As Lebanon holds its first elections for a decade, the civil war that ravaged the country from 1975 to 1990 is far from forgotten.

Fisk, an award-winning foreign correspondent, not only reported on it, he lived through it, so this account of that conflict is not simply a historical and political analysis by a detached, scholarly observer.

Context is given but this is history recorded as it happened by a reporter who not only finds many witnesses but also was a witness himself.

This is a tale of a country splintered by factions, bedevilled by betrayal from within and without and by the West’s limitless ability to ignore what it finds inconvenient or does not wish to know.

By definition, it is a personal testament of the savagery of those 15 years.

Some have criticized the author for putting too much of himself in it, accusing him of self-aggrandizement.

But despite its faults (and it does have them) it has become a classic of its genre and is widely regarded as required reading for anyone wanting to understand the Middle East — especially if you are not from the Middle East.

The title is from the poem of the same name by the Lebanese-American writer Khalil Gibran (1883-1931), who is revered in Lebanon.

As a title for a war memoir, it could not be more apt.