Thomas Keneally has based his story on an event of this kind, and written a riveting and dramatic fiction which explores, above all, the clash of cultures involved.
The extreme warrior culture of Japan involved a code of deathly shame in those taken prisoner, in this case a young Japanese pilot, whose appalling fervour for death is accompanied by total contempt for his captors.
They are bound by their humanity and efforts to abide by the Geneva Convention on the treatment of prisoners. The camp commander, Colonel Abercore, and his second in command, Major Suttor, do not see eye to eye. Only one man, a Russian academic, has any real understanding of the code under which the prisoners operate.
A second plot line revolves around a young married woman with a husband a prisoner of war in Germany and her father-in-law, who run a farm and who employ an Italian prisoner, a widespread practice at that time.
The factors that lead to the final catastrophe are developed in Keneally's straightforward literary style.
- Margaret Bannister is a retired psychotherapist and science teacher.
