On January 24, 2011, award-winning author Tim O’Brien was invited by the Stanford Humanities Center to address the relationship between writing and war at the annual Raymond Fred West Memorial Lecture. O’Brien sat down with fellow veteran and author Tobias Wolff to tackle such perennial questions as, How do you portray the horrors of war? What are the responsibilities of the writer?
Coverage of the event has been extensive. For some different perspectives on the conversation, see the Stanford Report’s article by Cynthia Haven, Caroline Chen’s article and interview with Tim O’Brien in the Stanford Daily, and a piece by Christina Farr on the CISAC news site.
The event was part of a yearlong series on Ethics and War at Stanford University, and was co-sponsored by Creative Writing and the McCoy Family Center for Ethics in Society.
A full video of the conversation between Tim O’Brien and Tobias Wolff on “Writing and War” is now available online.
