The Chequer Board is a novel by Nevil Shute, first published in the United Kingdom in 1947 by William Heinemann Ltd. The novel deals with the question of racism within the US forces during World War II and portrays black characters with sympathy and support. Shute began writing The Chequer Board in September 1945 and completed it in February 1946. [1]
"This novel may shock you, but not for any of the usual reasons. The clear vision of this swift-moving, heart-warming story will give you a glimpse of what the brotherhood of man might mean."
—Dust-jacket, US edition, 1947
The story tells of the experiences of one John (Jackie) Turner, whom the doctors have given just one year to live as a result of a severe head injury sustained when the aircraft in which he was travelling was attacked by a German fighter in the Second World War. Turner decides to use his remaining time to trace the men he got to know while recovering in hospital.
The men were:
As the story unfolds, the reader learns that charges against Lesurier were dropped after an Army investigation and that he later returned to the English town near which he was stationed during the war. He marries the girl he was courting and becomes a draughtsman. Brent is acquitted of murder but served six months for manslaughter after sucessfully being aquitted at a court-martial. He is later found living close to Lesurier and working as a meat vendor. Morgan relocates to Burma and becomes a successful businessman, married into a strong local community.
Turner is contented by the thought that each man, who had helped with his recovery after the plane crash, had succeeded in making a good life in his own way. The novel ends with what will be his last visit to his medical specialist.
Underlying the novel is the Buddhist belief in reincarnation and redemption. Despite his shady past, it is indicated that Turner, through his attempts to help his fellow patients and his acceptance of his death, has moved closer to Nirvana.
The book's title is taken from Stanza XLVIX of Edward FitzGerald's Rubáiyát of Khayyám :
'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.
The initial idea for The Chequer Board came about when Shute came across the book A Rising Wind (1945) by the American civil rights campaigner Walter White. Shute contacted White and a correspondence developed. [2]
The portions of the book that take place in Burma were based on Shute's own experiences there during World War II. [1] From the dust-jacket: "It was very difficult to feel these cultured brown girls, all speaking excellent English...were really any different from the girls at home." He also noted during the war the "popularity of American Negroes in England and the superior quality of the Burmese people", both of which are central to the book's story. [3] Shute drew on the outbreak of racial violence in 1943 involving American soldiers stationed in the village of Bamber Bridge, Lancashire, in Northern England. [4]
Shute was concerned that sales of the book in the United States would be reduced because of the book's open-minded handling of racial issues; as it turned out, sales soared. [5] Shute and his wife travelled around the U.S. on Greyhound buses to "get in touch with the man on the street," finding the experience refreshing. Afterwards he wrote "Sincerity is the first attribute for making money in the business of writing novels." [5]
Nevil Shute Norway was an English novelist and aeronautical engineer who spent his later years in Australia. He used his full name in his engineering career and Nevil Shute as his pen name, in order to protect his engineering career from inferences by his employers (Vickers) or from fellow engineers that he was "not a serious person" or from potentially adverse publicity in connection with his novels, which included On the Beach and A Town Like Alice.
William Clark Styron Jr. was an American novelist and essayist who won major literary awards for his work.
On the Beach is an apocalyptic novel published in 1957, written by British author Nevil Shute after he emigrated to Australia. The novel details the experiences of a mixed group of people in Melbourne as they await the arrival of deadly radiation spreading towards them from the Northern Hemisphere, following a nuclear war some years previous. As the radiation approaches, each person deals with impending death differently.
A Town Like Alice is a romance novel by Nevil Shute, published in 1950 when Shute had newly settled in Australia. Jean Paget, a young Englishwoman, becomes romantically interested in a fellow prisoner of World War II in Malaya, and after liberation emigrates to Australia to be with him, where she attempts, by investing her substantial financial inheritance, to generate economic prosperity in a small outback community—to turn it into "a town like Alice" i.e. Alice Springs.
Slide Rule: Autobiography of an Engineer is the partial autobiography of the British novelist Nevil Shute. It was first published in 1954. Slide Rule concentrates on Nevil Shute's work in aviation, ending in 1938 when he left the industry.
The Far Country is a novel by Nevil Shute, first published in 1952.
