Leyla Sanai

A war reporter bravely faces death – but not from sniper fire

As a foreign correspondent for the New York Times, Rod Nordland learned to expect many dangers, but a brain tumour wasn’t one of them

Rod Norland on 20 November 2016, looking at old Istanbul city from Galata Tower. Two months later he was denied entry to Turkey without being given any explanation. [Getty Images] 
issue 02 March 2024

When you are a foreign correspondent and have covered wars in dozens of countries, the last place you’d expect a threat to your life to come from is your own cells. Yet this was the predicament in which the New York Times reporter Rod Nordland found himself in July 2019. Despite close shaves in Lebanon, Iraq, Afghanistan, Central America and Darfur, he only really became aware of his mortality after collapsing with a seizure in India and discovering the existence of a ‘space occupying lesion’ (SOL) in his brain – a euphemism for a growth, benign or malignant. On transfer to a hospital in Manhattan, Nordland learned that his was a stage 4 glioblastoma multiforme, a primary brain cancer with a poor prognosis.

The roads in Iraq became too dangerous, with bombs hidden in everything from prams to dead dogs

In Waiting for the Monsoon, he speaks in almost beatific tones of the diagnosis marking the beginning of a second life for him.

Get Britain's best politics newsletters

Register to get The Spectator's insight and opinion straight to your inbox. You can then read two free articles each week.

Already a subscriber? Log in

Comments

Join the debate for just £1 a month

Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for £3.

Already a subscriber? Log in