Emma Sky was the political advisor to a top American general. She is currently the director of Yale University’s World Fellows programme and lectures on Middle East politics.
Her book The Unravelling: High Hopes and Missed Opportunities in Iraq was shortlisted for the prestigious Samuel Johnson Prize.
Emma is also appearing that the Auckland Writers Festival 2016. Here, we talk to her about her life and career to date:
At what point during your work in the Middle East did you know you would write a book about it and what inspired that idea?
After I left Iraq I struggled to make sense of what all the sacrifice had been for. I found writing therapeutic. I felt I had witnessed such key events in my role as General Odierno’s political adviser that it was my duty to record them.
I believe we honour those who lost their lives by trying to learn the right lessons from the war. I wanted to acknowledge the efforts of the military who strived year after year to give Iraqis a chance for a better future. And I wanted to pay tribute to Iraq, a country I came to love.
What did you hope to achieve with the book and what has the outcome been so far?
We should not have invaded Iraq in 2003. But nothing that happened in Iraq after 2003 was inevitable. There were hopes for a world without Saddam Husseins; and missed opportunities to create a better order.
I hope my book contributes to a more informed discussion about what happened in Iraq, so we can learn, heal, and re-examine who we are, and what we stand for. I hope the book will help us better understand the limitations of external actors in foreign lands – but also what we can do to make our world safer and more peaceful for everyone. At another level, it is about finding purpose in life, and focusing on what is important. I have been amazed by how widely the book has been read. I’ve received so many emails and letters from people telling me how they relate to it and sharing with me their own stories.
You provided a great deal of historical context in the book – what was the research process?
We had so little knowledge of the country’s rich history and the diversity of its people when we invaded. This land was the cradle of civilisation, the Garden of Eden, which gave the world the first written law, the first settled agriculture. This is where the Talmud was written. I listened to what Iraqis told me about their country. And I read up on Iraqi history.
You had to write about people you had worked very closely with – was this challenging?
I found it quite a responsibility to write about people I knew and to portray them in a nuanced and credible way. I sent extracts to those I was close to, asking them if they were okay with the way I described them. I got better at judging what was acceptable. The US military let me into their inner circle and it was important for me to respect that trust, while retaining my critical faculties.
Where do you write, and for how many hours a day?
I write in my house in New Haven, which has big windows and lots of light. I tend to get up early and write for a few hours, go for a run, and then write for another couple of hours. I stop at lunchtime.
Who helped you most in creating this book and how?
Writing can be very lonely; at times I wondered if it would ever end. This is my first book so I had nothing to compare it with. I wrote it for my US military and Iraqi friends. Once I’d told them I was writing a book, I had to get it finished. It helped having friends who would read sections and give me feedback. And it helped that I was teaching at Yale, surrounded by enthusiastic, optimistic students – and beauty.
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