos y cerca de un millón de vietnamitas.
El estilo de Wolff es ágil y entretenido y el libro se me ha pasado en un suspiro. Wolff pudo sobrevivir para contarlo y siguiendo los pasos de sus admirados Hemingway y London partió a una aventura que le cambiaría para siempre.
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