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Small Wars Permitting: Dispatches from Foreign Lands
An extraordinary collection of reportage that tells the story of some of the most important world events of the past 16 years, from one of the most talented and intrepid female journalists at work today.
Since leaving England aged 21 with an invitation to a Karachi wedding and a yearning for adventure, Christina Lamb has spent 20 years living out of suitcases, reporting from around the world and becoming one of Britain’s most highly regarded journalists. She has won numerous awards, including being named Foreign Correspondent of the Year a remarkable four times.
‘Small Wars Permitting’ is a collection of her best reportage, following the principal events of the last two decades everywhere from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe. But Lamb’s main interest has always been in the untold stories, the people and places others don’t visit. Undaunted by danger, disease or despots, she has travelled by canoe through the Amazon rainforest in search of un-contacted Indians, joined a Rio samba school to infiltrate crime rackets behind Carnival and survived a terrifying ambush by Taliban.
No less remarkable are the characters that Lamb meets along the way, from Marsh Arabs who covet Play Stations instead of buffaloes to an Armenian compère for performing dolphins with whom she travelled during the war in Iraq.
Lamb’s writing is passionate, powerful and poetic, transforming reportage into literature. Through the stories she tells – and her own development from a self-confessed ‘war junkie’ to a devoted mother – Lamb attempts to comprehend the human consequences of conflict in the countries she has come to know.
402 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 21, 2008
15 people are currently reading
339 people want to read
About the author
Christina Lamb
25 books355 followersChristina Lamb OBE is one of Britain's leading foreign correspondents. She has been named Foreign Correspondent of the Year five times in the British Press Awards and What the Papers Say Awards and in 2007 was winner of the Prix Bayeux Calvados - one of the world's most prestigious prizes for war correspondents, for her reporting from Afghanistan.
She has won numerous other awards starting with Young Journalist of the Year in the British Press Awards for her coverage of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in 1988; was part of the News Reporter of the year for BCCI; and won the Foreign Press Association award for reporting on Zimbabwean teachers forced into prostitution, and Amnesty International award for the plight of street children in Rio.
She was named by Grazia magazine as one of their Icons of the Decade and by She magazine as one of Britain's Most Inspirational Women. The ASHA foundation chose her as one of their inspirational women worldwide www.asha-foundation.org with her portrait featuring in a special exhibition in the National Portrait Gallery. Her portrait has also been in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. She was awarded the OBE in the 2013.
She has won numerous other awards starting with Young Journalist of the Year in the British Press Awards for her coverage of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in 1988; was part of the News Reporter of the year for BCCI; and won the Foreign Press Association award for reporting on Zimbabwean teachers forced into prostitution, and Amnesty International award for the plight of street children in Rio.
She was named by Grazia magazine as one of their Icons of the Decade and by She magazine as one of Britain's Most Inspirational Women. The ASHA foundation chose her as one of their inspirational women worldwide www.asha-foundation.org with her portrait featuring in a special exhibition in the National Portrait Gallery. Her portrait has also been in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. She was awarded the OBE in the 2013.
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Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews
August 20, 2020
I was actually thinking of assigning this three stars, but that would imply it's a run-of-the-mill books, mildy interesting and adequately written. I don't think that's fair to the author, because the real problem I had with this book isn't with its execution, which is well above its peers, but rather because the job she assigned herself in writing it just doesn't much align with my interests.
She's a foreign correspondent for the Financial Times of London, and has spent her working life in exciting and dangerous places such as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Rio De Janeiro and West Africa. Her job, which she does very well, is fly in, check into a hotel, meet with some bigwigs / military folks / commoners, interview them, and head out. Near the beginning, she mentions that working for a weekly column in the FT allows her to really dig into the story, and not just write up the shallow surface like many other reporters do.
But compared to the type of reading I really like to do, it's still pretty shallow. As an example, let's take the description of the samba school in Rio where she went to report on the experience of participating in Carnivale there.
[Hypothetical paragraph by a 'shallow' reporter]
[Hypothetical paragraph in this 'deep dive' reporter's book]:
These are not actual quotes, though the gist of what is described was taken from the book. And to be fair, she then spent a couple of paragraphs talking about how organized criminals run a lotto system that is tolerated by the officials. But having read about Rio in Peter Robb's brilliant A Death in Brazil, it's almost painful to read about it here, when so much is left out.
A simple case of mismatch between author and reader. And she did have some interesting things to say about Lady Diana and the countries she visited.
