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Radio 2 Book Club: We Chose to Speak of War and Strife

We Chose to Speak of War and Strife by John Simpson featured on the Radio 2 Fact not Fiction Book Club on Thursday 8 December. You can listen here (around 1hr 40).

The book was selected with help from a panel of brilliant library staff from across the UK. Find out more about the non-fiction strand of the Radio 2 Book Club.

You can win 10 copies of We Chose to Speak of War and Strife for your reading group – just visit our Noticeboard. We even have an exclusive extract available for you to read first.

We Chose to Speak of War and Strife

In corners of the globe where fault-lines seethe into bloodshed and civil war, foreign correspondents have, for hundreds of years, been engaged in uncovering the latest news and – despite obstacles bureaucratic, political, violent – reporting it by whatever means available. It’s a working life that is difficult, exciting and undeniably glamorous.

We Chose to Speak of War and Strife brings us pivotal moments in our history – from the Crimean War to Vietnam; the siege of Sarajevo to the fall of Baghdad – through the eyes of those who risked life and limb to witness them first hand, and the astonishing tales of what it took to report them.

Weaving the tales of the greats of yesterday and today, such as Martha Gellhorn, Ernest Hemingway, Don McCullin and Marie Colvin, with extraordinary accounts from his own lifetime on the frontlines, this is a deeply personal book from a master of the profession, the most distinguished foreign correspondent of our time.

Selection panel review

Our library reading panel found We Chose to Speak of War and Strife to be very interesting – here is one of their reviews:

“I really liked the book. It was very though provoking and covers modern history but in a very honest way. The writing is straight to the point and tells history in a way that is accessible to all. It is a book that is a talking point and yet delivers. I think the writing is very reflective without any obvious bias.”

About the author

John Simpson is the BBC’s World Affairs Editor. In a BBC career spanning fifty years he has reported on major world events from all corners of the globe, and was made a CBE in the Gulf War honours list in 1991. He has twice been the Royal Television Society’s Journalist of the Year, and has won three BAFTAs, the News and Current Affairs award in 2000 for his coverage, with the BBC News team, of the Kosovo conflict, and, in 2001, an Emmy for his report on the fall of Kabul. He has written four bestselling volumes of autobiography: Strange Places, Questionable People; A Mad World, My Masters; News from No Man’s Land and, more recently, Not Quite World’s End.

A word from John

“I’m really delighted and honoured that my book has been chosen for the Radio 2 Book Club. Surprised too, because I know how much competition there is for this prestigious slot. I do think We Chose To Speak Of War And Strife will suit the Book Club very well. It’s full of stories about the adventures of some of the most glamorous people in the past hundred and fifty years: foreign correspondents and war correspondents.

I knew many of them, including Martha Gellhorn, the impossibly beautiful American journalist who married Ernest Hemingway and beat him to the beaches of Normandy on D-Day, and Clare Hollingsworth, who watched the first German tanks cross into Poland on day one of the Second World War. Then there is Archibald Forbes, who rode nearly two hundred miles alone through hostile territory in Zululand to get his despatches through; and what really happened when Stanley met Livingstone. This book was a delight to write, and I’m hoping that Radio 2 listeners will enjoy it as much."

Get involved

Listen to the interview on the Radio 2 Arts Show with Jonathan Ross now.

Do you want to read We Chose to Speak of War and Strife? You can share your thoughts with us on Twitter using #FactNotFiction, or follow John. You can also see what other readers thought, or add the book to your group’s reading list.

Want to find out more? Take a look at the Radio 2 Book Club Twitter feed or find out more on the Radio 2 Book Club website.

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