“Disturbingly fabulous” is what one reader said about this book and I have to agree.  There is the lyrical prose that Flanagan uses while describing the horrors of how the Japanese used POWs to build the Thai-Burma railway, the deep soulfulness that is embodied by the book’s flawed hero, Dorrigo Evans, and the curiosity that compels the author to go beyond a simple demonization of the Japanese guards, and explore their motivations, which all coalesces into this profound meditation on life and death.  Winner of the 2014 Man Booker prize, this is one of the most moving, fascinating, disturbing, heartbreaking, books that I have read in a long time.

The Thai-Burma railway was conceived after the Japanese invaded Burma and found that their supply ships were vulnerable to US attacks. The overland route would connect Bangkok, Thailand with Rangoon, Burma using various pre existing railroad lines together. There was a gap of 111 km gap on one part of the line and a 304 km gap on another, where the connecting new line would be laid through some of the most difficult, isolated and hazardous terrain imaginable. Work began on the railroad in September of 1942 and was completed ahead of schedule in October of 1943. The Japanese used a mixture of impressed workers from Burma, Malay and Java as well as foreign prisoners of war to do the work, and it is estimated that at least 90,00 impressed workers died although there are no records and of the 61,811 POWs, 12,621 died.

When we meet Dorrigo Evans he is a child from a working class family in Tasmania playing football in school. Soon he has graduated from medical school and as a surgeon is making his way into Melbourne society. Along the way he has developed a love of poetry, especially Ulysses, by Tennyson which he reads and re reads.  And then our perspective shifts, and Dorrigo is now 77 years old.  Thanks to a TV documentary about his role in the Burma death camps, he is a famous  war hero and and a celebrated surgeon. and he is struggling to write a foreword for a book about the POW experience and in writing it hoped  “…to somehow finally put things to rights with the honesty of humility, to restore his role to what it was, that of a doctor, no more and no less, and to restore to rightful memory the many who were forgotten by focusing on them rather than himself.”

Switching perspective back and forth through the span of Dorrigo’s life we see how how this flawed person, arrogant and resistant to authority, with an inability to cultivate relationships, was able to use all of his natural inclinations to help, inspire, nurture, and give hope to the men who were under his care in the POW camp. His detachment and arrogance gave him the necessary tools to make hard decisions, create trust in the men who looked to him for direction and even made some of the Japanese respect him. Yet after the war it is these very same personality traits that wreak havoc in his life leaving him lonely and alone. Although it is difficult to like Dorrigo, Flanagan is able to let you deep inside this character so that you understand him, and in that understanding there is a recognition of our common humanity.

Dedicated to prisoner 335, Flanagan’s father who was a POW on the Thai-Burma Railway, it is clear that Flanagan has a deep personal interest in this topic and yet he makes an effort to tell a story that is even handed, letting us know of the suffering of the Korean guards who were maltreated and beaten by the Japanese and even the Japanese themselves who were victims of the Emperor’s will.  As Flanagan says, “A good book…leaves you wanting to reread the book. A great book compels you to reread your own soul.” In this book, Flanagan has achieved the latter!

Brenda’s Rating: *****(5 stars out of 5)

Recommend this book to: Keith, Ken, Lauren, Marian and Sharon

Book Study Worthy: Yes!

Read in ebook format.