In his last moments, he realises that the traumatic memory of his younger self as a Japanese POW on the Thailand-Burma “Death Railway” will end with him. With his image on coins and stamps, Dorrigo cannot recognise himself in his public persona of the Anzac war hero. Alwyn “Dorrigo” Evans, the haunted protagonist of Richard Flanagan’s Man Booker Prize-longlisted sixth novel, is the subject of television documentaries and talk shows. In a faraway teak jungle long since cleared, in a country called Siam that no longer exists, a man who is no longer alive finally falls asleep.
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