The War and Peace of Tim O'Brien

Tim O’Brien has been called “the best American writer of his generation,” and “our poet laureate of war.” A Vietnam veteran, and National Book Award-winner, O’Brien is one of the great voices in modern American literature. The Library of Congress named his groundbreaking novel about the Vietnam War, “The Things They Carried,” one of the 65 most influential books in American history. But O’Brien hasn’t put pen to paper in nearly two decades. He swore off making sentences when, at a late age, he had his first of two children. Plus, the nation was waging new wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that he couldn’t wrap his head around – wars that both reconfirmed and upended the notions of war, soldiers, and society that animated his books. Now, Tim O’Brien is trying to write again. He thinks the country is past due for a conversation about war’s impact. He thinks we’re running out of time. And, at age 70, that he is too. The War and Peace of Tim O’Brien follows O’Brien writing one last book.