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Please go to Paul Theroux.com's new site, Paul TherouxFree Computer Help Forum Jack Flowers, saint
or sinner, found a new lease on life when he jumped off the Allegro
in the Straits of Malacca, caught a passing bumboat to Singapore
and got a job as a water-clerk to a Chinese ship chandler. Soon he
executed a brilliant idea, which resulted in his fame throughout the
Far East - - work which Jack likens to that of an idealistic
missionary. He continues to offer girls (indeed “anything, anything at
all”) to tourists, sailors, residents and expatriates. In due course,
he starts two establishments of his own -- ‘Dunroamin’ with its Indian
palm court orchestra, and Paradise Gardens, a private hotel for
American soldiers on leave from Vietnam.
But Jack’s story is more than a
detailed record of pimping in the tropics. His 53 years weigh on him
and he dreams extravagantly of success. When Mr. Leigh from Hong Kong
shows up to do the accounts for his employer, Jack sees many of his
own yearnings in the visiting Englishman. After a heady period of
hope, however, he is brought face to face with death and a sense of
his own failure. The shock persuades him to agree to act as
blackmailer for the faintly sinister American, Edwin Shuck, in a plot
against a general from Vietnam. The outcome, which can hardly be
called a success, leaves Jack unscathed if not entirely triumphant.
These outrageous confessions of an
ingenious and thoughtful con man admit the reader into the seedy and
unforgettable world of expatriates among imperial ruins. |
