Christopher Pierre
Mr. Brigstocke
English 2 12/8/5
The Narrow Road to the Deep North: Personal response
The Narrow Road to the Deep North, by Richard Flanagan was an interesting book for me and felt like somewhat of an experience. The book mainly follows a man by the name of Dorrigo Evans, a boy from a small town in Australia, who grew up to become a doctor and soldier, and later suffered at the hands of the Japanese as a Prisoner of War during World War II.
The story starts off kind of different than a traditional novel. It begins as Dorrigo Evans, now in his 70’s recalling one of his first memories stepping in and out of a beam of sunshine while at church with his mother and grandmother. Back then, he still lived in a small town in the middle of nowhere, where life was much simpler. From there he proceeds to explain how, unlike his other siblings, he was fortunate enough to be able to go to school, and later, move out of his hometown to study medicine in the city. After his years of studying in the city he would eventually go on to become a doctor, a surgeon, and a soldier during the war. Unexpectedly his accomplishments led him to somewhat of a national war hero and celebrity. He has since been awarded countless medals of Honor and bravery for his efforts in saving the lives of the men under his command in the POW camps in Siam. Honors and praise he feels he does not deserve.
The Narrow Road to the Deep North was an experience for me to read because throughout college and high school I as used to reading the traditional formatted novels. The narrow Road to the Deep North isn’t traditional because it focuses less on actual plot than it does on the different characters, and though the novel primarily follows the life of Dorrigo Evans, it also shines a light on the lives of other characters throughout the novel. Of Dorrigo Evans, it tells of his love life, a passionate relationship with his uncle’s wife, before joining the war, and later of his married life, and his life as a doctor and prisoner of war. Although many characters are involved much of the novel is dedicated to Dorrigo Evans’ time in the POW camp, working on the Burma-Siam Railway, also known as the Death Railway, under the Japanese in 1943. As Corporal, Dorrigo Evans was responsible for the 700 men under his command, and as a doctor, he literally, had to save their lives from the cruel Japanese. Working on an impossible deadline, their Japanese captors worked the POWs non-stop, rain or shine, night and day. Because of their horrid living conditions and impossible work hours, the POWs were tired, malnourished, and including Dorrigo Evans, suffered from multiple illnesses and diseases. Working in the jungles of Siam during the monsoon, with little protection against the elements and insects, and with very poor nutrition, the POWs suffered from infections, dengue, malaria, pellagra, cholera, and other illnesses that without treatment, could prove life threatening. Aside from the harsh living and working conditions, the POWs were also in danger of random beatings and torture from their Japanese captors.
The latter parts of the novel focuses on the lives of the men who survived the war and the POW camps, including Dorrigo Evans, and how they assimilated back into society after they were freed. It is during these two parts of the novel that other characters are heard from, not only the POWs, but also from the Japanese officers, and guards who were declared war criminals or imprisoned after the war. After the war, Dorrigo Evans, the POWs who survived the camps, and their Japanese captors had to find new ways of living again many of them were not used to seeing their families or people that actually love them so for them it essentially was like learning how to live a free life again. Not only did they have to adjust to living with their families but they also had to adjust to being a normal civilian and adjust to the new ways of society and how things now worked post war. For many of them the hardest part of adjusting was to survive the new challenge of forgetting the past and moving on with their lives, any way they can.
Another reason I found this book to be an experience was because the author writes from the perspectives of both sides; those who suffered, and those who caused the suffering, though, everything being relative, it’s hard to decide which is which, or whether anyone is guilty of anything at all. At times I found myself often picking sides and leaving my own personal beliefs behind and really indulging in the book, which was interesting for me because I’ve never read a book that has ever made that happen before.
With the Narrow Road to the Deep North not really a plot-based book, I often found parts of it a bit tedious to read, especially when it focuses on Dorrigo Evans, a complex character, who, though the protagonist of the novel, is not, to me, a very likable character. He is deeply flawed, but comes out as a very realistic character, who despite being viewed by most as a hero, is not really a hero, but just an ordinary man, and not even a good man, at that. There was often parts of the book where the author went into detail about the role Dorrigo played for the Japanese that made my dislike for him increase but I often had to stop and ask myself did he really have a choice or was he doing what he knew to be right and acceptable. But for me, there were other characters in the novel who were much more interesting, likeable and respectable than Dorrigo Evans. I found that there were many other POW soldiers who could have been the main character of the story but again I had to ask myself was I thinking that only because of the way Dorrigo was portrayed or did I truly believe that. Of all the characters in the novel though, the one who really stood out for me was the POW Darky Gardiner. I found him to be a very likable character, who despite the hopelessness of their lives at the POW camps always tried to find something good in every situation and that really made me respect him.
The Narrow Road to the Deep North is not a very easy book to describe, nor is it an easy book to digest. At times, its content and structure made it hard to read, especially the detailed parts of the cruelty suffered by the POWs at the hands of their Japanese captors. I believe Richard Flanagan did a great job describing a wide range of emotions and other things that define some of the key components to humanity such as love, lust, pride, honor, loss, suffering, remembering, and forgetting. Also the book tackles many cultural issues, similarities, differences and prejudices that are often the cause of wars and misunderstandings. I called this book an experience because throughout the book it felt like a love story, an anti-war story, and a story about life all put together with characters that we all may not be familiar with but all can relate to somehow.

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