Book Review, NationalJournal.com
Few Americans understand post-traumatic stress disorder, much less choose to read entire books on the subject. Combine disturbing clinical accounts of Vietnam veterans' psychological and emotional damage with an allegorical reading of Homer's "Odyssey," and one could be forgiven for assuming the target audience is a half-dozen classically educated psychiatrists.
Nothing, however, could be further from the truth. In "Odysseus in America," Dr. Jonathan Shay uses the ancient Greek tale to explain the dangers facing modern soldiers who survive combat -- and to map out key steps that should be taken to minimize those risks. Moreover, Shay does so in a way that's both compelling and accessible to those who know little about PTSD (or Homer's "Odyssey," for that matter.)
Shay walks the reader through the 10-year trek back to Ithaca after the Trojan War. Along the way, he uses Odysseus' troubles and challenges -- some external, but many self-inflicted -- as jumping-off points to explore the nightmares, guilt, violence, substance abuse and emotional detachment found in the many U.S. veterans he has treated over the years.
Odysseus' problems continued even after he made it home, Shay notes: Home had changed, and Odysseus himself was cruel to his father, wife and son. "No one should ever hear from his mother, 'You're not my son!' or 'Better you died over there than come home like this,'" he writes, yet like Homer's hero, "veterans with severe psychological injuries have sometimes heard these terrible words."
While the first half of "Odysseus in America" is devoted to this re-telling of the classic, the remainder tackles the related goals of repairing damage already done to veterans and preventing future trauma in the first place.
"Restoration," as Shay calls it, can be helped along by therapists. But prevention, he argues, is a responsibility that falls squarely with "military leaders and... their civilian bosses in the executive branch and the Congress." He contends many current personnel and training practices leave soldiers far too vulnerable to PTSD -- and reduce combat readiness as well.
Shay offers a long list of recommendations, from the specific ("require all officers to serve in enlisted ranks prior to commissioning") to the general ("make unit stability the rule") to the abstract ("reconceptualize the skills, compensation and training of the enlisted ranks"). He even proposes a basic framework for developing and implementing these new personnel policies.
The military, of course, is famous for resisting outsiders' calls for change, and many of Shay's suggestions would no doubt create new problems for the armed services. But as Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Max Cleland, D-Ga., note in their foreword, the author "hits the nail on the head by proposing to compel American military institutions to create and protect trust.... If we achieve such results within our military, we will prevent not only psychological injury, but physical casualties as well."
Odysseus in America
By Jonathan Shay, M.D., Ph.D.
ISBN 0-7432-1156-1
Scribner
329 pp.