She's a foreign correspondent for the Financial Times of London, and has spent her working life in exciting and dangerous places such as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Rio De Janeiro and West Africa. Her job, which she does very well, is fly in, check into a hotel, meet with some bigwigs / military folks / commoners, interview them, and head out. Near the beginning, she mentions that working for a weekly column in the FT allows her to really dig into the story, and not just write up the shallow surface like many other reporters do.
But compared to the type of reading I really like to do, it's still pretty shallow. As an example, let's take the description of the samba school in Rio where she went to report on the experience of participating in Carnivale there.
[Hypothetical paragraph by a 'shallow' reporter]
"Despite my protests that I cannot dance, I find myself two hours later with peacock feathers erupting skywards from my head, a pair of glittery wings that enclose my chest and shoulders, a sequined bikini and little else. At first, moving through the streets, I felt awkard and out of step, but then something amazing happened. The music seemed to talk hold of my feet and I found myself catching the rhythm. I never wanted the night to end.".
[Hypothetical paragraph in this 'deep dive' reporter's book]:
"Despite my protests that I cannot dance, I find myself two hours later with peacock feathers erupting skywards from my head, a pair of glittery wings that enclose my chest and shoulders, a sequined bikini and little else. At first, moving through the streets, I felt awkard and out of step, but then something amazing happened. The music seemed to talk hold of my feet and I found myself catching the rhythm. I never wanted the night to end.
While Carnivale is a major contributor to Rio's image, and corporate sponsorship is highly visible in all directions, rumor has it that most of the events are funded by organized crime. Talk of drug money has surfaced in recent years."
These are not actual quotes, though the gist of what is described was taken from the book. And to be fair, she then spent a couple of paragraphs talking about how organized criminals run a lotto system that is tolerated by the officials. But having read about Rio in Peter Robb's brilliant A Death in Brazil, it's almost painful to read about it here, when so much is left out.
A simple case of mismatch between author and reader. And she did have some interesting things to say about Lady Diana and the countries she visited.
April 15, 2018
This book has informed me more about the Middle East than all my years of listening to BBC and ABC radio and trying to figure out what the hell is going on. How depressing that the same catastrophic plots are still playing out in the same way just a few years later and a few hundred miles up the road. Again, it all confirms my opinion, facile but true, that the world would be a better place if women were in charge and men had a 5pm curfew.
March 28, 2016
Christina Lamb is one of the greatest international journalists out there.
Always courageous, a penetrating mind that misses nothing, an engaging sense of humour and biting wit, compassion and a talent for putting what she witnesses onto paper.
Ms Lamb has a deep understanding of Afghanistan, where she has worked on and off for 21 years.
From the resistance to soviet occupation by the mujahideen to the unspeakable horrors and tortures committed by the Taliban during their nightmare rule over Afghanistan from 1996 until late 2001.
Where people were tortured and killed for breaking the dark code of Taliban rule which included a ban of people owning pets of any kind, flying kites or woman being unaccompanied by a male relative or not wearing a Burka at all times.
It is harrowing to read of this as well as Saddam's genocide of the Marsh Arabs during the 1990s by draining the water bodies on which they survived, the organized killing of children and the war against his own people by Robert Mugabe and his totalitarian ZANU PF , in which mass rape camps have been set up by the ruling party's militia where systematic rapes of girls as young as ten years old take place daily.
There is also as witnessed by Ms Lamb, an organized systematic depopulation of urban areas al la Pol Pot.
One of Mugabe's top Gauleiters ZANU PF Organisation Secretary and Senior Cabinet Minister Didymus Mutasa spoke of ZANU PF's plans to halve Zimbabwe's 12 million strong population so only loyalists of ZANU PF would survive : "We would be better off with only 6 million people, with our own people who support the liberation struggle."
A few months later South Africa's then Minister of Intelligence and Stalinist hardliner Ronnie Kasrils said at a joint press conference with Mutasa' "Zimbabwe and South Africa have a joint world view and will march together shoulder to shoulder."
Ms Lamb wryly pontificates at the begiining of the book that the pen is not that mighty otherwise Robert Mugabe would not still be in power.
Lamb also includes lighter relief of the night spots around the places she covers and Nigeria's 'fat farms'. for a penetrating insight of much of the world during the last two decades.
Always courageous, a penetrating mind that misses nothing, an engaging sense of humour and biting wit, compassion and a talent for putting what she witnesses onto paper.
Ms Lamb has a deep understanding of Afghanistan, where she has worked on and off for 21 years.
From the resistance to soviet occupation by the mujahideen to the unspeakable horrors and tortures committed by the Taliban during their nightmare rule over Afghanistan from 1996 until late 2001.
