Lamb, David 1940-

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LAMB, David 1940-

PERSONAL: Born March 5, 1940, in Boston, MA; son of Ernest (a stockbroker) and Pauline (Ayers) Lamb; married Sandra L. Northrop (a filmmaker), February 14, 1977. Education: University of Maine, B.A., 1962.

ADDRESSES: Agent—Carl Brandt, Brandt & Brandt Literary Agents, Inc., 1501 Broadway, New York, NY 10036.

CAREER: Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles, CA, reporter in Vietnam, 1970-75, Nairobi bureau chief, 1976-80, Cairo bureau chief, beginning 1982, Southeast Asia bureau chief, Hanoi, North Vietnam, 1997-2001; writer. Writer-in-residence, University of Southern California School of Journalism. Narrator and host of documentary Vietnam Passage: A Journey from War to Peace, Public Broadcasting System, 2002. Military service: U.S. Army, 1963-64; became lieutenant.

AWARDS, HONORS: Nieman fellow, Harvard University, 1980; Alicia Patterson fellow; Pew fellow.

WRITINGS:

The Africans, Random House (New York, NY), 1983, published with a new preface and epilogue, Vintage Books (New York, NY), 1987.

The Arabs: Journeys beyond the Mirage, Random House (New York, NY), 1987, revised and updated edition, Vintage Books (New York, NY), 2002.

Stolen Season: A Journey through America and Baseball's Minor Leagues, Warner Books (New York, NY), 1991.

A Sense of Place: Listening to Americans, Times Books (New York, NY), 1993.

Over the Hills: A Midlife Escape across America by Bicycle, Times Books (New York, NY), 1996.

Vietnam, Now: A Reporter Returns, PublicAffairs (New York, NY), 2002.

Contributor to periodicals, including National Geographic and Sports Illustrated.

SIDELIGHTS: David Lamb spent the years 1976-1980 as Los Angeles Times correspondent in Nairobi, Kenya, traveling through forty-eight countries covering wars, coups, and other events. His impressions of the political and social situations in Africa are collected in The Africans, a survey divided by topics into sections on poverty, education, health, women, currencies, and trade. Writing in the New York Times Book Review, Alan Cowell predicted that Lamb would provoke debates with his argument that African society would benefit from the establishment of a middle class and his call for a "Marshall Plan" to replace undirected aid to Africa from Western nations. Nonetheless, Cowell called The Africans "a timely and valuable work that cuts through many of the distorted images propagated by Africans themselves, by the continent's apologists and by its detractors." He concluded: "The Africans is highly readable, uncluttered by statistics and marked by many an insight for the newcomer and more seasoned hand alike. Scholars may find that its very scope precludes detailed analysis of any one particular subject, but Mr. Lamb has nonetheless contributed to the relatively slim library of works that are essential reading for an understanding of modern-day Africa."

In subsequent years, Lamb has covered many major international events, from the Iranian revolution in the 1970s to the turmoil in East Timor in 1999. But it was Lamb's early assignment as a wartime reporter for the Times in Vietnam that provided him with an insider's perspective on a complex region. He was based in the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) but spent most of his time in the bush with the soldiers. After six years as a battlefield correspondent, Lamb left Vietnam in 1975, just days before the fall of Saigon. More than twenty years later, he returned to Hanoi to manage the Times Southeast Asia bureau, the first American to run a news bureau in peacetime Vietnam. This led to a new book, Vietnam, Now: A Reporter Returns. The volume's 2001 publication coincided with a television documentary shot by Lamb's wife, Sandra, and narrated by the author.

For many Americans Vietnam has remained an emotional issue, even decades after the Communist takeover. But Lamb's view was different: "I was never hooked by the war," he told Cindy Yoon of AsiaSource. "But I was always intrigued with Southeast Asia and what had happened to Vietnam when the war ended. To go back and to really bookend my career thirty years later was far too tempting and compelling to resist." Vietnam, Now focuses on the human aspect of the war and its aftermath; the author is also "not shy about sharing his personal feelings," as a Publishers Weekly reviewer noted. The author found the latter-day Vietnamese people friendly, even accepting of the events that shattered their country in the 1960s and '70s. Comparing what might in Asia be called the "American War" (much as the conflict was known as the "Vietnam War" in the U.S.), Lamb found that the Vietnamese people "have gotten over [it] in a far better way than how we [Americans] have tried to." As he continued in Yoon's interview, Lamb said that the war, put into Vietnam's historical perspective, "was really a small blip in their history. They fought the Chinese for thousands of years, the French for over [one] hundred, and they were occupied by the Japanese during World War II. Americans have basically come and gone in a decade."

