成人论坛

Richard Flanagan discusses his 2014 Man Booker Prize winning novel The Narrow Road to the Deep North set among prisoners of war who were forced by the Japanese to work on the notorious Thai-Burma railway.

Flanagan, a Tasmanian, wrote the book in tribute to his late father, who survived the horrors of "The Line". Thousands more did not, and in the programme Flanagan describes how he and his siblings were children of the Death Railway as they grew up listening to their father's stories, which included witnessing the violent murder of his friend Micky Hallam at the hands of Japanese guards.

Flanagan also talks how he set out to write a non-judgemental novel about the camps, and how he used Japanese poetry to open himself up to what is best in the Japanese character, with the poet Basho's Narrow Road to the Deep North as his inspiration. The beauty of the poetry allowed him to write the novel that set him free from his father's past.

His father died on the very day Richard Flanagan finished the novel.

Presented by James Naughtie and recorded with a group of readers.

February's Bookclub choice : Burnt Shadows by Kamila Shamsie (2009)

Interviewed Guest : Richard Flanagan
Presenter : James Naughtie
Producer : Dymphna Flynn.