<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><I>Taking Mesopotamia</I> was originally inspired by Jenny Lewis’s search for her lost father—the young South Wales Borderer who led his troops across the desert by starlight in the ill-fated Mesopotamian campaign of World War I. Through reconstructed diary extracts, witness statements, and a mixture of formal poems and free verse, the book extends into a wider exploration of the recent Iraq war seen from a woman’s point of view—the horror of sons and daughters being sent into battle, the struggles of widows and orphans. Woven through the personal and geopolitical content is a more ancient strand inspired by <I>The Epic of Gilgamesh</I>, the world’s first piece of written literature, whose themes of hubris, abuse of power, and fear of death show us how little the world has changed in 4,000 years.