Cella d'isolamento

by Christopher Burney, Francesco Bovoli (Translator)

Parachuted into France as a British secret agent, Christopher Burney was arrested by the Gestapo and thrown into a solitary confinement cell in a prison outside Paris. There he spent 526 days in complete isolation. With little human contact and nothing to distract him, Burney developed a mental and spiritual regime that enabled him not just to survive but to develop an internal resilience that enabled him to survive his subsequent time in Buchenwald concentration camp.

Out of print for over 40 years and virtually unknown outside the U.K., Solitary Confinement has quietly developed a reputation as a modern masterpiece of contemplative literature.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Memoir, War, Psychology, Biography, Philosophy

182 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1951

About the author

Christopher Burney MBE (1917 – 1980) served in the Special Operations Executive during World War II.

Reviews

[Tosh · Rating 4 out of 5]

A remarkable document of a human in a bleak landscape, and coping with the restrictions of his prison cell. Well-written, and very much a classic piece of literature.

[James Klagge · Rating 5 out of 5]

An impressive even if little-known book. Having read about the solitary lives of monks, I now read a memoir by a wartime prisoner in solitary confinement in WW2. Burney was not educated past 16 years old, but was a very smart, thoughtful person. He was completely unprepared for his ordeal, which lasted 17 months, but found ways to survive it. What I liked best about the book was that Burney told not only about the routines he created, but the feelings and insights that they produced. He also spent a lot of time thinking about philosophical issues such as the problem of evil, the nature of free will, and the role of religion. He was raised outwardly in a Christian fashion, but never took it seriously. Now he wanted to think through ideas from the Bible that he remembered. And a year into his imprisonment he was given a Bible, which he mostly read through--twice. This gave him a lot to process, which he did skeptically, but also appreciatively. While his philosophical and theological reflections were pretty uninformed, he was impressively insightful. Nothing new, or even that clear, but impressive nonetheless.
When he was finally transferred from solitary, it was to a concentration camp--which was just the opposite, with its chaotic and social horrors, instead of his more predictable and solitary horrors, which he much preferred. While the memoir does not cover his time at the camp, he does indicate the difficulty he had communicating and even talking in this new setting.
Well-worth reading.

[Sarita · Rating 5 out of 5]

Damn All life really is passing time till the next meal

[Kayla · Rating 5 out of 5]

In "Solitary Confinement" the author takes readers on a journey through the corridors of introspection and existential contemplation. Each page is adorned with poignant insights that compel us to reconsider the very fabric of our existence. Through eloquent prose, the author challenges conventional notions of time and perception, inviting us to perceive life not as a linear progression of past consequences but as a series of discreet thresholds toward an uncertain future. As articulated on page 2, this perspective shift sets the tone for a narrative that navigates the delicate balance between anticipation and reflection. Incarceration becomes a metaphor for the human condition, as the protagonist transforms their prison cell into a metaphysical waiting room, where innocence is suspected. Suspicion is eventually dispelled (pg. 4). This imaginative compensation, the author suggests, is intrinsic to human nature, as we grapple with the enigma of mortality and the allure of metaphysical doctrines (pg. 36).

God, as portrayed in these pages, emerges not as a divine entity, but as a product of human longing for explanation, comfort, and hope (pg. 61). This deconstruction of religious tropes lays bare the essence of human yearning and the power of imagination to shape our existential narratives. As the narrative progresses, themes of resilience and liberation emerge from the shadows of solitude. The tiniest window becomes a symbol of defiance against oppressive forces, igniting a fervent desire to fight for what is loved rather than succumbing to the despair of what is hated (pg. 162). Yet, solitude, as portrayed on page 170, is not without its existential perils. It serves a purpose, providing the author with a canvas for introspection and the freedom to shed societal expectations. However, the looming specter of inanition threatens to extinguish this flame of self-discovery, reminding us of the delicate balance between solitude and connection.

"Solitary Confinement" is a captivating exploration of the human psyche, offering readers a mirror through which to reflect on their journey through life's labyrinth. With each turn of the page, we are invited to confront our fears, embrace our vulnerabilities, and ultimately, find solace in the pursuit of meaning amidst the uncertainty of existence.

[Tony Gualtieri · Rating 5 out of 5]

A masterpiece of contemplative literature and one of the greatest works on solitude ever written. The author combines a very British sangfroid with a Christian serenity bordering on the mystic.

[Joseph Hirsch · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've seldom read a book that this relentlessly takes you into the mind of someone else. Maybe Knut Hamsun's "Hunger" is the best parallel. Christopher Burney's "Solitary Confinement" throws the reader into the experience of an English resistance fighter caught by the Germans in occupied France during the Vichy regime.

