作者	ANTHONY SWOFFORD
出版社	POCKET STAR
出版时间	2005-09-01

特色：

戰爭是逼迫男人成長*快，也*殘酷的方法，本書用一種"死亡幽默"的方式道出身處伊拉克戰爭中的所見所聞，當初從軍的熱情可能被痛苦佔據，原來的勇氣也換成徬徨懷疑，小說中有著對於戰爭的反諷，也有友誼的貼近描寫。保衛家園本該勇敢無懼，但在戰爭中卻成了一種似是而非的矛盾心情...1990年夏天，年僅二十歲的第三代軍人安東尼史沃福被派到沙烏地阿拉伯的沙漠，打**場波灣戰爭。2003年，他根據他的參戰經驗寫出一本暢銷書《鍋蓋頭》。他將自己的親身經驗，以坦誠幽默的筆觸，娓娓道出一名年輕大兵接受訓練的艱辛過程，以及開戰之前令人感到挫折沮喪的漫長等待。史沃福的著作擠進《紐約時報》暢銷書排行榜長達九週，並被譽為「經典作品…這是關於1991年波灣戰爭震撼人心的回憶錄，也將成為關於從軍生涯*優秀的作品之一。這部著作真實描述了數百萬青年士兵共同的經驗。」他描述的波灣戰爭和各大報紙或電視新聞報導的完全不同。故事描述一群粗魯好色，全身髒兮兮的菜鳥大兵，因為戰爭隨時可能展開感到興奮害怕，同時有因為戰爭可能不會發生感到挫折沮喪。這群年輕人突然被派到地形險惡的沙漠地帶，開戰之前唯一能做的事就是拿防毒面罩當美式足球來打發時間和發洩精力，或是等待來自家鄉的信件和黃色刊物，或是賭毒蠍大戰，或是在遠離家園過的耶誕節喝得爛醉。這群美國大兵彼此看不順眼，對政治局勢不甚瞭解，也不確定他們能得到他們當兵想得到的好處。但是他們在這地獄般的生活中，也激發了他們願意為對方犧牲性命的同袍情誼，也是這些被戲稱為鍋蓋頭的菜鳥大兵發誓永遠信守的承諾.... "When the marines - or "jarheads," as they call themselves - were sent in 1990 to Saudi Arabia to fight the Iraqis, Swofford was there, with a hundred-pound pack on his shoulders and a sniper's rifle in his hands. It was one misery upon another. He lived in sand for six months, his girlfriend back home betrayed him for a scrawny hotel clerk, he was punished by boredom and fear, he considered suicide, he pulled a gun on one of his fellow marines, and he was shot at by both Iraqis and Americans. At the end of the war, Swofford hiked for miles through a landscape of incinerated Iraqi soldiers and later was nearly killed in a booby-trapped Iraqi bunker." "Swofford weaves this experience of war with vivid accounts of boot camp (which included physical abuse by his drill instructor), reflections on the mythos of the marines, and remembrances of battles with lovers and family. As engagement with the Iraqis draws closer, he is forced to consider what it is to be an American, a soldier, a son of a soldier, and a man." Unlike the real-time print and television coverage of the Gulf War, which was highly scripted by the Pentagon, Swofford's account subverts the conventional wisdom that U.S. military interventions are now merely surgical insertions of superior forces that result in few American casualties. Jarhead insists we remember the Americans who are in fact wounded or killed, the fields of smoking enemy corpses left behind, and the continuing difficulty that American soldiers have reentering civilian life.