Anna and the King of Siam

THIS is an enchanting book. The author wears her scholarship with grace, and the amazing story she has to toll is recounted with humor and understanding. And what a story it is! Not fiction, but skillful documented biography.

Anna, the Englishwoman who became governess to innumerable children of the King of Siam and many of his concubines, was heaven-sent for the role. She was attractive and uncompromisingly virtuous. Neither the King nor anyone else could bribe her to the smallest degree, and it was through her complete integrity that she became a real power in the harem city of Bangkok for five years in the 1860’s.

Herself living outside the enervating atmosphere of the court, where all were slaves to the whim of their master, she was able to do astonishing things. She penetrated jails where favorites out of fashion languished, she interceded with the hard-faced but comparatively just prime minister for the lives of innocent victims of all classes, and she frequently challenged the King himself when outrageous and vindictive passions overwhelmed him.

The conversations between the two make exquisite episodes, beginning from the first moment of their meeting when he imperiously demands her age. That is her own affair. “One hundred and fifty years old, Sire,” she tells him. And the strange temperamental king, though accustomed to crawling sycophants, evidently recognizes the free character of Anna, a young woman still in her twenties, and jocularly inquires the number of her grandchildren, thereby turning the tables on her.

She was to endure many exhausting and some terrible interviews with him. But she had made her mark upon his mind. After the most terrible tragedy in the book has taken place at the King’s command, and she faces him, so strong are her detestation and scorn that he presently admits his mistake with an almost childlike penitence. The tragedy is horrifying and superb, the victims a noble young monk and a girl of sixteen. The story of Tuptim and her former betrothed, innocent of any expression of their love through the double ban of religious vows and the law of the harem, might rank with any great love story of the world.

Apart from imprisonment and torture, the saddest accounts are of the women in the monstrous harem world who possessed intellectual gifts and a spirit to reach out beyond the enclosing walls. To some of these the Englishwoman was able to bring light and comparative happiness. Such women as she are a leaven in any lump. Highly educated and firm in her beliefs, she was also blessed with a compassionate understanding. “You are difficult woman,” said the King, “and more difficult than generality.” But he added, “I have more confidence on you every day.”

The effect on Oriental affairs of these “ difficult ” women from the West has been out of all proportion to their numbers. Anna herself in her education of the young prince and future king undoubtedly assisted in the transformation of old Siam into the Thailand of today.

Not all in this book is sad. Much is humorous and exotic, and the illustrations are deft, romantic, and of the period. John Day, $3.75.

KATHARINE SANSOM