The Fall of Baghdad

In the months leading up to the American invasion of Iraq, Jon Lee Anderson "embedded' himself among the people of Baghdad and, along with a small number of other Western reporters, rode out the entire invasion and much of the subsequent occupation from inside the city. His dispatches from Baghdad were immediately and widely recognized as the most important writing anyone was doing on the war anywhere, for any publication. In recognition of its significance, the New Yorker routinely held the magazine open an extra day and set up a special production team to deal with the pieces; around the magazine, comparisons to John Hersey's fabled piece "Hiroshima" were flying. "The Fall of Baghdad" is not a collection of New Yorker pieces; it is an original and organically cohesive narrative work that tells the story of what the people of Baghdad have endured at the hands of Saddam Hussein, during the war, and during its aftermath. This is not a pro- or anti-war book in the same way that "A Perfect Storm" isn't a pro- or anti-weather-event book; the point is to bear witness to what the people in this ancient world city have endured, to put a human face on a calamity of epic dimensions. The book's focus alternates among a small cast of characters, a group of disparate Iraqis who allow Anderson to bring to life different facets of the story he wants to tell; and he fills in the canvas around his figures with rich background that makes their significance sing, and helps bind the book together as the definitive reckoning with this, among the most fateful stories of our time.

The hallmark of Jon Lee Anderson's writing is its bravery, its moral wakefulness, even in the sorts of extreme situations in which most other war reporters retreat into gonzo, vainglorious posturing. That bravery shines through here: because he is able to keep the aperture of his mind open wide in situations in which others shut down, he's able to capture the humanity of his subjects, the people of Baghdad, with a depth of field that's breathtaking. It is no surprise that two of his heroes are George Orwell and Robert Capa; he is their rightful heir.