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My War Gone By, I Miss It So

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It was worth the read for the bits about the wars in Bosnia and Chechnya, but I honestly didn't care about some Brit's personal psychological problems and heroine addiction. Why would someone voluntarily place himself in a situation that is known to put life and sanity at great risk? As Loyd relates, La guerra è come il consumo di droghe pesanti, è uno sballo di sentimenti contraddittori, agonia ed estasi che ti trascinano… When starting this book, the big reminder to keep in mind is Loyd has an addictive personality. Raised in an affluent family, he had the means to take on whatever new addiction crossed his path. He discusses his drug addictions that started when he was in school and obsession with the military thanks in part to a family who boasted and romanticized a long history of war participation. Naturally, he joined the army and was in the Persian Gulf and Northern Ireland. However, it was not enough. He wanted to see war. Drugs and depression followed and when they lifted, the war in Bosnia was beginning. It's a riveting read, and although I didn't always like the author, I found myself trusting his words because of the fearless way in which he confronts his own shortcomings, not least of which is the guilty truth many of us suspect - being close to war can be glamorous, exciting, and fun. Of course the flip side is that you see, hear and do horrible things that scar you and stay with you forever.

My War Gone By, I Miss It So | Grove Atlantic My War Gone By, I Miss It So | Grove Atlantic

Mass graves were all over, hidden in the forests, and relatives would search for bodies of missing kin. The bodies had been looted and ID cards were scattered all over; sometimes the faces were almost unrecognizable as war changed them. “It’s not what people lost; it’s what they gained.” Evil , Loyd notes, makes an indelible impression on the eyes. Parlando la lingua, iniziata a studiare prima di lasciare Londra, vivendo il più possibile con e in mezzo ai locali, invece di rinchiudersi nelle enclave giornalistiche. for arming and training the Muslims. I believed something fundamental was at stake.'' His disgust at the West's (the United Nations', the world's) inaction was not dispelled by the bombing thatIf Lloyd had been a damaged soul before going to the Balkans, he was a burned out husk by the time he left. “Everything I had seen and experienced confirmed my views about the pointlessness of existence, the basic brutality of human life and the godlessness of the universe.” Even the presence of UN “peacekeepers” was part of the farce, their leaders apparently chosen from the ranks of the least capable and least imaginative, “He was one of those officers who had risen to a position of authority without ever having the confidence to know when to abandon the book.” This book is essentially a memoir, so what we get is the author's experience during the war years, which consists of staggering atrocities and brutality, mediations on fear and war, and the chronicle of a heroin addiction. Annoyingly, the Kindle version replaces every ć with a graphic that doesn't scale with the text, or match the font. A typographic atrocity to match anything the Serbs did. My War Gone By, I Miss It So, is a book based on his experiences in Bosnia and Chechnya. In the book Loyd staggers chapters about war in Bosnia, Chechnya, and boredom tinged with heroin addiction in London. Everywhere Anthony Loyd goes, he keeps his eyes open. He sees horrific things, but he also sees acts of kindness and strength. He remembers. He respects. He learns. These are the events which shaped the man who became a great journalist, The Times’ lead war reporter and winner of the Amnesty International Award.

My War Gone By, I Miss It So Movie - Movie Insider My War Gone By, I Miss It So Movie - Movie Insider

Da viva la ragazza era sorprendentemente carina. Morta, era così bella da indurti ad assoldare un esercito e saccheggiare Troia per averla. Ines Sabalic (2000). "War in the Balkans". bosnia.org.uk New Series no.13/14 December 1999 - February 2000. Archived from the original on 31 March 2010 . Retrieved 12 September 2007.As much as I appreciated the writing about the wars, I could not get over my dislike of the man, the self-admitted 'war tourist'. He was not there to fight and, although he was at first a would-be photographer and then a reporter, he makes it clear that he was there to be in a war, not to inform about the war. His only motive is self gratification. Even when he tells of his adventure in helping to save the life of a young girl, he cannot redeem himself. His tone throughout the book is disingenuous. His attitude is one of superiority. Much of what he tells us is coldly cynical. These things are not as a result of the war. They are who he is. He befriends, benefits from and even protects men who are monsters and war criminals. He is not likeable nor admirable.

My War Gone by, I Miss it So by Anthony Loyd | Waterstones

Another thing that stood out to me was his attraction to the dead and he describes them. Of course, with an addictive personality, he is attracted to not just the dead. Every woman in this book was alluring, stunning, beautiful, etc. He gets himself a bare-bones qualification in photojournalism, a smattering of Serbian from a restaurant-owner’s daughter, throws some bags in the boot of a mate’s car, and heads off to the new war in Bosnia. He has no affiliation with a news agency, little money and some sketchy press papers – little justification and no safety net, but he goes – because he has to.How someone could admit to thinking like this post WWI, nevermind post WWII is beyond me. This ~conflicted morality~ angle he's clearly going for is repulsive. I kept reading because I thought he would eventually be yelled at by someone but nope. The heroin addict bit doesn't really add to the story, but it probably couldn't have been cut out without affecting the truth of the rest of the work -- if this were fiction, it would definitely be a messy subplot that should be cut out just to streamline the book. Likewise, his relationship to his father is just kind of there, butting into the atrocities. Loyd also weaves in anecdotes from his personal life, mostly having to do with his struggle with heroin, which becomes his coping mechanism after witnessing some truly disturbing stuff. I don’t mind these sections, since they offer not only a change of pace from the war (albeit only a slightly less depressing one—I don’t recommend reading this book before bed), but also a glimpse into the mind of a person that would voluntarily put their body and mind in harm’s way.

My War Gone By, I Miss It So - Anthony Loyd - Google Books

He became so fond of one murderous Croatian militia leader that in a story he filed about the killer's flight from the region, he now confides, he changed the man's destination from Australia to Brazil, not wanting You won't get a good sense of the politics that fueled the wars, hatreds and genocides from this book. It's the memoir of a journalist heroin junkie who spends a lot of time near the front lines. It's not a book I would recommend to anyone who doesn't already have a modest understanding of the fall of Yugoslavia. Qamishli, northern Syria, Anthony Loyd (14 February 2019). "How I found Shamima Begum". The Times. ISSN 0140-0460 . Retrieved 4 March 2021. Eden, Richard (20 January 2013). "Kate Rothschild makes new marriage vow". The Telegraph . Retrieved 12 April 2016.

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Robert Kaplan’s 1993 book Balkan Ghosts is still used today by policymakers trying to navigate this troubled region, and he saw what was coming. “My visit to Yugoslavia was eerie precisely because everyone I spoke with—locals and foreign diplomats alike—was already resigned to big violence ahead. Yugoslavia did not deteriorate suddenly, but gradually and methodically, step by step, through the 1980s, becoming poorer and meaner and more hate-filled by the year.” He also wrote that “Macedonia was like the chaos at the beginning of time,” but the comment could have been applied to much of the Balkans. The war began when Croatia declared its independence from Serbian-dominated Yugoslavia, and when My War Gone By opens the fighting has already been going on for a year. I reluctantly suggest this book to all those who think they can love the writing despite hating the writer.

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