The Military Philosophers

Über

The Military Philosophers is the ninth of Anthony Powell's twelve-novel sequence A Dance to the Music of Time. First published in 1968, it covers the latter part of Nicholas Jenkins' service in World War II. It depicts, with ironic detachment, a little-chronicled byway of the war effort, Allied Liaison.
The author draws more directly here than elsewhere upon his own experience, and the novel adopts a tone at times close to that of diary, as it records the improbable events involving the allied military delegations, including the springing of a Polish officer from prison. The vanity and jealousies of the allied military attachés are portrayed with humour in dialogue that rings with conviction.
Characters previously encountered are seen to have aged, some greatly, others, like Mrs Erdleigh, hardly at all. Pamela Flitton emerges as a three-dimensional figure, turbulent and intriguing all who encounter her.
The final scene is at Olympia, a large exhibition hall in west London, where the demobilised Jenkins now a major in the Intelligence Corps, is choosing his new civilian clothing known as a 'demob suit'.