Fighting back against partisanism

“You say it is the good cause that hallows even war? I say unto you: it is the good war that hallows any cause.” – Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra1 Three months ago, I introduced the concept of partisanism and discussed some of the problems it causes.2 Two months ago, I described how the partisan…
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The Parade

by Dave Eggers In The Parade, two foreign contractors are sent to an unnamed country to build a road from its poor south to the capital in the north, to be finished in time for a military parade in celebration of the end of years of civil war. The workers are sent in without identification,…
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Mostarghia

by Maya Ombasic Mostarghia starts in the days surrounding the death of Ombasic’s father. Told that she can only recover his body from the hospital morgue if a religious authority prepares it for its final resting place, we bear witness to the callousness the author is met with when church after church after church refuses…
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The Good Soldier Schweik

by Jaroslav Hašek The Good Soldier Schweik is said to be one of the most famous pieces of Czech literature that exists, if not the most famous. It’s at least the most widely-translated and far-reaching novel to come out of the region, with lasting influences on language and culture in the Czech Republic and elsewhere….
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Beirut Hellfire Society

by Rawi Hage Taking place in the midst of the Lebanese civil war in the late ’70s, Beirut Hellfire Society follows Pavlov, the son of an undertaker. After the sudden passing of his father, Pavlov agrees to carry on his life’s work helping an underground organization perform last rites for those denied proper burials because…
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The Fall of Yugoslavia

by Misha Glenny I’m a sucker for what I understand to be a sort of Slavic charisma. It’s probably not actually exclusive to the Slavs, but that’s where I can recall encountering a sort of joking, masculine joviality with a subtle undercurrent of cruelty or aggression. And I love it, for some reason––even when it’s…
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Fateful Triangle

by Noam Chomsky Fateful Triangle is Noam Chomsky’s analysis of the relationship among the US, Israel, and Palestine. While most of the book centres on the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982, he talks about the history of conflict and subjugation within Israel, beginning with the country’s origins, moving through the expansionist period post-1967, and…
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Warlight

by Michael Ondaatje Warlight is a story about a young teen’s formative years in England immediately after WWII, but it’s more complicated than that. Our narrator, Nathaniel, looks back to when his parents, sent to Asia for a work position, left his older sister and him in the care of their secretive lodger. They start…
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Everything is Illuminated

by Jonathan Safran Foer Everything is Illuminated is autobiographical, but only a touch, only superficially. It’s about a character named Jonathan Safran Foer travelling to Ukraine with only an old picture to help him find a woman who may have helped save his grandfather from the Nazis. This much actually happened, but I understand that…
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The Iran-Iraq War

by Pierre Razoux The Iran-Iraq War is an in-depth exploration of the terrible conflict that wracked the Middle East through most of the ’80s. Razoux starts us off by thrusting us into the heated political climate in the region immediately before the war broke out, moves into the initial, largely ineffectual military campaigns, and then…
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