Robert Emmet Meagher is Professor of Humanities, Hampshire
College, Amherst, MA. His publications include numerous books,
translations, and original plays, most recently Herakles Gone Mad:
Rethinking Heroism in an Age of Endless War and Killing from the
Inside Out: Moral Injury and Just War. Across many years he has
served in a range of veteran-focused programs aimed at
understanding and healing war's inner wounds, and since 2010 has
led a VA literature seminar.
Douglas A. Pryer retired as a lieutenant colonel from the US
Army military intelligence corps in August 2017, last serving on
the Joint Staff as a Middle East political-military advisor. His
military experience includes five years supporting combat
operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Kosovo, and his essays and
book, The Fight for the High Ground, explore warfare's moral and
psychological dimensions. He is pursuing a PhD in International
Politics at the University of Aberystwyth, Wales.
Other Contributors:
Anthony Camerino, Anthony J. Jack, Bill R. Edmonds, Bob
Darlington, Braden Allenby, Brian Turner, Charles Pacello, Chester
Nez, D. William Alexander, David Peters, Doug Anderson, Edward
Tick, Eric Newhouse, Erik D. Masick, Euripides, Hamilton Gregory,
HC Palmer, Jonathan Shay, Joshua Phillips, Kristen Leslie, Michael
Lapsley, Michael Putzel, Monisha Rios, Peter D. Fromm, Peter G.
Kilner, Peter Marin, Sean Levine, Shannon French, Siegfried
Sassoon, Stefan J. Malecek, Steve Mason, Timothy Kudo, Tom Robert
Frame, Tyler Boudreau, Wilfred Owen, William Allen Miller, William
P. Mahedy, and William Shakespeare
"This book is a tremendous contribution to understanding Moral
Injury, an impact of war largely unseen through ignorance or
design. It should compel us individually and as nations to tackle
mythologies contrived to glorify wars at the cost of the moral
wellbeing of those sent to fight them--and to stop ignoring the
costs to any nation's collective soul."
--Jody Williams, Nobel Peace Prize, Founding Coordinator,
International Campaign to Ban Landmines
"War and Moral Injury is not only a work from the conscience, but
from the heart. This earnest and moving collection of essays,
poems, memoirs and meditations gives us a much-needed view of what
it is to be human in the face of war, of how we are not made to
kill, and of how doing so injures the human soul. A stunning and
essential book."
--Helen Benedict, Columbia University, author of Wolf Season, Sand
Queen, and The Lonely Soldier.
"If you are a non-combatant interested in a life with depth, with
real humanity, then allow yourself to be guided into the inner
darkness of war, and beyond, by the courageous, no bull-shit,
truth-bearing veterans in this volume. While the focus is on the
consequences for conscience and soul when the blood of war is
visible on your hands, in the process a precious window is opened
for all of us to grapple more honestly, more humbly and more
hopefully with accepting our share of responsibility for violent
conflicts, with transforming the profoundly dehumanizing legacy of
war, whether justified or not."
--Wilhelm Verwoerd, Philosopher and International Peace and
Reconciliation Worker, Director of the International 'Beyond
Dehumanization Project', author of My Winds of Change
"War and Moral Injury is a profound and courageous reader that
gathers the voices of warriors, chaplains, reporters, poets, and
scholars to open an honest place for our generation to deepen the
timeless conversation about what constitutes Moral Injury and how
we might restore our humanity by repairing and atoning for what
violence has done to all of us. In a world increasingly numb to
what we do to each other, it is clear that unless the wounds of war
are forthrightly addressed, the violence will keep permeating the
societies we live in. This book and the integral voices it carries
helps to stop the cycle of violence and to begin to heal the
trespass."
--Mark Nepo, author of More Together Than Alone and Seven Thousand
Ways to Listen
"This brilliant, timely, and compelling collection of essays, poems
and reflections on the experience of war from those who fought the
fight and are still fighting war's demons, sheds urgently needed
light on the moral "wounds" of our combat veterans and how we, our
society, and especially faith organizations can reach out to assist
them in their time of need."
--John Scott, Retired United States Major General, Deacon, Roman
Catholic Church, Diocese of Phoenix, Arizona
"Moral Injury, an ancient idea with a new name, is not PTSD. But,
like PTSD, it deserves in-depth exploration. Meagher and Pryer
compiled such an exploration with disparate viewpoints from poets
to professors, and from warriors to chaplains. Moral Injury's guilt
and shame festers in darkness. War and Moral Injury: A Reader
brilliantly sheds a much-needed, antiseptic light on this terrible
wound."
--Colonel Clark C. Barrett, Iraq War veteran, infantry officer, and
military ethicist
"As a field battalion surgeon in Vietnam, I am a witness to the
moral and physical injury inflicted by war. Thanks to the
contributors for the healing made possible by the compassion and
wisdom that is woven into every page
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