The Road Past Mandalay

This book appealed to me as a fascinating piece of history, & great , true life adventure tale. Speaking as a former student & teacher, I found American schools turn students OFF to history. In contrast, I have found John Masters turns people ON.I first became acquainted with John Masters via his three historical novels, set in India during British rule. Enthralled with the first one to come my way --- [ "The Deceivers" - based on the the very real problem the British had rooting out the "Thugs". Yeah, folks, Indiana Jones & "The Temple of Doom" was based upon "Gunga Din" --- & both were based upon these very real cultic robbers & assassins. ---SCARED ME SILLY !!! ] --- I found it difficult to find the other two novels. [Thanks to Amazon & perseverance, I finally did. ] Then came the author's partial autobiography -- "Bugles & a Tiger" -- describing his life as a young British officer in India, choosing to lead Gurkha infantry. It was only recently that I came upon the continuation of his story --- namely his service in the Middle East & Burma during WW!!It was having read these four books that caused me to snatch up this final one, as soon as I came across it on Amazon.It came to me from the UK. I find it is not as well written as his other books. [ Which I rate EXCELLENT!] Yet, it intrigues me, filling in a piece of the great void of history left by our grossly inadequate educational system. Our current involvement in places such as Iraq, Iran, & Afghanistan are very much repetitions of the British experiences -- i.e.: history repeating itself. Masters' writings really bring home the fact that what is happening now is grounded upon what has gone before. Or, as King Solomon put it, "There is nothing new under the sun."I highly recommend not just this one book, but all five by this author. They are NOT exclusively for history bluffs --- NOT just for folks who are trying to figure out what is happening in our world today. They are great, gut gripping, classic tales based upon a reality most Americans know little or nothing about. Lastly, Thank You Amazon ! Were it not for you, I would never have found these books.

One of the best combat memoirs I have ever read.

My wife and I planned a southeast Asia trip for this fall and I couldn't see passing on the opportunity to see Mandalay, and thankfully she's on board with that, because I have been linked sentimentally with the city since I first read this book more than 30 years ago. Masters is maybe my best friend that I never met... I feel like I've known him all my life after reading this and "Bugles", the prequel to this book.Someone else called this "one of the finest memoirs ever written". I was taken aback by that at first (it really is a bold statement), but after re-reading this I just can't argue with it. It is an amazing experience- a movie playing out in words on paper.If you are reading this then you or someone you like must be interested, so I urge you to just buy it. Get an older copy with a very good or better dustjacket because it will occupy a prominent spot on your bookshelf after you read it. Cheers.

I first read Masters' "The Lotus and the Wind" fifty years ago, and subsequently read all the "Savage family" books. I selected "Bhowani Junction" for my Book Club last year, and while checking to see whether it was still in print, found Amazon's author page. So then I read "Bugles and a Tiger", volume one of Masters' autobiography, which was fascinating. This is the second volume, and is beautifully written and gripping. It covers his wartime service in Burma. If you've read "A Town Like Alice", "The Purple Plain", or "Defeat into Victory", or if you want to know something about the history of Myanmar, this will interest you.

One of the greatest books ever written. To really understand it fully you would want to read "Bugles and a Tiger" first. Together they tell the story of a mans life from adolescence to manhood. He was in command of 70 Column and later Blackpool Block behind Japanese lines in Burma and that alone should have made his life but he went on to raise a family, and write several books I have personally owned this book for some seventy years and have three copies now. I've read it more than twenty times and will probably will read it again soon. I'm a person who doesn't like told what to do so if you don't read it I understand.

A fascinating look at the twilight of the British empire and the price that was paid to stand true to the profession of those few good men that dedicated their lives and their souls to turn back the evil of another "would-be" empire.

Ordered this after reading Masters' first memoir, "Bugles and a Tiger". Both are wonderful, beautifully written accounts of a very strange time in history. This volume addresses some of the horrors of combat in Burma in WWII. Those parts are very grim and sad, reminiscent E. B. Sledge's account of combat on Okinawa in "With the Old Breed" but seen from farther up the chain of command. This is one of the great WWII memoirs. Both are indispensable.I might give them 4.5 stars due to an occasional effusion of schmaltz, but if it's got to be an integer, I'll round up.

