This classic was written in Saigon in the mid-50's and that is the time and place of this novel. The narrator is British, and a somewhat world-weary reporter on the wars in Indochina. The French had been defeated the year before and the Americans were beginning their involvement. The quiet man of the title is Pyle, young, enthusiastic and an economic attache. His optimism and naievete costs him his life. As for our narrator, Thomas Fowler, he exhibits a cynicism and despair at the efforts of the west to try and understand Vietnam and to save them from communism. His statement, "it's their war, not ours" anticipates the foolishness that America would embrace in the following decade.
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