''In Pharaoh's Army: Memories of the Lost War'' is the second

memoir A memoir (; , ) is any nonfiction narrative writing based on the author's personal memories. The assertions made in the work are thus understood to be factual. While memoir has historically been defined as a subcategory of biography or autob ...

by American writer

Tobias Wolff Tobias Jonathan Ansell Wolff (born June 19, 1945) is an American short story writer, memoirist, novelist, and teacher of creative writing. He is known for his memoirs, particularly '' This Boy's Life'' (1989) and '' In Pharaoh's Army'' (1994). H ...

, published on October 4, 1994. The book chronicles the author's experiences as a US Army officer in the

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (1 November 1955 – 30 April 1975) was an armed conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia fought between North Vietnam (Democratic Republic of Vietnam) and South Vietnam (Republic of Vietnam) and their allies. North Vietnam w ...

. Before beginning his year tour of duty proper in Vietnam, Wolff spent a year in Washington, D.C. learning the Vietnamese language; prior to that he had been trained as a

paratrooper A paratrooper or military parachutist is a soldier trained to conduct military operations by parachuting directly into an area of operations, usually as part of a large airborne forces unit. Traditionally paratroopers fight only as light infa ...

with Special Forces. Wolff was stationed with

South Vietnamese Army The Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN; ; ) composed the ground forces of the South Vietnamese military from its inception in 1955 to the Fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. Its predecessor was the ground forces of the Vietnamese National Army ...

soldiers near

Mỹ Tho Mỹ Tho () is a city in the Tiền Giang province in the Mekong Delta region of South Vietnam. It has a population of approximately 169,000 in 2006 and 220,000 in 2012. It is the regional center of economics, education and technology. The majori ...

and he was present during the Communists'

Tet Offensive The Tet Offensive was a major escalation and one of the largest military campaigns of the Vietnam War. The Viet Cong (VC) and North Vietnamese People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) launched a surprise attack on 30 January 1968 against the forces of ...

. The memoir includes a recollection of that battle as well as vignettes of various personal experiences, both in and out of Vietnam. The book picks up more or less where Wolff's first memoir, '' This Boy's Life: A Memoir'', leaves off. It was a

National Book Award The National Book Awards (NBA) are a set of annual U.S. literary awards. At the final National Book Awards Ceremony every November, the National Book Foundation presents the National Book Awards and two lifetime achievement awards to authors. ...

finalist for non-fiction.

Reception

The ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'' noted limitations of Wolff's characteristic style, finding that it may be too limited for a war memoir, however precise and evocative his writing. The reviewer describes Wolff's writing about his year in Vietnam as "an elegant gallery of small sketches in which he is almost invariably the central figure..." but praises his conveying "for example, the altered sense of time and space that he and other American servicemen developed in Vietnam." ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

'' noted: "Even under fire, Wolff was self-consciously having an experience, giving himself something to write about one day. And quite a large part of what is only a small book is taken up with memories of the author's father, an ex-convict whose indisciplined life fostered in Wolff the desire for order." ''

Publishers Weekly ''Publishers Weekly'' (''PW'') is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers, and literary agents. Published continuously since 1872, it has carried the tagline, "The International News Magazine of ...

'' noted that Wolff expressed "a sense of futility and growing disillusionment with the war" in his memoir. After being discharged, he was somewhat adrift, but the memoir extends through his four years of study of English literature at Oxford, a period when he committed to writing and "found himself"."In Pharaoh's Army: Memories of the Lost War/ Tobias Wolff, Author
''

'', October 1994 ''

Kirkus Reviews ''Kirkus Reviews'' is an American book review magazine founded in 1933 by Virginia Kirkus. The magazine's publisher, Kirkus Media, is headquartered in New York City. ''Kirkus Reviews'' confers the annual Kirkus Prize to authors of fiction, no ...

'' called it "an excellent volume" that "evenly weighs the many costs and few gains of coming of age in a war."

References

1994 non-fiction books Books by Tobias Wolff Alfred A. Knopf books Vietnam War memoirs {{Vietnam-war-memoir-stub