“Mistrust had the viral obstinacy of wild bamboo, impossible to cut back before it had sprouted elsewhere,” writes Delphine Schrank. The Washington Post reporter’s comment, applicable to police states everywhere, is directed toward the military regime of Burma (Myanmar). In The Rebel of Rangoon, she takes an unusually close look at the rank and file of Burma’s pro-democracy movement, telling their story with a novelist’s eye for detail and setting. Some of the rebels have absorbed the ideals of Buddhism, letting go of anger and selfishness while pressing ahead for change; they communicate with each other through cryptic emails and furtive encounters in noisy bars, always suspecting that police agents are listening.