Where people were tortured and killed for breaking the dark code of Taliban rule which included a ban of people owning pets of any kind, flying kites or woman being unaccompanied by a male relative or not wearing a Burka at all times.
It is harrowing to read of this as well as Saddam's genocide of the Marsh Arabs during the 1990s by draining the water bodies on which they survived, the organized killing of children and the war against his own people by Robert Mugabe and his totalitarian ZANU PF , in which mass rape camps have been set up by the ruling party's militia where systematic rapes of girls as young as ten years old take place daily.
There is also as witnessed by Ms Lamb, an organized systematic depopulation of urban areas al la Pol Pot.
One of Mugabe's top Gauleiters ZANU PF Organisation Secretary and Senior Cabinet Minister Didymus Mutasa spoke of ZANU PF's plans to halve Zimbabwe's 12 million strong population so only loyalists of ZANU PF would survive : "We would be better off with only 6 million people, with our own people who support the liberation struggle."
A few months later South Africa's then Minister of Intelligence and Stalinist hardliner Ronnie Kasrils said at a joint press conference with Mutasa' "Zimbabwe and South Africa have a joint world view and will march together shoulder to shoulder."
Ms Lamb wryly pontificates at the begiining of the book that the pen is not that mighty otherwise Robert Mugabe would not still be in power.
Lamb also includes lighter relief of the night spots around the places she covers and Nigeria's 'fat farms'. for a penetrating insight of much of the world during the last two decades.
April 25, 2009
Some women possess astounding courage that seems to be a part of their being. Christina Lamb is one of these women. Those who tell the real stories of others who face oppression of all sorts are to be admired. We can never be complacent and take for granted the importance of reporters who go and uncover the facts we all need to be made aware of.
May 14, 2012
This was an interesting book, for one because it does not focus on one single event and the news coverage of that, but also because I thought the writer herself was a bit of an interesting person. Her attitude towards her job is very much like the one I have about mine: "Never mind the dangers, this is what I love to do, this is what I'm good at."
October 4, 2021
Với mình thì có thể đây là các bài phóng sụ mẫu của báo chí. Các bài viết, phóng sự của chị trong đây rất chất và nhiều khi còn rất văn học.
Đọc quyển này xong biết được nhiều hơn về khủng hoảng/vấn đề của các quốc gia giai đoạn 90s - 20s.
Từ Afghanistan/Palestine trong chiến tranh với Liên Xô (kèm sụ hậu thuẫn của Mỹ cho các nhóm thánh chiến) đến Taliban, Al Qaeda và cuộc chiến tranh hiện tại. Đúng là what goes around comes around (khủng bố 11/9, sự rút quân của Mỹ ở Afghanistan vào bây giờ).
Đến vấn đề trẻ đường phố (và thảm sát trẻ đường phố) ở Brazil hay những đứa trẻ bị mất tích/bắt cóc ở Argentina, cũng như phá rừng Amazon. Khủng hoảng chính trị ở các nước Nam Mỹ vào những năm 90s và Zimbabwe vào những năm 2000.
Và câu nhớ dai dẳng nhất là "truth is truth" (trong phóng sự về những đứa trẻ bị mất tích/bắt cóc ở Argentina khi bỗng dưng biết được mình bị bắt cóc).
Chị tác giả đúng là "heart of gold" khi viết về những câu chuyện này đề mọi người được biết (và cũng có khi là platimum vì đã dám đến những vùng chiến sự, khủng hoảng nhân đạo và trải qua những lúc cực căng thẳng).
Đọc quyển này xong biết được nhiều hơn về khủng hoảng/vấn đề của các quốc gia giai đoạn 90s - 20s.
Từ Afghanistan/Palestine trong chiến tranh với Liên Xô (kèm sụ hậu thuẫn của Mỹ cho các nhóm thánh chiến) đến Taliban, Al Qaeda và cuộc chiến tranh hiện tại. Đúng là what goes around comes around (khủng bố 11/9, sự rút quân của Mỹ ở Afghanistan vào bây giờ).
Đến vấn đề trẻ đường phố (và thảm sát trẻ đường phố) ở Brazil hay những đứa trẻ bị mất tích/bắt cóc ở Argentina, cũng như phá rừng Amazon. Khủng hoảng chính trị ở các nước Nam Mỹ vào những năm 90s và Zimbabwe vào những năm 2000.
Và câu nhớ dai dẳng nhất là "truth is truth" (trong phóng sự về những đứa trẻ bị mất tích/bắt cóc ở Argentina khi bỗng dưng biết được mình bị bắt cóc).
