CHESTERTOWN, MD—On Thursday, April 18, Washington College and the Rose O’Neill Literary House will welcome author and former Marine Anthony Swofford for the final installment of the “Writing in Wartime” lecture series. Swofford, whose bestselling memoir inspired the Hollywood drama Jarhead, will speak in Decker Theatre of the Gibson Center for the Arts at 5 p.m.  The event is free and open to the public.

Anthony Swofford served as a lance corporal in a U.S. Marine Corps Surveillance and Target Acquisition/ Scout-Sniper platoon during the 1991 Gulf War. After completing his service, he attended the University of Iowa Writer’s Workshop before writing a memoir recounting his wartime experiences. Praised by Newsweek for its “witty, profane, down-in-the-sand,” style, Jarhead, A Marine’s Chronicle of the Gulf War and Other Battles was published in 2003. The film adaptation of Swofford’s memoir, directed by Sam Mendes and starring Jake Gyllenhaal, was released in 2005.

Swofford went on to publish his first novel, Exit A, in 2007 and a second memoir, Hotels, Hospitals and Jails, in 2012. His eloquent, politically aware writing has appeared in publications that include Harper’s, The New York Times Magazine, The Guardian, and Slate. A graduate of the University of California, Davis, Swofford lives in upstate New York with his wife and daughter.

The former Marine is the final visiting writer in the Literary House’s “Writing in Wartime” series, which also hosted talks by fiction writer Siobhan Fallon (February 19) and playwright KJ Sanchez (April 9 and 11).