This story is a striking indictment of colonialism and imperialism in all its forms. What struck me the most was how the protagonist developed from merely having some feelings of guilt about the racist treatment meted out to prisoners, to becoming self-aware of his privilege and his role in the advancement of Empire, to experiencing self-hate and indifference. His continuous naivete and idealistic bursts of optimism keep pushing him towards yet more atrocities as he comes to terms with the evil that he stands for. He grapples with his own perception of what can be defined as "civilisation" and what can be its opposite, "barbarianism", and finds the gaps in his understanding very troubling. The writing is delicate yet every sentence is pregnant with myriad conflicting emotions. The ever-present threat of war against an enemy created from nothing, the inner conflict between a life's worth of imperialist indoctrination and a newfound sense of post-colonial truth, the uncertain relations with other people, a rejection of history (especially imperialist history) and a return to nature, all are present consistently in the text, and impress themselves upon the reader continuously. Coetzee strives to explore all aspects of colonialism and how it makes prisoners of both oppressor and oppressed, with an almost austere, detached yet deeply poignant perspective that left a mark so deeply that it has compelled me to research more into settler-colonialism and other forms of imperialism that linger to this day.