Chị tác giả đúng là "heart of gold" khi viết về những câu chuyện này đề mọi người được biết (và cũng có khi là platimum vì đã dám đến những vùng chiến sự, khủng hoảng nhân đạo và trải qua những lúc cực căng thẳng).
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 27, 2022
“I never set out to be brave or daring or any of those labels often attached to the title ‘war correspondent’. What I wanted to be was a storyteller. […] To me the real story in war is not the bang-bang but the lives of those trying to survive behind the lines. […]
These are my places of hope and despair.”
Incredible Christina Lamb.
These are my places of hope and despair.”
Incredible Christina Lamb.
June 7, 2017
Excellent book and I love Christina Lamb. This book features great articles from around the world - namely Brazil, Africa and the Middle East. I skipped some of the more gory stories (rape, child abuse...) and overall a worthy read.
April 17, 2019
Disturbing stuff, so well written, first class
October 28, 2020
Foreign Correspondent's life covering wars between 1987-2007. Interesting.
December 20, 2023
One of my all-time favourite books. Christina Lamb takes us through the experiences she’s had and the people that she’s met with such a easy distilling of information, a matter-of-fact understanding and warmth of the people in her stories, and a lot of insight. I learned so much from this book about the state of the world during a time when things were changing so drastically (and I was just a baby or a kid so I knew none of these things), and I was also able to reflect on much of my own life through the candid conversations Lamb had with people. The only thing that I will note is that it does show that Lamb is a white British journalist in the 90s with some of the things she says as she reports across countries in Asia, Africa and South America — but, for the most part, the work she does is nothing but admirable and worth reading. I really learned so much.
July 9, 2011
Successful journalists are allowed to publish books with the word “dispatches” in the title, wherein they simply reprint the most popular of their published journalistic pieces, possibly strung together by a few calculated autobiographical reflections, a prologue, an afterword and decorated, perhaps, with amateur, black and white photographs they have taken on their travels.
“Small Wars Permitting: Dispatches from Foreign Lands” is a desultory anthology with a prevalence of writing about conflicts in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Lamb is most focused and committed when risking her life to approach gunfire in these two countries, where she accumulates enough contacts and strategies to find herself in intriguing positions. Her stories amount to a lively refresher course on the history of that region in the last decade of the twentieth century and the first decade of the twenty first.
In contrast, her random assignments around Africa feel superficial and under-thought: here’s a piece about Nigerians sending their skinny girls to specialists who promise to transform them into marriageable heifers; here’s twenty pages meant to summarize the downward trajectory of Zimbabwe; or a jaunt around Ivory Coast hunting the slave drivers of children. These pieces pad Lamb’s book; but seem arbitrary and a bit canned—little snapshots of absurdity or atrocity—especially compared to the more involved and sustained coverage of power plays around the training grounds of Al Qaeda.
The third sort of content available in “Small Wars Permitting” involves Lamb’s courtship, marriage and negotiation of family obligations. These passages feel as if there were demanded by an editor because Lamb doesn’t bring to them even half of her investigative tenacity. She offers a zoomed out scarcely-emotional summary of what must have been a tumultuous and intriguing relationship. And that’s fine; I don’t need her to write an expose about her own vulnerabilities; but if she’s going to include her personal life at all, it would be better to do so whole-heartedly.
Lamb has had some memorable adventures and has unique and sometimes shocking answers to the mainstay, dick-sizing questions of war-mongering journalists: Who did you meet in their youth before they attained a powerful position? What exotic, dangerous or illegal things did people try to sell you? What are your best death-cheating experiences? What are your most outrageous disguises or ruses? How did you talk your way out of prison?
And these sorts of details can propel you through a book of this variety if you’re on an airplane or a subway; but if you’ve got the time and inclination to focus on what you’re reading, I wouldn’t put this book at the front of the line. I like to have my history refreshed now and then by primary source documents and that’s about what this book is good for.
“Small Wars Permitting: Dispatches from Foreign Lands” is a desultory anthology with a prevalence of writing about conflicts in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Lamb is most focused and committed when risking her life to approach gunfire in these two countries, where she accumulates enough contacts and strategies to find herself in intriguing positions. Her stories amount to a lively refresher course on the history of that region in the last decade of the twentieth century and the first decade of the twenty first.
In contrast, her random assignments around Africa feel superficial and under-thought: here’s a piece about Nigerians sending their skinny girls to specialists who promise to transform them into marriageable heifers; here’s twenty pages meant to summarize the downward trajectory of Zimbabwe; or a jaunt around Ivory Coast hunting the slave drivers of children. These pieces pad Lamb’s book; but seem arbitrary and a bit canned—little snapshots of absurdity or atrocity—especially compared to the more involved and sustained coverage of power plays around the training grounds of Al Qaeda.