Excellent reading

I have found it to be an interesting, informative, and something of a page-turner of a book. It is the biography of a British Indian Army officer from the start of World War II to its end in 1945, and I think that it is well written.John Masters is first posted with the Gurkhas to the Middle East as a more junior officer, followed by Staff College in India, and then to Burma as a Chindit with a high rank, getting as far as commanding a brigade, followed in the end by a period as in effect number two of the division that took Mandalay towards the end of World War II.It is difficult to know how useful this book is. It is a War Memoir, and for people with an interest in what happened in particular in Burma it'll be informative. In essence, John Masters thinks that the concept of having Chindits was sound, but that the concept was not carried out well in practice, firstly, because politics entered into its creation, and, secondly, because Generel Stilwell simply got it wrong on the ground.The little that I have read about the war in Burma confirms the view given by John Masters that General Slim was excellent, but that General "Vinegar" Joe Stilwell was rubbish.There is an interesting sub-plot in that John Masters falls in love with a married woman called Barbara who already has two children. They have a baby, Barbara then gets a divorce, and then John Masters and Barbara get married. British culture of the day, particularly in India, frowned upon that sort of thing. In fact, it could wreck a promising military career. There were plenty of very pretty single women he could have fallen in love with and married. It isn't at all obvious to me why none of the single women would do.There is a significant amount of discussion of religion in this book, or at least it crops up a lot. Page 266 is the key to what John Masters thinks. "The hand of God? Causing death and mutilation, taking sides in violence? Not the Christian God, surely. Let each man believe what he wished." The senior padre thought otherwise. To him the hand of God had been with them.The independence movement is mentioned. It is clear that by the time of World War II it did intrude on the military. The Indian National Army is referred to as the Indian Traitor Army by John Masters.There is also the deliberate killing of severely wounded men so that they don't fall into the hands of the Japanese.The book would have been of real use to soldiers if John Masters had given a clear indication of what he felt at actually killing people and / or ordering that people be killed in the many different circumstances that it happened. He never really wavers from the line that war is terrible and terrible things are done that have to be done.For myself, there is much that is troubling. Much as I would like to be able to agree with John Masters a married woman with two small children is not an obvious yes, it is perfectly OK. There are two sides to every story.On the religious front I get the impression that John Masters hasn't really thought it through. He'd like it all to be Heaven on Earth, but it can't be all Heaven on Earth. Bad things can and will happen to people down here. At the same time, all credit to John Masters in that he does mention religion ... and politics. A very anodyne war memoir it would have been if he hadn't given us the benefit of his religious and political views.A book worth reading by historians, (and by relatives of the people mentioned in the book), but I suspect that soldiers in general looking for advice / guidance / real words of wisdom aren't going to find it here. I'm feeling generous, so it is five stars, but although it is a lot better than just an OK, it is not quite in the excellent category, and, therefore, arguably, four stars. Maybe it is four and half stars.

Follow-up to 'Bugles and a Tiger', this book covers John Masters's wartime experiences. It is an impressive story, well told.Personally, I found the first part the most interesting as it tells the story of the preventive interventions (occupations if you will) in 1941, first of Iraq and then of Iran, to prevent them from allying with the Germans and creating mischief behind the main British frontline. I never realized that the Germans actually flew a handful of Heinkels out of Mosul (they got there via Vichy-French Syria). Even the Italians joined in with their beautiflul SM79s and SM82s.Another little known episode in the same year (in between Iraq and Iran) was the occupation (against serious Vichy French resistance) of Syria and Lebanon, in which Masters also participated, dodging bombs raining down from Vichy-French Martin 167 'Maryland' bombers.Whereas the occupation of Iran (the last of these 3 campaigns) was an Anglo-Russian operation, the Iraq occupation happened just before the Germans attacked Russia (i.e. with Russia potentially coming to the aid of the Iraqis, being allied with Germany via Molotov-Ribbentrop) and simultaneously with the British echecs in Greece and on Crete.One wonders what would have happened if the Germans had come to their senses in time, canceled Barbarossa and instead focused their considerable energies on the Middle East.Back to the book: the second and third parts describe Masters's advanced officer and then jungle training, which lasted through 1942 and 1943, followed by the summit his military career with the Chindit force in Burma. Definitely recommended.

John Masters is one of the most important writers to emerge in the 20th Century. His descriptive powers of place, people and history are unsurpassed. One knew, of course, Bhowani Junction, but his other non-fiction books are absolutely magnificent. One should also not forget the Nightrunners of Bengal, and The Deceivers. His book on going to the USA is also a masterpiece, Pilgrim Son. Having been a senior officer in the Indian Army, and the Ghurkas, his inside knowledge of the military is so superior to authors who have not served.

A classic from its era. John Masters is a very gifted writer, and he helps you feel you can understand the Burma campaign of WW2 from the inside. In here is a story of men at war stretched to their absolute limits and then beyond, and sacrifices both vital and pointless. Wingate and Stilwell are two famous generals who do not fare too well in John Masters' telling of their stories. I had not realised the extent of the Iraq and Iran campaigns that he took part in as "openers" to WW2 for the Indian Army either. There's also the strong sense of "end of an era", as British India is coming to a close in the time he writes of. He begins the story as a committed and ambitious army officer, and by the war's end his former ambitions have all died, despite his personal successes. And that, of course, gave us the great novelist of later years. For anyone interested in WW2 and the story of India this book is highly recommended.

