Miracle on the River Kwai - Ernest Gordon

Published by Collins: London and Glasgow, 1963.

I had the wrong idea about what this book was to begin with. Not drastically wrong, but just wrong enough that there were points I began questioning whether I was reading what I thought I was reading.

What I thought I was reading was the book that inspired the movie Bridge on the River Kwai. I've never seen that movie, but I know it was popular when it came out, and it is one I'd like to see eventually. It turns out, though, that Bridge is a fictional story based around the building of an actual bridge on an actual River Kwai by British prisoners-of-war, and that Miracle is the non-fiction account of one of those prisoners. The bridge itself is only mentioned briefly.

At points it is quite intense, as many prisoner-of-war stories (and, sadly, especially prisoner-of-war stories set in Japanese prisoner-of-war camps) can be. And this intensity is added to by the way the author describes the spiritual journey of the prisoners in question; the widespread loss of faith and sense of hopelessness spreading through the camps, as well as the author's own dismissive views towards Christianity, were hard to read at some points, especially for a person of faith as myself.

But, it is important to read difficult texts as well. And what is interesting, is that - unexpectedly - the author of Miracle ends up finding a faith within the midst of the prison camps. Perhaps I should have seen it coming (after all, the word 'miracle' is in the title!) but this is where the misconceptions I had about the book's contents actually helped. I was so disorientated by what the book actually was that I was ready to accept the possibility that it wasn't a 'Christian' book despite this copy having a stamp inside the cover that was from a particular church! This made his sudden discovery of faith more surprising, and, yes, miraculous.

Anyway, it is an interesting read overall (and would have been, even without the faith journey). Not my favourite book of this style, and I'm not sure I would call Gordon a natural author, but certainly impacting and thought-provoking. 

Completed 1 May 2024.

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