Martha Gellhorn was a fearless war correspondent for nearly fifty years and a leading journalistic voice of her generation.
From the Spanish Civil War in 1937 through the wars in Central America in the mid-eighties, her candid reporting reflected her deep empathy for people no matter their political ideology, and the openness and vulnerability of her conscience. "I wrote very fast, as I had to," she says, "afraid that I would forget the exact sound, smell, words, gestures, which were special to this moment and this place." Whether in Java, Finland, the Middle East, or Vietnam, she used the same vigorous approach. Collecting the best of Gellhorn's pieces on foreign conflicts and now with a new introduction by Lauren Elkin, The Face of War is what the New York Times called "a brilliant anti-war book" and has become a classic.
A collection of "first-rate frontline journalism" from the Spanish Civil War to US actions in Central America "by a woman singularly unafraid of guns" (Vanity Fair).
For nearly sixty years, Martha Gellhorn's fearless war correspondence made her a leading journalistic voice of her generation. From the Spanish Civil War in 1937 through the Central American wars of the mid-eighties, Gellhorn's candid reporting reflected her deep empathy for people regardless of their political ideology. Collecting the best of Gellhorn's writing on foreign conflicts, and now with a new introduction by Lauren Elkin, The Face of War is a classic of frontline journalism by "the premier war correspondent of the twentieth century" (Ward Just, The New York Times Magazine).
Whether in Java, Finland, the Middle East, or Vietnam, she used the same vigorous approach. "I wrote very fast, as I had to," she says, "afraid that I would forget the exact sound, smell, words, gestures, which were special to this moment and this place." As Merle Rubin noted in his review of this volume for
The Christian Science Monitor, "Martha Gellhorn's courageous, independent-minded reportage breaks through geopolitical abstractions and ideological propaganda to take the reader straight to the scene of the event."
Praise for Martha Gellhorn and The Face of War:
"One of the most fearless, determined and talented journalists ever to have covered wars."-Wall Street Journal
"[Gellhorn was] a heroine to generations of young women correspondents for her fight to get equal treatment and a place on the front lines with male colleagues." -New York Times
"Gellhorn felt her duty as a journalist was to bear witness . . . She told stories not of generals and politicians, but of powerless people-the victims of war."-NPR
"There is a hard, shining, almost cruel honesty to Gellhorn's work that brings back shellshocked Barcelona, Helsinki, Canton and Bastogne-the prelude and crashing symphony of World War II-with almost unbearable vividness."-Guardian (UK)
