A Terrible Love of War

Reads like drama. Just the time it takes to turn the page produced an anxiety reaction as I was so eager to keep reading. A extremely well written cogent main thread is inter-populated with short "just in the right spot" and "just the right length" diversions. I especially enjoyed the diverson about Japan(1543-1879)and guns. A very nice presentation model. Hillman presents war as an archetypal suprahuman truth he calls Mars or Ares. The book really gives no hope for the eradication of war as Hillman states towards the end: "But war itself shall remain until the gods themselves go away." As a vet, I also recommend this book for any veterans who otherwise might not be interested in psychology and mythology or give a hoot about archetypes. uniquely fascinating!

If you read nothing else on war, read this. This book was excellent beyond my wildest dreams. Hillman is brilliant: not only in the broad range of his knowledge, but his prose is superb. This book has changed the way I see the world, international affairs, and perhaps most of all, myself. It is fiercely clear, and unwaveringly and brutally insightful. If you fear change. Do not read this book. If you seek understanding, profundity, and wisdom, put this at the top of your list of books to read this month.

Hillman shows formidable scholarship as he takes the reader through a tour of western civilization in terms of man's propensity for aggression against his own species. Hillman is especially good in using classical texts to develop his thesis. This book will not persuade those who dogmatically insist that man is essentially a loving creature, but it will prove to many readers that violence is as much a part of human nature as kindness. War is mankind's ineluctable destiny.

In "A Terrible Love of War", Hillman examines war in a manner analogous to a psychologist working to understand the pathological behaviour of a person in depth therapy. This approach takes us on a engaging and extremely challenging journey into the archetype of war. On the way we meet famous men of battle, we rediscover the Greek gods Ares and Aphrodite (Mars and Venus), we catch a transferential glimpse at Hillman the man in some autobiographical "confessions", and finally come face to face with the war monger within the sacrificial lamb of God. It's confronting because Hillman makes no attempt to "explain" war, but leads us instead to understand it and the dark role it plays in our psyches, individually and collectively. It's a book that will reward careful and considered reading. I'm sure you will revel in his rhetoric, see the myth in his madness, and most of all, admire Hillman's unique approach to this most challenging subject, as I have.