Reviews for Cage

The average rating for Cage based on 2 reviews is 2 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2019-03-10 00:00:00 Carl Kloeppner The book was well-written, but it was the most dismal, unhappy book I've run into in a long, long time. There was nothing pleasant to be said about it.

Review # 2 was written on 2015-08-15 00:00:00 Bob Dieckman Trust Graham Greene to make a "biography" as well as a nuanced and objective account of the political tumult of South and Central America in the 1970s and 1980s not only so compulsively, instantly readable and entertaining but also, most crucially, warm, wise, witty, even hilariously absurd and ultimately poignant and profound in turns. "Getting To Know The General" is, uncharacteristically for a man who could never quite bring himself to trust a single leader or ideology, above all these things too - it is a stirring, gentle, even Quixotic tale of friendship and camaraderie between Greene and General Omar Torrijos, the military leader of Panama's National Guard, who had, among other notable things, assumed de facto reign of Panama and was also the leader who had eventually negotiated the Torrijos-Carter treaty in 1977, thus ensuring, at least in piecemeal fashion, the eventual handover of the Canal back to Panama, a treaty that caused something of a furore in America's political circuits who were aghast at surrendering their "vital strategic asset". And yet, the book is less concerned with the Treaty, the behind-the-scenes chicanery that resulted in it being signed, despite the generally uneasy relations between USA and Panama or even the apprehensive aftermath; rather, Greene is more interested in chronicling his freewheeling adventures with the General (with whom he shares a melancholic sense of introspection as well as a blustery sense of mischief and goodwill), Sergeant Chuchu, the General's trusted right-hand man, whose belligerent idealism is as infectious as the complexities of his marriage and sexual life are befuddling and a host of other intriguing real-life characters - the determined, heroic Sandinistas on exile from Nicaragua, the General's allies in the neighbouring islands and also a few comically sinister men prowling on the periphery, wondering what is Greene really up to here. Indeed, what was he up to in Panama, a place which, unlike his other beloved foraging grounds like Indo-China, Cuba, Paraguay, has little of that sinful, dangerous allure that so excited him about them in the first place? The answer to that is the General and Chuchu's company - the rollicking, picaresque spells of flying from here to there in planes in bad weather, drinking rum cocktails and Pisco Sours well into the night, fancying beautiful women and also trying to make some sense of the strange political conundrums in the region. And so the book is more fun to read than it should be, Greene dispensing largely with standard issue political commentary and instead diving into the centre of all the action, thus gripping us readers into the tale and travesty effortlessly as ever and eventually helping us understand the General and all these people very believably. General Torrijos emerges, in this slim charming book, as an enigmatic and admirable personality. In a bright contrast to most other South American dictators and rulers, sponsored for most part by the United States and almost tyrannical in their methods, he was amiable, affable and even mild-mannered in turns - he is portrayed here as nursing the dream of bringing freedom to Panama and also establishing it as an independent republic capable of negotiating with any of the superpowers without bowing to their whims and fancies. He is considerate of the woes of the villagers, he is prudent enough not to commit totally to Communism and at the same time, he also heeds the advice of his fellow leaders, most notably Fidel Castro, on how to act on crucial decisions. On top of that, he is just the Quixotic hero that a man like Greene, both dignified and raffish, would look up to and admire. Not everything in this book is fun and frivolity, though. Greene's usual penchant for journalistic observation pads these mellow, boisterous memories with a depth of political prescience - he is aware at all times of the General's political dilemma, of being torn between leading an armed confrontation with USA (which is what his own people expect from him) and following the more cautious, taciturn course of negotiating a fair treaty for returning the Canal to his people. The writer, true to his finely sharpened flair for thrillers, also portrays the interplay between Torrijos and his neighbouring states and how the General represented a paradigm-shift in the status of Latin America on the stage of global democracy and sovereignty. And as the book arrives at its expected but still heartbreaking denouement - the accidental death of Torrijos which was suspected, widely and even plausibly, as an insidious plot by the Reagan administration (though Greene, impressively, does not choose easy answers) - "Getting To Know The General" also becomes something else - a wistful lament about the near-failure of a dream - the dream that the General cherished about his and other South American countries being able to throw away the mantle of America's pervasive political intervention and build and evolve themselves into sovereign countries capable of a functional government. Even as we might not be aware of the actual realities in the present day, we can all agree on how that dream has either faltered or been nipped in the bud, time and again. Brilliantly, evocatively written with that trademark lucid prose, irreverent asides and wry character sketches and with both a warm poignancy and an astute understanding of political conundrums, Greene's book, predictably and happily so, is worth reading again and again.