Memoir of a Forgotten War: John Masters's The Road Past MandalayPreviously, I was vaguely aware of John Masters as the author of Bhowani Junction (1954), a novel set in the late 1940s at the end of the Raj and known to me only via the mediocre film adaptation starring Ava Gardner. More recently, I wanted to read something about World War Two in Burma, the theatre of war my father experienced and in which I was therefore particularly interested. By chance I came across Masters's The Road Past Mandalay (1961), the second volume of his autobiography and primarily about the war in Burma. I have just finished reading it and find it an honest, well written and informative book based on first-hand experience of a sometimes visceral intensity.Masters is well qualified to write about the war in the East. Though educated at Wellington College and Sandhurst, he was born in Calcutta in 1914 and served on the North-West Frontier in the 1930s, first with a British infantry regiment and later with the Gurkhas, experiences described in the first volume of his autobiography, Bugles and a Tiger. Such a life follows tradition, for Masters's family had a long genealogy of military service in India. He is both insider and outsider, knowing the country well but as a member of the imperial caste. This doubleness has advantages but also limits. Masters is a knowledgeable and perceptive chronicler of both the war and the last days of the Raj, but there is little if anything radical in his thinking and his limited sympathy with Indian nationalism may now seem very much of its period, though his remarks about British rule in India do call attention to achievements which it's currently fashionable to ignore.Mandalay begins with Masters serving as a temporary captain in a regiment of Gurkhas fighting in the Middle East in 1941-42. From there he goes for training at the army Staff College in Quetta, in present-day Pakistan but then within the Raj, and later takes part in the Burma campaign as a Chindit, a soldier fighting against the Japanese behind their lines. The account of his intimate personal life, a phrase that could apply equally to his army experience, such is the intensity of its relationships, appears in the background and comes to prominence at the end of the book, when Masters, now a brigadier, makes a pilgrimage with his wife through the Himalayas and discovers that the war has ended.Masters's narrative is primarily linear, a chronicle studded with anecdotes. Such a structure enables a balance between the large picture and the tiny but telling detail. Masters gets the mix of close-up, the wider view of the action in which he's involved and the bigger picture of the whole campaign exactly right. Tiny vignettes with, apparently, the actual spoken words, ghastly details like the problem of overcrowding in the Main Dressing Station at the base in Burma being solved by "two direct shell hits," and the relentlessly close-up pictures of the terminally wounded who, in a nadir of horror, must be executed, are placed in the larger, more generalised narrative of the fight, making it vivid and shocking. Masters does not romanticise military action or its consequences, emotional as well as physical, for the participants, and the reader can well believe that the author remembers the very words and tiniest details at the time of writing even 15 or 20 years later. No account, however powerful, could really give the war-virgin reader full empathy with the intense experiences Masters describes, but his use of stabbingly vivid detail within the larger narrative comes close.Masters's use of language or, more accurately, languages enhances the telling of his story. Like many Anglo-Indians, he is polyglot, speaking Gurkhali and Hindi, and the presence of words from these and other Asian languages colours the text, adding to its strong sense of authority and authenticity. The language of Mandalay is further enriched by army terms, for example, a listing of ranks in the Indian Army, which gives a flavour of that wonderful compendium of the language of the Raj, Hobson-Jobson, and the then not-so-long-lost world of Kipling's India. Period terms, such as "flicks" for films, a usage familiar to my parents' generation, further enhance the sense of another time and place.Towards the end of the book, and the war, Masters goes on a journey with his wife through the Himalayas. High up, they find "one of the rarest and quite the most beautiful flower in the world, a Himalayan Blue Poppy." This flower, reminiscent of German Romanticism's Blue Rose, is a symbol of Masters's quest or pilgrimage to transcend the war and the horrors of it, to connect with something beyond the ephemera of human history, with some essence of existence beyond words. Masters manages to convey the reality of this desire without indulging in fortune-cookie philosophising like, say, Somerset Maugham in The Razor's Edge. The pilgrimage, in fact, occurs elsewhere in Anglo-Indian literature, in Kipling's Kim, for example, and Masters is following that tradition. Similarly, escape to and challenge by the mountains has a long history in English autobiography and the lives of military men, as in Robert Graves's Good-bye to All That or, more recently, as documented in Wade Davis's Into the Silence. As the title suggests, Masters's novel, Far, Far the Mountain Peak (1957) has a similar focus. In the end section of Mandalay, the reader may feel the novelist's shaping hand, though events themselves may be as neat as fiction's patterning, and autobiography and the novel are, inevitably, overlapping genres. Mandalay ends with Masters's discovery that the A-bomb has been dropped on Japan. This is the way the war ends, not with a whimper but a bang.Like all of us, Masters is a product of his time and place, though he isn't the prisoner of these. His love for India and its people and for the men he serves with is clear. Mandalay is a vividly written, informative account of the Burma campaign, one that has received less attention than the European war. There are good histories of the Burma campaign such as Louis Allen's Burma and Christopher Bayly and Tim Harper's Forgotten Armies. These don't ignore the soldier's eye view but a well written personal account is unmatched at conveying the first-hand experience. Along with George MacDonald Fraser's Quartered Safe Out Here and Julian Thompson's anthology of oral history, Forgotten Voices of Burma, Mandalay is essential reading for anyone interested in that campaign and the reality of war.