Laurens ediciones

A Bar of Shadow

1954ref. 91276London: The Hogarth Press 1954. Presumed First Edition First Printing thus. Hardcover. Good. The format is approximately 5 inches by 7.5 inches. 58 6 pages. The spine is frayed and slightly separating at the top. Some discoloration and ink notations on the front and end papers Brief ink notation on fep and rep. This story was first published in The Cornhill and then as a book in 1954. This is the story of Hara a Japanese sergeant in virtual command of a prisoner-of-war camp. It is more than a little autobiographical for Colonel van der Post was himself a prisoner of war in the Far East. The book is a penetrating study of the Japanese mentality the Japanese myth as personified by this demonic brutal weirdly idealistic sergeant. How Hara's curiosity about Father Christmas saves a British Prisoner from the death-cell and how this officer later spoke up for his torturer at a War Crimes Tribunal provide the climaxes of a book which proves once again that truth is far stranger than fiction. But A Bar of Shadow does something more. It shows that men not only must but can love their enemies: and it shows how this most difficult love may be achieved by a courageous imaginative understanding. Sir Laurens Jan van der Post CBE 13 December 1906 - 15 December 1996 was a South African Afrikaner writer farmer soldier educator journalist humanitarian philosopher explorer and conservationist. He was noted for his interest in the Kalahari Bushmen his experiences during World War II as well as his relationships with notable figures such as King Charles III and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. The Hogarth Press was a business run by the married couple Leonard Woolf and the novelist Virginia Woolf. The Woolfs were members of the literary and artistic Bloomsbury group. In 1934 the Woolfs published van der Post's first novel. Called In a Province it portrayed the tragic consequences of a racially and ideologically divided South Africa. In May 1940 van der Post volunteered for the British Army and upon completion of officer training in January 1941 he was sent to East Africa in the Intelligence Corps as a captain. There he took up with General Wingate's Gideon Force which was given the task of restoring the Emperor Haile Selassie to his throne in Abyssinia. In early 1942 as Japanese forces invaded South East Asia van der Post was transferred to Allied forces in the Dutch East Indies Indonesia because of his Dutch language skills. By his own statement he was given command of Special Mission 43 the purpose of which was to organize the covert evacuation of as many Allied personnel as possible after the surrender of Java. On 20 April 1942 he became a prisoner of the Japanese. He was taken to prison camps first at Sukabumi and then to Bandung. Van der Post was known for his work in maintaining the morale of prisoners of many nationalities. Along with others he organized a "camp university" with courses from basic literacy to degree-standard ancient history and he also organized a camp farm to supplement nutritional needs. He could speak some basic Japanese which helped him greatly. He wrote about his prison experiences in A Bar of Shadow 1954. Following the surrender of Japan while his fellow POWs were repatriated van der Post chose to remain in Java and on 15 September 1945 he joined Admiral Wilfrid Patterson on HMS Cumberland for the official surrender of the Japanese in Java to British forces representing the Allies. Van der Post then spent two years helping to mediate between Indonesian nationalists and members of the Dutch Colonial Government. He had gained the trust of the nationalist leaders such as Mohammad Hatta and Sukarno and warned both British Prime Minister Clement Attlee and the Allied Supreme Commander in South East Asia Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten whom he met in London in October 1945 that the country was on the verge of blowing up. Van der Post traveled to The Hague to repeat his warning directly to the Dutch cabinet. In November 1946 British forces withdrew and van der Post became military attaché to the British consulate in Batavia. By 1947 after he had returned to England the Indonesian Revolution had begun. That same year van der Post retired from the army and was made a CBE. In 1950 Lord Reith head of the CDC asked van der Post to head an expedition to Bechuanaland now Botswana to see the potential of the remote Kalahari Desert for cattle ranching. There van der Post for the first time met the hunter-gatherer people known as the Bushmen or San people. He repeated the journey to the Kalahari in 1952. In 1953 he published his third book The Face Beside the Fire a novel about a psychologically "lost" artist in search of his soul and soul-mate which shows Jung's influence on his thinking and writing. His 90th birthday celebration was held over five days in Colorado with a "this is your life"-type event with friends from every period of his life. On 15 December 1996 after whispering in Afrikaans "die sterre" the stars he died. The funeral took place on 20 December in London attended by Zulu chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi Prince Charles Margaret Thatcher and many friends and family. The Hogarth Press hardcover

Ground Zero Books · Estados Unidos85,00 US$≈ 75,79 €

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