Goddamn This War!

One of the best anti-war books I have read, is strangely, a comic; or a graphic novel, a term that covers the content better. 

Goddamn this War! by Jacques Tardi and Jean-Pierre Verney is split into six chronological chapters, one for each year of the war; bold colors of the early chapters fading into a grimy near-monochrome in the later ones as the war drags on.

A very cynical first-person reminiscence/narration by an unnamed soldier, Goddamn This War! is full of anger, outrage, pitch-black gallows humor, and impeccably scrupulous historical exactitude. 

In fact, Goddamn This War! includes an extensive year-by-year historical text section written by Tardi s frequent World War I research helpmate, the historian and collector Jean-Pierre Verney, including dozens of stunning rare photographs and visual documents from his personal collection.

A book that should be compulsory literature in NZ and Australia, where WWI  and ANZAC celebrations have turned horror and suffering into plain heroism and mythicism.