Poet praises Marlowe's work on frontline

THE CLASH between the secular and non-secular was the real frontline on which journalist Lara Marlowe worked, the Ireland Professor of Poetry said last night.

Harry Clifton was speaking at the launch of a book by the Irish TimesWashington Correspondent.

Among the collection are writings from most major conflicts of the past 30 years in Lebanon, Afghanistan, Iraq, Israel, Palestine and former Yugoslavia, as well as reports from Paris and Washington.

While Marlowe worked on many frontlines, the real front line was the larger one of the contemporary crisis everywhere of the confrontation of the secular and the non-secular, Clifton said.

She reported on the interface repeatedly in her writing, he said, citing the example of a non-believing taxi driver at the height of the Lebanon bombings playing a cassette tape of Muslim prayers just in case.

Collecting Marlowe’s journalism in a book format clears it of its ephemeral context, he said.

Reading the pieces in a book requires more devotion from readers than when gliding over the news pages on a day-to-day basis. When people were looking back at this time the great ethical and moral content would not be found in novels but in accidental collections of journalism, he said.

The French ambassador Emmanuelle d’Achon, novelist John Banville and former executive director of Amnesty International Ireland Seán Love were among those gathered at The Gutter Bookshop in Dublin.

The Things I've seen: Nine Lives of a Foreign Correspondentby Lara Marlowe is published by Liberties Press (€17.99).