BURMA SAHIB

From a distinguished literary veteran, a compelling historical novel about callow youth.

George Orwell wrote that for each of us comes a brief period in which “character is fixed forever.” Theroux’s premise is that for Orwell, that period was a 5-year stint in Burma during the early 1920s, where he—then Eric Blair—spent time as a trainee and junior policeman. From the start, Blair stands out from his fellow recruits. He’s bookish, intimidatingly tall (one superior officer won’t speak to him unless he’s seated), a recent graduate of swanky Eton, adept with languages, and intent (to the consternation of many) to learn the languages of the Raj. Theroux’s portrait of young Blair is complex and nuanced. Steeped in the violence of English public schools, Blair is both repulsed by and amenable to casual violence to enforce order and hierarchy. He’s similarly appalled by, dependent on—and implicated in—the paternalistic racism that created and sustains British rule. Blair is torn between hatred of the moral position of the Brits here…and contempt for the often brutal criminals it is his job to pursue. A similar ambivalence—self-disgust, guilt, shameful pleasure—haunts Blair’s sexual life, which consists of discreet visits to brothels, liaisons with Burmese women in his employ, and an affair with the wife of another Brit. Theroux nimbly weaves in episodes Orwell would write about in Burma Days, “Shooting an Elephant,” and other works. The result is in many ways an old-fashioned novel—large in scale, slowish to build—but one that exemplifies the best virtues of such novels: steadily accruing momentum and depth, rich detail, psychological intricacy, and immersion. Best of all, the big canvas allows Theroux to depict a Blair whose wounds and offenses and flaws and guilty knowledge are changing him as we watch. The battered, self-loathing man who limps home at the end of the five years is recognizably on the cusp of being Orwell: keen-eyed, morally complex, skeptical of authority and what it allows—or requires—of those who wield it.

Theroux is always great with setting; here it’s not just Burma but the mind of Orwell that he persuasively inhabits.