Introduction: Artistic and Cultural Responses to War

Abstract

This introduction explores the role played by artistic and cultural responses to conflict in communicating an understanding of loss, grief, and memory. Though it is acknowledged that artistic truth is not synonymous with literal truth, the arts are well able to explore the nature of war and in doing so illuminate something about human nature, both at its best and at its worse. This chapter provides a broad sweep of the material included in this handbook and contextualises it, both in terms of the other chapters, and its broader place in the genre of war art.