{"product_id":"slow-war-9780773551428","title":"Slow War","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eremember your body again \/ how cedar smells of god \/ and a Bach cantata \/ makes you almost \/ forgive \/ your hands.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"We are occasionally lucky enough to encounter a writer we need, like Benjamin Hertwig, who offers solidarity while challenging our assumptions, who illuminates and shades our lives in surprising ways. After reading these poems I can’t imagine a world without them.\" John K. Samson, musician and editor, author of Lyrics and Poems, 1997–2012\u003cbr\u003e\"In his quiet way, Benjamin Hertwig shows us the terror and wonder of being alive. Slow War is a powerful exploration of violence, longing, and the before and after of 'time and war and other old gods.' A profound and beautiful book.\" Deborah Campbell, winner of the 2016 Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for A Disappearance in Damascus\u003cbr\u003e\"I know of few books that deal with the experience of combat in such a humane and almost tender way. Benjamin Hertwig's Slow War is a powerful and moving work of art.\" John Skoyles, poetry editor of Ploughshares, author of Suddenly It’s Evening\u003cbr\u003e\"Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder was once called \"soldier’s heart.\" The term may not be scientifically precise, but it’s metaphorically apt. Benjamin Hertwig served in the Canadian Armed Forces in Afghanistan, and this hard-hitting debut collection is the record of a soldier’s heart, before, during and after war. The \"before\" poems have an elegiac sense of distance, while the combat poems have a jarring immediacy: the lines stutter and break into fragments. In \"First Shot,\" Hertwig writes of the confusing surge of emotion when he shoots at the driver of a taxi following their convoy too closely: \"you’ve never felt this way before shame euphoria, the first\/time you saw a body without clothes, your order was to shoot.\" Poems about returning to civilian life bear poignant witness to how war has changed him: \"When you returned from the war, you didn’t\/think of the dead much. you wanted to be\/a child again.\"\" Toronto Star\u003cbr\u003e\"Hertwig touches on some of our deepest national myths, only to push in, breaking the veneer of patriotism to reveal something much more potent.\" CV2\u003cbr\u003e\"In this collection, Hertwig remembers, in lyrical detail, moments of violence, fear, and respite. He traces violence from the schoolyard to war, and its aftermath for the soldier. The consequences of the indiscriminate violence of war are made delicate in spite of an uneasiness with making poetry of it.\" Montreal Review of Books","brand":"McGill-Queen's University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49083621409111,"sku":"9780773551428","price":13.59,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9780773551428.jpg?v=1725549517","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/slow-war-9780773551428","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}