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Shadowed Country

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In 2004 a journalist reported that two magnificent English country houses had become properties of a "wild man from Asia." The article created waves of diverse responses due to the nature of the claim as well as the background of the new owner, a son of impoverished peasants from the mud and mire of the East.

Prem Surin, the new owner of Warleigh Manor and Ashdown Hall, reportedly stated: "Ashdown Hall has been our family seat for centuries. I am destined to return and protect it from falling into wrong hands. It is beyond me to prevent Siam from the take-over but Ashdown Hall must not go the same way while it is within my power to protect it. As for Warleigh Manor, the previous owner, Charles Tregonning, pinched my spoons when he was my butler in the other life. In this life he merely gave back what had been mine plus interest at the rate of 13 per cent APR – whatever that is – which the Lord has kept the account, counting from an actual time of pilferage up to now which would be 135 years."

Pira Canning Sudham takes a different approach. Craftily he explores dark caverns, mysterious avenues and perilous highways and byways that lead to the take-over not only of England’s treasure troves but also of a shadowed land named "Siam."

Sudham delves deep into the morass as opposed to the journalist’s muckraking technique. Eventually he comes up with riveting accounts of the massacres of pro-democracy protesters, the murders of idealistic and courageous teachers, a pernicious plot code-named DDT, corruptive forces and shadowy worlds of graft, sex trade, drug trafficking and various forms of corruption. But Sudham deftly deals with such stark and gross matters with poetical narrative that has become one of the most remarkable writings of contemporary literature. That is understandable for he is primarily a poet.

The exploration has been Pira Canning Sudham’s work of a lifetime, covering fifty years of social, political changes occurred in Thailand since 1955. In his thirties, Sudham worked on the first book of Shadowed Country and published it in 1988 under of title of Monsoon Country. The saga continued. In 2002 The Force of Karma, a sequel to Monsoon Country, appeared separately. To combine the prequel and its sequel, Sudham extensively revised and expanded them so that the two works match seamlessly.

"The Force of Karma was penned in my late fifties after having lived a writer’s life in England for over a decade," Sudham said. "Though I wanted to adhere to that clear, crisp and direct prose, which many readers of Monsoon Country considered daunting, it would be pretentious for an aging wordsmith like me to continue in the same vein. Hence, I extensively revised both books, taking the opportunity to weave in some new yarns so as to enrich further the whole tapestry. To my mind Monsoon Country is now at the same par with its sequel, The Force of Karma."

Pira Canning Sudham’s Shadowed Country is available at all good bookstores or can be ordered online direct from DCO Books in Bangkok for immediate shipment worldwide.