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The diaries depicted the difficulties of day-to-day survival but also the funny and macabre goings-on about town.

"The birds have taken the worst beating of all," she wrote. "They have sensitive souls which cannot take all this hideous noise and vibration. All the caged love-birds have died from the shock of the blasts, while birds in the wild fly upside down and do crazy somersaults. Hundreds, if not thousands, have died in the orchard. Lonely survivors fly about in a distracted fashion."

The book won praise from the likes of the late literary scholar Edward W. Said, a passionate advocate of Arab causes. Publishers Weekly called Ms. al-Radi's prose "powerful but not ostentatious" but took her to task for saying little about Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, which touched off the 1991 war and sanctions, while criticizing the U.S. bombardment.

"Nuha was also highly critical of the [2003] U.S.-led invasion of Iraq," said her sister, Selma al-Radi, an archaeologist.

Iraqi critic Ali Abdel Amir said the diaries reflected Ms. al-Radi's "high sense of human feelings."

"She used her artistry to portray the sufferings of millions of Iraqis under war," Abdel Amir said of the book, speaking to the Associated Press by telephone from Amman, Jordan.

A painter and ceramist, Ms. Al-Radi had several pieces commissioned by the Iraqi government for government offices in Baghdad

Even when Iraq was under sanctions for its 1990 invasion of Kuwait, she had a large studio at her home in Baghdad where she exhibited her work.

She was born in Baghdad and raised in India, where her father was ambassador. She studied ceramics in London.

Survivors also include her mother and a brother.

Associated Press, Washington Post, September 9, 2004

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