S4 Ep. 26: Bullshit Saviors: Helen Benedict and Nadia Hashimi on Depictions of the American Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq

fiction/non/fiction

Novelists Nadia Hashimi and Helen Benedict join hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to discuss the mistakes American writers and culture made in depicting the United States’ wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. In the wake of the 20th anniversary of 9/11 and President Biden’s decision to pull U.S. troops out of Afghanistan, have American fiction and film truly confronted the cost of these wars, especially to civilians overseas? In this episode, Benedict discusses the persistent and problematic glamorization of conflict, and reads from her 2017 novel, Wolf Season, which is about the Iraq War and its aftermath. Then, Hashimi speaks about centering Afghan voices in her fiction and reads from her novel Sparks Like Stars, which begins in 1978 Kabul during the Saur Revolution.

To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video excerpts from our interviews at LitHub’s Virtual Book Channel, Fiction/Non/Fiction’s YouTube Channel, and our website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/

This podcast is produced by Anne Kniggendorf.

Selected readings:

Nadia Hashimi

• Sparks Like Stars
• The Pearl that Broke Its Shell

Helen Benedict

• Wolf Season
• Sand Queen
• Lonely Soldier
• “The Best Contemporary Iraqi Writing about War” (LitHub)

Others:

• The Storytellers of Empire, By Kamila Shamsie – Guernica
• Unbecoming by Anuradha Bhagwati
• “A Former Marine Looks Back on Her Life in a Male-Dominated Military” by V.V. Ganeshananthan (New York Times)
• Elliot Ackerman and Anuradha Bhagwati on the Role of the Military in American Politics, Fiction/Non/Fiction, season two, episode 21
• Charlie Wilson’s War
• Afghan Women are In Charge of Their Own Fate by Cheryl Benard
• “The Other Afghan Women” by Anand Gopal (New Yorker)
• “What Should a War Movie Do?” by Whitney Terrell (The New Republic)
• The Hurt Locker directed by Kathryn Bigelow
• Generation Kill by Evan Wright
• Karate Kid
• Matt Gallagher
• Teen Wolf
• Casualties of War directed by Brian De Palma
• The Messenger
• Frankenstein in Baghdad by Ahmed Saadawi
• Goodbye to All That by Robert Graves and Miranda Seymour
• Corpse Exhibition by Hassan Blasim
• The Taliban indoctrinates kids with jihadist textbooks paid for by the U.S. Washington Post, 2014
• Sylvester Stallone in First Blood (1982)
• Katey Schultz
• Jesse Goolsby
• Cara Hoffman

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