A Jarhead At Home

Ex-Marine Anthony Swofford told his story about war in the Gulf. Now he’s talking about the pain at home, in his America.

When U.S. Marines get their buzz cut for training, for battle, they also get the nickname “jarhead”. Ex-Marine Anthony Swofford was a jarhead fighting with Iraq. He wrote about it in the memoir of war that became the movie with Jake Gyllenhaal. Then the jarhead came home.

Like many thousands of vets now from Iraq and Afghanistan, he had to make the adjustment to civilian life. That adjustment can come hard. Witness his own Vietnam veteran father, still on the road, looking for love.

This hour, On Point: Jarhead comes home. Anthony Swofford writes again.
-Tom Ashbrook

Anthony Swofford, a writer and former Marine known for his book Jarhead, published in 2003. His new book is Hotels, Hospitals, and Jails: A Memoir.

Newsweek "All across America veterans are committing suicide at unprecedented rates, but no one has been able to answer why. Author and former marine Anthony Swofford gets to the bottom of an epidemic."

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