Vietnam, in Lamb's book "emerges as a passionate yet patient country that is trying to adapt to . . . the needs of a new generation," suggested Library Journal reviewer Mike Miller. The author acknowledged that the first postwar baby boom of Vietnamese turned out to be "a whiz-kid generation that thirsts for knowledge," as he told Yoon. "They are so industrious and want to know about the world, but they really don't give a hoot about Communism and politics." Indeed, Americans and free enterprise in general are widely welcomed in the new Vietnam, a fact that the author attributed to the culture of the country: Animosity toward their former enemy, wrote Lamb in Vietnam, Now, "was replaced by a sense of relief that life was on the mend. Hating took energy—energy the Vietnamese wanted to expend in more productive pursuits." Robert Mann of the New York Times Book Review found that "it is this perplexing dichotomy—Vietnam's instinctive embrace of capitalism and western democracy mixed with toleration of moderately repressive Communism—that Mr. Lamb explains so skillfully."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Lamb, Robert, Vietnam, Now: A Reporter Returns, PublicAffairs (New York, NY), 2002.

PERIODICALS

American-Arab Affairs, summer, 1987, review of The Arabs: Journeys beyond the Mirage, p. 138.

Best Sellers, May, 1983, review of The Africans, p. 63.

Booklist, January 15 1983, review of The Africans, p. 656; March 1, 1991, review of Stolen Season: A Journey through America and Baseball's Minor Leagues, p. 1314; May 1, 1993, review of A Sense of Place: Listening to Americans, p. 1567; April 1, 1996, Janet St. John, review of Over the Hills: A Midlife Escape across America by Bicycle, p. 1340; May 1, 2002, Gilbert Taylor, review of Vietnam, Now: A Reporter Returns, p. 1501.

Book Report, November, 1991, review of Stolen Season, p. 62.

Bookwatch, March, 1988, review of The Arabs, p. 2.

British Book News, February, 1984, review of The Africans, p. 78.

Business Week, February 21, 1983, review of The Africans, p. 16; March 23, 1987, review of The Arabs, p. 15; June 29, 1992, review of Stolen Season, p. 14.

Christian Science Monitor, March 11, 1983, review of The Africans, p. 20; December 7, 1984, review of The Africans, p. B16; March 9, 1987, review of The Arabs, p. 28.

Foreign Affairs, number four, 1987, review of The Arabs, p. 912.

Guardian Weekly, August 21, 1983, review of The Africans, p. 21.

Journal of Reading, May, 1992, review of Stolen Season, p. 684.

Kirkus Reviews, December 1, 1982, review of The Africans, p. 1323; February 1, 1987, review of The Arabs, p. 203; January 1, 1991, review of Stolen Season, p. 32.

Kliatt Young Adult Paperback Book Guide, fall, 1984, review of The Africans, p. 55.

Library Journal, March 1, 1983, review of The Africans, p. 487; March 15, 1987, review of The Arabs, p. 71; February 15, 1991, review of Stolen Season, p. 201; April 15, 1993, review of A Sense of Place, p. 115; May 15, 2002, Mike Miller, review of Vietnam, Now, p. 109.

London Review of Books, December 1, 1983, review of The Africans, p. 24.

Los Angeles Times Book Review, May 3, 1987, review of The Arabs, p. 2; October 2, 1988, review of The Arabs, p. 14.

Middle East Journal, summer, 1989, review of The Arabs, p. 522.

National Review, May 27, 1991, review of Stolen Season, p. 52.

Newsweek, February 18, 1991, review of The Arabs, p. 62.

New Yorker, July 13, 1987, review of The Arabs, p. 89.

New York Times, May 29, 2002, Robert Mann, "Despite All Vietnam Still Likes Americans."

New York Times Book Review, February 6, 1983, Alan Cowell, review of The Africans, p. 7; March 18, 1984, review of The Africans, p. 34; April 5, 1987, review of The Arabs, p. 9; March 21, 1988, review of The Arabs, p. 34; April 7, 1991, review of Stolen Season, p. 27; March 29, 1992, review of Stolen Season, p. 28.

Publishers Weekly, December 3, 1982, review of The Africans, p. 51; January 20, 1984, review of The Africans, p. 87; February 20, 1987, review of The Arabs, p. 64; May 27, 1988, review of The Arabs, p. 59; January 15, 1991, review of Stolen Season, p. 43; March 2, 1992, review of Stolen Season, p. 63; February 19, 1996, review of Over the Hills, p. 194; April 29, 2002, review of Vietnam, Now, p. 54.

San Francisco Review of Books, May, 1983, review of The Africans, p. 15; March, 1993, review of A Sense of Place, p. 27.

Times Educational Supplement, September 23, 1983, review of The Africans, p. 25; September 27, 1985, review of The Africans, p. 26.

Times Literary Supplement, September 16, 1983.

Tribune Books (Chicago, IL), April 7, 1991, review of Stolen Season, p. 5.

Virginia Quarterly Review, autumn, 1991, review of Stolen Season, p. 140.

Wall Street Journal, April 19, 1991, review of Stolen Season, p. A13.

Washington Post Book World, March 13, 1983, review of The Africans, p. 4; March 22, 1987, review of The Arabs, p. 4; April 7, 1991, review of Stolen Season, p. 3; May 30, 1993, review of A Sense of Place, p. 3.

Wilson Library Bulletin, January, 1992, review of Stolen Season, p. S15.