The story starts in media res and very few details about the prior service or fighting of the narrator are revealed. Instead, what's depicted in transcendental prose is what it is like to be thrown into a cell and to have the door locked behind you, for a long period of time. The protagonist struggles first with boredom, later with hunger and illness, and finally with the metaphysical issues that have dogged mankind since time immemorial.

Along the way, the hungering body and the hungering soul reach a kind of strange accord, a serenity (strange as the word sounds) in which the protagonist-prisoner not only resolves himself to his plight in solitary confinement, but pretty much commends himself to the forces of nature, the universe, and the divine providence of God.

The prose is clean, usually succinct but peppered here and there with a word that was new to me (and I know a bunch of words), recalling a mixture of George Orwell at his most direct and Robert Graves at his most erudite. The prison where the narrator languishes (Fresnes) is French, as are the other prisoners for the most part, but the soul of the man telling the tale is English down to the last tweedy fiber.

A really incredible book, which came highly recommended by Kenneth Hartman, an author ("Mother California") currently serving life in prison; he ranks "Solitary Confinement" right up there with Nelson Mandela's autobiography. Highest recommendation, and it really puts the Corona "quarantine" into perspective. We got it easy, people, at least comparatively speaking.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

In this extraordinary 1951 memoir, Burney recalls his eighteen-month incarceration in a grim five-by-ten-foot cell, and the contemplations that preserved his sanity. A British secret agent arrested by the Gestapo in France in 1942, Burney endured beatings, interrogations, starvation and the constant proximity of death. More challenging than all these was the Sisyphean struggle of passing day after unending day stripped of stimuli, his sole agency invested in waiting until night to devour his daily chunk of bread. Mind games, singing and daydreams soon gave way to more profound epistemological, metaphysical and theological speculations, drawing the untutored young man towards a non-dualistic vision that transcended Good and Evil, biblical Wrath and Love, and perhaps even life and death. In precise and searching terms, Burney describes the transformation of his dungeon into an anchorite’s cell, a ‘blind eyrie’ from which can scan ‘the horizon of existence.’ These insights are further elaborated in Burney’s 1962 allegorical colloquy Descent from Ararat, appended here, which suggests we return to Eden by uprooting our knowledge of good and evil, while ‘respecting each other’s idiocy.’ Hugh Purcell’s invaluable afterword adds context for both works, revealing Burney’s early and later life, including his subsequent transfer to the hell of Buchenwald and his lifelong struggles with PTSD. Simple yet esoteric, visceral yet abstract, this revelatory account of humanity in extremis will reward multiple re-readings.

[Lofiuto Mascagni · Rating 5 out of 5]

Silenzio, lumaca, libero arbitrio e guerra

[Maurizio Manco · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Mentre un lato della nostra natura ci fa sezionare l’universo con i bisturi più affilati, l’altro ci spinge a cercare l’unità: noi siamo, di volta in volta, prosaici e poetici." (p. 130)

[Michael Roman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well worth the read.

[Logan Teder]

I'm grateful that he so eloquently shared the singular work of his lived experience. Maybe it's cruel to put it as such. This book is a meteorite.

[Anna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ricco, potente e magnifico. Riflessivo e introspettivo, ogni frase è un aneddoto interessante e stimolante. L'esercizio di libertà dell'autore è connubio di forza e coscienza di sè tale da influenzare il lettore a più profonda lettura, pensiero e vita.

[Neglectedbooks · Rating 5 out of 5]

Solitary Confinement is Christopher Burney’s account of the 526 days he spent in Fresnes prison, outside Paris, after being captured by the Germans as a suspected spy in 1942. Contrary to what you might expect, though, this is not a Wooden Horse/Escape from Colditz book of British derring-do and ingenuity. Escape was never a serious consideration for Burney, something he chides himself for rather late in the narrative.

Instead, he fully expected something worse than solitary confinement, and even pictured the firing squad he’d face if his real identity as a spy were found out. What makes Solitary Confinement stand out among war and prison memoirs is that Burney focuses, to the exclusion of almost all extraneous details, on the mental and emotional experience of his long stretch in solitary.

Frank Kermode was moved to write of Burney, “The courage and the intellectual integrity of this writer are far beyond what most of us would expect of ourselves….” The author’s interior journey, as it were, comes to overshadow even the drama of his physical adventures. And his sensitive, thoughtful, yet always self-deprecating account makes Solitary Confinement a truly exceptional book.

See the full review at http://neglectedbooks.com/?p=31.

[Cleo · Rating 2 out of 5]

I read this out of print book for a reader report for the New York Review of Books, and while it had its moments, overall I felt the prose was blocky and overly wordy. Not a book I would recommend the NYRB to reprint, although there were some amusing anecdotes and insights.