Farewell Summer is a novel by American writer Ray Bradbury, published on October 17, 2006. It was his last novel released in his lifetime. It is a sequel to his 1957 novel Dandelion Wine, and is set during an Indian summer in October 1929. The story concerns a mock war between the young and the old in Green Town, Illinois, and the sexual awakening of Doug Spaulding as he turns 14. With Something Wicked This Way Comes, they form a trilogy of novels inspired by Bradbury's childhood in Waukegan, Illinois.
Round the Bend is a 1951 novel by Nevil Shute. It tells the story of Constantine "Connie" Shaklin, an aircraft engineer who founds a new religion transcending existing religions based on the merit of good work. It deals with racism, including the White Australia policy, and also with the importance of private enterprise. It was one of the first novels Shute wrote after emigrating from Britain to Australia in 1950.
Ruined City is a 1938 novel by Nevil Shute, published by Cassell in the UK. In the US, the book was published by William Morrow under the title Kindling.
Pukka sahib is a slang term taken from the Hindi words for "substantial" and "master". Among English users, "pukka" came to signify "first class" or "absolutely genuine", so that the combined phrase can be translated as "true gentleman" or "excellent fellow". The expression was used in the British Empire exclusively to refer to White people of European extraction and frequently to describe an attitude which British administrators were said to affect, that of an "aloof, impartial, incorruptible arbiter of the political fate of a large part of the earth's surface."
Pastoral is a novel by the English author Nevil Shute. It was first published in 1944 by Heinemann. Its theme is that even in the midst of war, and among warriors, everyday life, such as romance, will continue.
Landfall: A Channel Story is a novel by Nevil Shute. It was first published in England in 1940 by Heinemann.
Marazan is the first published novel by the British author Nevil Shute. It was originally published in 1926 by Cassell & Co, then republished in 1951 by William Heinemann. The events of the novel occur, in part, around the Isles of Scilly.
On the Beach is a 1959 American post-apocalyptic science fiction drama film from United Artists starring Gregory Peck, Ava Gardner, Fred Astaire, and Anthony Perkins. Produced and directed by Stanley Kramer, it is based on Nevil Shute's 1957 novel On the Beach depicting the aftermath of a nuclear war. Unlike the novel, no one is assigned blame for starting the war, which attributes global annihilation with fear, compounded by accident or misjudgment.
Requiem For A Wren is a novel by Nevil Shute. It was first published in 1955 by William Heinemann Ltd. It was published in the United States under the title The Breaking Wave.
Herbert James "Ringer" Edwards was an Australian soldier during World War II. As a prisoner of war (POW), he survived being crucified for 63 hours by Japanese soldiers on the Burma Railway. Edwards was the basis for the character Joe Harman in Nevil Shute's novel A Town Like Alice. The book was the basis for a 1956 film and a 1981 Australian television miniseries of the same name.
The Franchise Affair is a 1948 British mystery novel by Josephine Tey about the investigation of a mother and daughter accused of kidnapping a young woman visiting their area. It was published in the UK by Peter Davies Ltd in 1948 and in the USA by The Macmillan Company in 1949. While the book has maintained its reputation among readers of British genre fiction, and has often been adapted to other media, its social attitudes have been heavily criticised by more modern commentators.
Stephen Morris and Pilotage are two short novels by Nevil Shute; the first novels he wrote after writing poetry and short stories. Stephen Morris was finished in 1923 while Shute was working at Stag Lane for de Havilland, and Pilotage was written in 1924. Unpublished during his lifetime, but published by his estate in one volume as many of the characters are common to both novels. They are set in the budding post-war aviation industry in Britain, and also on yachts (Pilotage).
The President's Plane Is Missing is a 1967 novel by Robert J. Serling. The book was made into a made-for-TV film by the same name, directed by Daryl Duke, which aired on 23 October 1973 in the United States. The book tells the story of a crash of Air Force One in remote terrain and the uncertainty stemming from the lack of confirmation whether the president of the United States is alive or dead. The vice president, an unpopular figure, pressures the cabinet to declare him acting president under the terms of the 25th Amendment so he can address a growing crisis with China with a pre-emptive nuclear strike.
A Brightness Long Ago is a historical fantasy novel by Canadian writer Guy Gavriel Kay published in 2019 by Viking Press. It is inspired from the events of 15th-century Italy leading to the Italian Wars, and particularly the feud between Federico da Montefeltro and Sigismondo Pandolfo Malatesta.