The Soldier Factory: A Window

In July of 1968, at the age of 20, Salven, having been drafted, began his basic training at Fort Ord, on California's Monterey Bay. He served his time, returned to California, and opened his own landscaping business. He didn't return until more than 30 years later, after Fort Ord's closing in 1994. But when he did, the recollections came in cascades. Salven wrote down more than 80 of them, and they form the poetic core of this book. Hushed, vivid and digressive, and set in lines of verse, they read like a cross between Joe Brainard's I Remember and zen reportage. On a later trip back, Salven found a set of soldier portraits done in 1994, the year Fort Ord was closed, by local art students. They, along with photographs of the abandoned base that Salven took, form a moving semi-contemporary counterpoint to Salven's recollections. This book makes a unique contribution to the literature of Vietnam, and to contemporary debates about the American military. 50 color illustrations.