NEW BOOK: Achilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma and the Undoing of

Jonathan Shay (jshay@WORLD.STD.COM)
Wed, 22 Dec 1993 14:44:58 -0500

Dear Editor of ANTHRO-L,

I am attempting to identify people who may be interested in reviewing this
book for journals in the field of anthropology, so that review copies
can be sent to them.

I believe that there are aspects of this work that will be of considerable
interest to members of your Bitnet discussion list and those working in the
field as a whole.

*I shall be grateful if you would post this message to your list, provided
that it comports with the interests of the listmembers.*

What follows is a brief abstract in the style of dust-jacket copy, a
brief sketch of how the book came about, and a detailed table of contents.

Respectfully,

Jonathan Shay, M.D., Ph.D.

jshay@world.std.com
11 Miller Street
Somerville MA 02143
617-661-4808


ACHILLES IN VIETNAM places the powerful words of Vietnam combat veterans
next to the story that Homer tells of Achilles in the Iliad.
Modern combat soldiers can teach us something new about this great
ancient Greek epic. And Homer saw within the heart of the soldier
many things that we in modern psychiatry have missed. Achilles'
story -- betrayal of "what's right" by his commander; shrinkage
of his moral and social horizon to the small group of his
combat-proven comrades; death of his closest friend; grief; guilt;
feeling like he is "already dead;" going berserk and committing
atrocities -- is one that we hear again and again from former
Vietnam combat soldiers. Veterans speak their own words in this
book. This is a realistic and respectful portrait of men whose
war experiences caused severe life-long psychiatric symptoms and
undid their good character. ACHILLES IN VIETNAM raises the level
of discourse about the Vietnam War, and with trustworthy
scholarship uncovers important new meaning in Homer's war epic.
This readable and accessible book is outstanding for the emotional
power of the veterans' narratives and for its fascinating insights
into war, the mind, and society.

I am the psychiatrist for a group of American combat veterans of the
Vietnam War who have severe, chronic Post-traumatic Stress Disorder
(PTSD) and personality changes. A number of years ago I was struck by
the similarity of their war experiences to Homer's account of Achilles in
the Iliad. This observation led to an article in the Journal of
Traumatic Stress, "Learning about Combat Stress from Homer's Iliad,"
which led to my book, _Achilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma and the Undoing
of Character_, forthcoming from Atheneum in May. The thrust of this work
is that Homer's epic gives center stage to bitter experiences that
actually do arise in war; and further, it makes the claim that Homer has
seen things that we in psychiatry and psychology have more or less
missed. Homer's Iliad was composed about 27 centuries ago; it is about
soldiers in war.



ACHILLES IN VIETNAM: COMBAT TRAUMA AND THE UNDOING OF CHARACTER
by Jonathan Shay, M.D., Ph.D.
Forthcoming from Atheneum [imprint of Macmillan], May, 1994



DEDICATION
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

INTRODUCTION

PART I

1. BETRAYAL OF "WHAT'S RIGHT"

An army is a moral construction
Victory, defeat, and the hovering dead
Some veterans' view -- What is defeat?
What is victory?
Dimensions of betrayal of "what's right"
On danger in war
The fairness assumption
The fiduciary assumption
Soldiers' rage -- the beginning

2. SHRINKAGE OF THE SOCIAL AND MORAL HORIZON

One American soldier's social space
Tracking Achilles through social space
Desertion
Simplification of the social world to a single comrade
Achilles' character before his psychological injuries
Respect for the dead
Taking prisoners alive
Moral luck
War destroys the trustworthy social order of the mind
Combat is a condition of captivity and enslavement
"Don't mean nothin'" -- Destruction of ideals, ambitions,
affiliations

3. GRIEF AT THE DEATH OF A SPECIAL COMRADE

Soldiers' love for special comrades -- Vietnam and Troy
Homer on the relationship between Achilles and Patroklos
The specialness of the special comrade
Portrait of Patroklos
The grief of Achilles
Being already dead
Grief and the warrior's rage
Communalization of grief in the Iliad and in Vietnam
When were the dead brought to the rear?
Who brought the dead to the rear?
When were the dead mourned?
What was the level of trust,
safety, and social cohesiveness
in the rear during mourning?
Use of mind-altering substances
Who wept for the dead, and how were tears valued?
Who washed and prepared the dead for cremation/burial,
shipment home?
The importance of thwarted grief

4. GUILT AND WRONGFUL SUBSTITUTION

Abandonment and wrongful substitution
Deserving the death sentence
Homecoming renounced
An unintended outcome of religious education?
Soldier's rage -- fatal convergence and
completion

5. BERSERK

Triggers of the berserk state
"Don't get sad. Get Even!"
Characteristics of the berserk state
A beast
A god
Above and beneath -- disconnection from human community
Loss of all restraint
Revenge as reviving the dead
The berserker in the eyes of other soldiers
Flaming ice -- berserk physiology
Aristeiai of American Soldiers in Vietnam -- The differences
Naked berserkers and Achilles' invulnerability
Clinical importance of the berserk state

PART II

6. DISHONORING THE ENEMY

The enemy as enemy: Images in common to Vietnam and Troy
Image of the Vietnamese enemy
Homer: Valor does not depend on contempt for enemy
Enemy soldiers talk to each other at Troy
Soldiers talk about the enemy at Troy
Religious roots of the enemy as vermin: Biblical anti-epic
in 1 Samuel 17
Clinical importance of honoring or dishonoring the enemy
Abuse of the Dead Enemy

7. WHAT HOMER LEFT OUT

Deprivation
Friendly fire
Fragging
Suffering of the wounded
Civilian suffering
Suffered by all civilians during war
Suffered exclusively or primarily by women

8. SOLDIERS' LUCK AND GOD'S WILL

The social spectrum of luck
Equipment failure
Attributing blame
Job's paradox and the possibility of
virtue

9. RECLAIMING THE ILIAD'S GODS AS A METAPHOR OF SOCIAL POWER

Armies as creators of social power
Gods as REMFs
Heartlessness of the Gods
Readiness to "waste" lives
Sunk costs argument
Sinister demographic agendas
Inconsistent, unreliable, inattentive, distractable
Homeric irony and god's love

PART III

10. THE BREAKING POINTS OF MORTAL EXISTENCE -- WHAT BREAKS?

The official diagnostic criteria for PTSD of the American
Psychiatric Association
PTSD and the ruins of character
Persistence of the traumatic moment -- Loss of authority over
mental function
Untrustworthiness of perception
Memory
Persistent mobilization for danger
Persistence of survival skills
Persistence of betrayal
Persistence of isolation
Persistence of suicidality
Persistence of meaninglessness
Destruction of the capacity for democratic
participation

11. HEALING AND TRAGEDY

Is recovery possible?
Return to "normal" is not possible
We don't know if recovery is possible
Yes -- recovery is possible
What is the best treatment?
Why and how does narrative heal?
The law of forgetting and denial

CONCLUSION

Prevention
Protect unit cohesion by unit, rather than individual
rotation
Griefwork
Do not encourage berserking
Eliminate intentional injustice as a motivational
technique
Respect the enemy as human
Acknowledge psychiatric casualties
War is not an industrial process
Pissing contests
Species ethic

ENDNOTES
BIBLIOGRAPHY
INDEX