Books

Celebrated journalist Robert Fisk’s last book launched in Dublin

Friends and former colleagues hear Night of Power delves into events, people and ideas that have shaped the Middle East

Nelofer Pazira-Fisk and journalist Olivia O’Leary pictured at the launch of Robert Fisk’s Night of Power in Hodges Figgis Bookshop on Thursday evening. Photograph: Nick Bradshaw/The Irish Times

Saedullah Safi
Thu Jul 4 2024 - 19:35

The late Robert Fisk’s last book, Night of Power, was launched at an event in Dublin on Thursday evening.

Drawing from over four decades of his frontline reporting from the Middle East, the books reflects his deep engagement with the region until his death in 2020.

With a foreword by Patrick Cockburn, Night of Power delivers “day-to-day eyewitness reporting from the battlefields, scenes of massacres and everyday stories of loss, grief, folly, and failures that are combined with scholarly and academic historical analysis”, said his widow, Nelofer Pazira-Fisk, at the event.

She said the journalist’s perspective is especially missed at the moment, given the heightened crisis in Palestine in the wake of Israel’s invasion of Gaza. “Robert’s voice is missing, his analysis is needed,” she said. “‘What would he make of the current crisis?’ is among the comments and questions I hear on a daily basis. His voice, the depth of his analysis and clues to the current crisis can be found in the chapters of his upcoming book.”

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The book begins with Legacy: The War in Iraq – 2012, which Ms Pazira-Fisk highlighted as a reminder of the “stories of families and local people from the time of the US/UK invasion and the wars in Falluja”.

The final chapter, The Surgeon with the Bloodstained Hands, provides “an in-depth look at Bashir Al-Asaad and the Syria war; Homs, Aleppo in the early days, and the role of other countries in the conflict: Russia, Iran, Hizbullah, Saudi Arabia, Turkey etc”, she said.

Writer and journalist Robert Fisk photographed in Trinity College Dublin in January 2009. Photograph: Bryan O'Brien

“Fisk’s reporting is clear-eyed and unflinching, a model for what journalists should aspire to practise in their ever more important and widely threatened craft” said author and editor Anthony Arnove at the launch.

Born in England in 1946, Fisk, who won many awards for his work as a war correspondent, had been living in Dublin and continued his journalistic work until shortly before his death.

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