A compassionate, personal, and illuminating work of nonfiction that draws on the author's celebrated work as a director of socially conscious theater to connect readers with the power of an ancient artistic tradition.
Bryan Doerries is a writer, director, and translator. He is the founder of Theater of War, a project that presents readings of ancient Greek plays to service members, veterans, and their families to help them initiate conversations about the visible and invisible wounds of war. He is also the co-founder of Outside the Wire, a social-impact company that uses theater and a variety of other media to address pressing public health and social issues, such as combat-related psychological injury, end-of-life care, prison reform, domestic violence, political violence, recovery from natural and man-made disasters, substance abuse, and addiction. A self-described “evangelist” for classical literature and its relevance to our lives today, Doerries uses age-old approaches to help individuals and communities heal after suffering and loss.
‘The Theater of War is an enthralling, gracefully written, and
urgently important examination of the vital, ongoing relationship
between past and present, between story and human experience, and
between what the ancients had to report about warfare and human
values and the desperate moral and psychological struggles that
soldiers still undergo today. Bryan Doerries has given us a gift to
be treasured.’
*Tim O’Brien*
‘Bryan Doerries’s The Theater of War is a testament both to the
enduring power of the classics and to the vital role art can play
in our communal understanding of war and suffering.’
*Phil Klay, author of Redeployment, recipient of 2014
National Book Award*
‘One has the feeling we are being watched by our ancestors, that
they continually call out to us, bestow us with gifts of their
wisdom, warn us about habitual traps and foibles common to all
humans. We rarely have the presence to listen to, to receive that
wisdom. Bryan Doerries asks: what lessons will we finally take to
heart from these ancients? In this riveting narrative, simply but
elegantly told, Doerries movingly resurrects the inner life of a
people who lived 2,500 years ago, but whose struggles evoke our own
familiar and damaged present, now endowed by this wonderful book
with more drama, more tragedy, more compassion, more possibility.
Here is the proof at last: our future depends on the gifts of the
past.’
*Ken Burns*
‘Bryan Doerries’s ongoing staging of Greek tragedies before U.S.
military personnel and others processing trauma is an act of
courageous humanism: a tribute to vanished lives and a succor to
current soldiers and citizens. In connecting the valiance and
pathos of modern military life to a 2500-year tradition, Doerries
has returned dignity to countless troops nearly destroyed by war.
His capacious yet intimate book offers a privileged look into not
only the psychological costs of the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts
and other proximate disasters, but also the larger meaning of
inhabiting an unpredictable and militarized world.’
*Andrew Solomon, author of Far From The Tree*
‘I have always thought of Greek tragedies as the earliest public
service announcements. Those ancient stories of family politics,
their warnings about civic duty, and their parables of grief and
its management are as vital today as when first written. Through
his translations and public readings, and now this powerful book,
Doerries offers modern audiences access to these ancient PSAs. We
hunger and thirst for the guidance these plays contain.’
*Frances McDormand*
‘A deeply humane quest, movingly recalled. Doerries’s passionate
search for meaning in ancient text has led him out of the dusty
stacks of scholarship into an arena of ecstatic public engagement.
He has taken his elegantly reasoned thesis — that the main business
of tragedy has always been catharsis – and created a theatrical
experience that has lifted countless audiences out of isolation and
into profound community.’
*Garry Trudeau*
‘[The Theatre of War] illuminates how Greek tragedy penetrates to
the deepest of levels in us all. It also shows how certain
audiences, when given permission, can help illuminate the urgency
and relevance of these ancient stories today. In his approach to
tragedy, Doerries has found the way to remove out-of-date barriers
and clean the outer crust of language with fresh words so that the
essential can appear once more’
*Peter Brook*
‘Moving and personal … Doerries’s potent memoir reveals that the
enduring power of Greek dramas lies in their ability to help us
understand the present.’
*Publishers Weekly*
‘Engaging and sometimes moving.’
*The Guardian*
‘A compelling, raw book … both memoir and manifesto; [Doerries]
chronicles his own gradual discovery of the power and relevance of
Greek tragedies while also championing their social utility …
Across a gulf of two and a half millennia, the Greek tragedians can
still help us know and cure ourselves.’
*Boston Globe*
‘'An insightful tale of Doerries' discovery of classical mythology
and his evangelical-like zeal of turning plays written 2,500 years
ago into salves for war, death, prison, illness and other suffering
that can break, diminish or redeem us … The Theatre of War aims to
narrow the divide between soldier and civilian, to lay bare —
through verse and myth —- the horrors and transgressions of the
battlefield.’
*L.A. Times*
‘The Theatre of War moves effortlessly between a social discourse
on war, autobiography and a love letter to classical academia … A
profoundly moving case for the healing power of drama.’
*The Lady*
'As more and more information is coming out about how western
governments that should know better have been neglecting the
veterans of recent wars, especially those suffering from
post-traumatic stress disorder, resulting in a high rate of
suicide, this book is very timely … Doerries' direct, high-volume
technique appears to connect sufferers with their emotions in a way
the Greeks would have called “cathartic”.'
*New Statesman 'Books of 2015'*
‘The themes are timeless … Doerries examines both suffering and
healing in this new, albeit ancient light.’
*New Statesman*
'Heart-gripping … Mr Doerries staged excerpts from the Greek plays
for war veterans and their commanders, prison guards and prisoners,
and others, followed by forums. The results, as he recounts in
fluent, agile prose, upheld his belief that communal exposure to
the power of the Greek tragedies can be a profoundly useful healing
tool.’
*New York Times ‘Best Books of 2015’*
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