What is the Significance of the prisoner in'The Long The Short and The Tall?" "The Long the Short and the Tall" is a play set in the Second World War, 1942, in the humid Malayan tropical jungle.

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What is the Significance of the prisoner in

'The Long The Short and The Tall?"

"The Long the Short and the Tall" is a play set in the Second World War, 1942, in the humid Malayan tropical jungle. Most of the action takes place in a small, wooden hut, where a British Patrol, consisting of one sergeant, two corporals and four privates, who have been cut off from their base camp because of advancing Japanese soldiers, are trying to make contact with base, which is fifteen miles away, using a radio transmitter/ receiver.

A Japanese soldier, who has slipped away from his platoon for a cigarette becomes interested in the hut after seeing the radio transmitter/receiver on the table through the glassless window. As the Japanese soldier advances towards the entrance to the hut, the British Patrol inside prepare to attack him as soon as he walks in. As the soldier marches in, he is pounced on by Johnstone, who restrains him and turns the Japanese soldier into a P.O.W. The British Patrol, have the option of killing the non-English speaking soldier or taking him back with them to base as he could give information about the enemy when interrogated. This is where the resources of the British Patrol are tested as some want to give the Japanese soldier his human rights and follow the laws of the Geneva Convention but others want to break these laws and kill the soldier in cold blood, as they believe he is just an ordinary soldier and there is no need to take him back by risking their own lives. This brings out the character of each of the soldiers as the heated argument of life and death carries on and the tension grows. In my opinion the prisoner has a huge significance in the play and has a large effect on all of the characters. All of the characters approach the prisoner in different ways and have conflicting views about him.

Private Bamforth is probably one of the most important characters in the book. He is intensely sceptical about war and about the British army. He challenges its authority at every opportunity and mocks his superiors with his knowledge of all the army rules and regulations. He constantly defies other members of the patrol and makes himself more estranged from the rest of the group as the play advances. He is the one who realises that the Japanese soldier is a human being, that he has a wife and children and he sees him as not just as an enemy P.O.W. At first Bamforth was totally the opposite. He was aggressive towards the Japanese prisoner and was willing to kill him along with Johnstone, using the bayonet. Sergeant Mitchem orders Bamforth to stay with the prisoner, keeping an eye on him so that he doesn't escape.
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His relationship with the prisoner changes after he is offered a cigarette by him and is shown pictures of his wife and kids. These two simple actions by the prisoner make Bamforth see him as a human being and not as a P.O.W; this being proven when Bamforth says 'He's almost a human this one.' Bamforth defends the prisoner during the two arguments about the cigarettes and the case and says that he gave him the cigarettes after the prisoner is accused of the stealing them from a British soldier. When Mitchem makes the decision that they will ...

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