Why Did All Those People Die?

W. D. Ehrhart, The Madness of It All: Essays on War, Literature, and American Life [2002] This is a collection of the Vietnam veteran and poet’s prose pieces up till 9.11.  Some are quite short…

Citizens

A Singer In 1969 or 1970, I began to re-evaluate my whole concept of what I wanted my music to say…. I was very much affected by letters my brother was sending me from Vietnam,…

Insertion

Wherever you have refugees, you have vultures who feed off them. –Kuan Ying, quoted in Lady Borton, Sensing the Enemy: An American Woman among the Boat People of Vietnam [101] Three worlds collide in this…

Deep Listening

“I’m sorry. We Americans have never taken responsibility for what we did.” –Lady Borton Lady Borton worked for the American Friends Service Committee in South Vietnam from 1969-1971. A decade later, she assisted Vietnamese boat…