The Gate
French ethnologist Francois Bizot'sThe Gateoffers a unique insight into the rise of the Khmer Rouge. In 1971 Bizot was studying                         ancient Buddhist traditions and living with his Khmer partner and daughter in a small village in the environs of the Angkor temple                         complex. The Khmer Rouge was fighting a guerilla war in rural Cambodia; during a routine visit to a nearby temple, Bizot and his                         two Khmer colleagues were captured by them and imprisoned deep in the jungle on suspicion of working for the CIA. On trial for                         his life, over the next three months Bizot developed a strong relationship with his captor, Comrade Douch, who would later become                         the Khmer Rouge's chief interrogator and commandant of the horrifying Tuol Sleng prison where thousands of captives were                         tortured prior to execution. The portrait Bizot gives of the young schoolteacher-turned revolutionary and their interaction is                         simultaneously fascinating and terrifying.Finally freed after Douch had pleaded his case with the leadership, Bizot became the only Western captive of the Khmer Rouge ever                         to be released alive, but his story does not end there. On his return to Phnom Penh, due to his fluency in Khmer, he was appointed                         interpreter between the occupying forces and the remaining western nationals holed up in the French embassy. As the interlocutor at                         the eponymous gate, he relates with dreadful resignation the moment when the Khmer nationals in the compound were ordered out                         by the Khmer Rouge forces for "resettlement."Bizot's is a touching and gripping account of one of the darkest moments in modern history and it is told with a unique voice. As a                         Cambodian resident, a lover of Cambodia and a fluent Khmer speaker, Bizot shows an understanding of the prevailing mood in the                         country that other Western commentators have failed to capture effectively, while as a Western academic he is able to see the forces                         at work and how Cambodia fits into the bigger picture of South East Asian conflict. What emerges is a tale of a land plunged into                         insanity and Bizot tells it like a eulogy for a dead friend and a confrontation of old demons.The Gateis a stunning book and a must                         for anyone interested in this grim period of Asian history.--Duncan Thomson