The third sort of content available in “Small Wars Permitting” involves Lamb’s courtship, marriage and negotiation of family obligations. These passages feel as if there were demanded by an editor because Lamb doesn’t bring to them even half of her investigative tenacity. She offers a zoomed out scarcely-emotional summary of what must have been a tumultuous and intriguing relationship. And that’s fine; I don’t need her to write an expose about her own vulnerabilities; but if she’s going to include her personal life at all, it would be better to do so whole-heartedly.
Lamb has had some memorable adventures and has unique and sometimes shocking answers to the mainstay, dick-sizing questions of war-mongering journalists: Who did you meet in their youth before they attained a powerful position? What exotic, dangerous or illegal things did people try to sell you? What are your best death-cheating experiences? What are your most outrageous disguises or ruses? How did you talk your way out of prison?
And these sorts of details can propel you through a book of this variety if you’re on an airplane or a subway; but if you’ve got the time and inclination to focus on what you’re reading, I wouldn’t put this book at the front of the line. I like to have my history refreshed now and then by primary source documents and that’s about what this book is good for.
July 6, 2012
Christina Lamb is a British foreign correspondent and Small Wars combines articles published in the Financial Times, Sunday Times, Sunday Telegraph and others along with the odd extract from her diary and some narrative. I thought it was an informative and insightful book.
Lamb's first big interview is with Benazir Bhutto and her second-to-last dispatch is during an attempt on Bhutto's life (two months before she was assassinated). She has spent a lot of time in Pakistan and Afghanistan (a place she clearly loves). It's interesting to see the depth and length of foreign stories in these British newspapers - clearly longer and more detailed than most American newspapers (I expect the NYT is an exception). I was particularly fascinated by her experience as an independent correspondent during the Afghan and Iraqi wars and her criticism of the embedded journalist system.
The African stories are tragic, as you might expect. The Zimbabwean situation is particularly tragic, going from the breadbasket of Africa with the highest rate of education to a complete disaster, thanks to Mugabe - so absolutely depressing.
Lamb's first big interview is with Benazir Bhutto and her second-to-last dispatch is during an attempt on Bhutto's life (two months before she was assassinated). She has spent a lot of time in Pakistan and Afghanistan (a place she clearly loves). It's interesting to see the depth and length of foreign stories in these British newspapers - clearly longer and more detailed than most American newspapers (I expect the NYT is an exception). I was particularly fascinated by her experience as an independent correspondent during the Afghan and Iraqi wars and her criticism of the embedded journalist system.
The African stories are tragic, as you might expect. The Zimbabwean situation is particularly tragic, going from the breadbasket of Africa with the highest rate of education to a complete disaster, thanks to Mugabe - so absolutely depressing.
March 20, 2008
Christina Lamb has always been one of my favourite correspondents. Mostly because she just gets out there and talks to people. And in large part, too, because she's a really lovely writer with a pronounced sense of the absurd. It's nice to be reminded that there are correspondents out there who want to be truly involved with a story, without wanting to become the story.
July 31, 2014
Very good book for a trip. The style is very simple and direct. Christina is a very brave woman and shows her best when she describes the landscapes of Afghanistan, the country where she writes her best stories. She diverges a bit in some chapters when she talks about her personal life in a very superficial way. Overall a good book.
May 24, 2010
A must-read for journalists or anyone interested in international intrigue. Christina Lamb is at once heroic and humble, fearless and human. She represents the true journalistic spirit of seeking truth and representing those who might otherwise not be heard from.
November 7, 2022
Journalisten Lamb har skrevet en svært interessant, spennende og tidvis rystende bok om livet som korrespondent i noen av verdens mest konfliktfylte områder. Spesielt inntrykk gjorde historiene om barneslavene i Elfenbenskysten og Mugabes destruktive framferd mot eget folk i Zimbabwe.
November 8, 2008
I thought this book was great. A really good insight into the challenges of being a war reporter and showing the risks good journalists take to bring us our news.
Read
August 11, 2011Loved it - well-written - fascinating and informative
August 19, 2012
I'm not a big fan of compilations but this one is enjoyable because of the quality of Lamb's writing.
February 17, 2013
Definitely worth reading. Other authors have covered similar stories and done a better job.
i-gave-up
August 22, 2017Something about the tone rubbed me the wrong way. Maybe the young, intrepid, white, female reporter as protagonist in the middle of the Afghan war? I like her writing, I just couldn't hang.
Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews