watervole | The Chequer Board

Like all of Shute's books, this is as much about people as events.

The title is taken from the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayam.

“Tis all a Chequer-board of nights and days

Where Destiny with men for Pieces plays:

Hither and thither moves, and mates, and slays,

And one by one back in the closet lays.”

Four men meet in a military hospital during the WWII. John Turner is unable to see the other three because of an injury to his eyes, but they all help him by reading to him, or holding conversations with him.

One, a black man, has been accused of raping a white woman; the second, a paratrooper, is facing a murder charge; and the third has been betrayed by his wife. None of them has much too look forward to when they are well enough stand trial, or to go home.

Many years later, when Turner learns he has not long to live, he determines to find out what happened to the other three, and see if there is anything he can do to help them.

This a book about prejudice and preconceptions. It uses the 'N' word, but it was written at a time when that word was still in common use.

Each of the three men has faced misunderstanding in one form or another. Two of their stories (the strongest ones, I feel) relate to the way people have pre-conceptions or prejudices with regard other races. The third is also telling in its own way - it looks at the way the army trains a man to kill, but how that training can work against him in a non-combat situation.

One of the things I like about Shute's writing is that he doesn't rush. He tells the story as it happens to Turner. It shows us - as does 'One the Beach' that there are choices when we have fore-knowledge of our own death.

Shute lived in a slower world than ours. Even with aviation, it still took longer to get to places than it does now.

Turner is not a perfect man -he's done some wheeling and dealing in the black market, and his relationship with his wife is not all it could be. But his quest to help his fellow men draws him and his wife closer together for the time they have remaining.

All in all, this is a book that helps one remember that we're all just people. And that there are unexpected kind people in many different places.

The Chequer Board - Nevile Shute

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