ImageNations

Bombay's Republic  looks at war and its aftermath, especially the psychological effect of a war fought for an unknown cause in an unknown land. Bombay, the main protagonist, has returned from Burma where he had fought at the 'Forgotten' front of the Second World War. But Bombay had not returned quietly and innocently and wholly as he had left. He has come back to his village in Nigeria as a man transformed, with scars all over his body and also with silence. Upon his arrival he has made it a point not to tell any of the news-seeking folks the ordeal he went through in the war and how prejudice against him helped saved his life. He has refused to tell these adult folks how tiger-leeches stuck and sucked out his blood as they waded through rivers; how his comrades were caught in traps that snapped off their heads and carved through their bellies. He has not told anyone any of these including several acts of bravery that earned him three medals of honour including the presti...