Does for Kuwait what Casablanca does for Morocco.
- Book: Our Man In Kuwait
- Location: Kuwait
- Author: Louise Burfitt-Dons
The narrative of Our Man In Kuwait is mostly set in Ahmadi, the oil town constructed by the Kuwait Oil Company in 1946 to house expats and oil workers. “The Ahmadi roads were laid out in an orderly US grid system orientated east west and north south. They carried numeric names such as 11st Street, 2nd Street and so on.”
Gordon Carlisle is the protagonist. A Brit who is lured into working for MI6 during the period leading up to a potential invasion of Kuwait from Iraq in 1961. We follow his adventures as he weaves himself in and out of trouble following a spate of unexplained deaths, fires and abductions.
As a travel book, it’s a colourful portrayal of this tiny Middle Eastern country. The book evokes a great sense of the place, the sights and smells of the souk, a vivid description of a hawking expedition with visiting author and Naval Intelligence agent Ian Fleming, and café life in the old town. “Brigadier General Mustafa al-Ramiz al-Sabah sat enjoying the outside shade of the café on Abdulmunim Riyadh Street. The traffic streamed by, disturbing the peace. But inside the air was thick with tobacco smoke. Which was worse, he asked himself?” The maddening traffic is a feature of Kuwait city. “I don’t know of anywhere drivers honk their horns as much as here.”
Balanced against that is the quietness of the empty desert and an Anglo-American society which collects around The Hubara Club under sun umbrellas. “The short walk in the overpowering heat to the upper pool terrace at the Hubara Club had been enough to leave Jan Beresford gasping for air,” or prepare home-based black-tie dinner parties. “Overhead the stars shone brightly out of the velvet tropical sky over Ahmadi. Verandah lights glowed through gaps in the thatched fencing as he sped by.’”
There’s a also love story running throughout to balance the spy intrigue and a cast of multi-dimensional characters who create their own entertainment around the Grundig radiogram with their Peter Stuyvesant cigarettes and pink gins.
Our Man in Kuwait is a nostalgic timepiece which does for Kuwait what Casablanca did for Morocco in terms of romantic appeal. There’s a realism about the writing which is based on true events. The story is set in 1960 when the oil-rich country was facing a possible invasion from Iraq, espionage was highly active in the post-War post-Colonial Middle East and the Arab League was expanding.
The plot twists and turns constantly searching for a Russian agent buried deep in the stiff upper lipped community. It doesn’t let up until the very end.
Our Man in Kuwait is a wonderful read, a brilliant story and a travel book with a difference.
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