The Long Day Wanes: A Malayan Trilogy

A sweetly satiric look at the twilight days of colonialism. Set in postwar Malaya at the time when people and governments alike are bemused and dazzled by the turmoil of independence, this three-part novel is rich in hilarious comedy and razor-sharp in observation. The protagonist of the work is Victor Crabbe, a teacher in a multiracial school in a squalid village, who moves upward in position as he and his wife maintain a steady decadent progress backward.

Arguably the best work written by Anthony Burgess based on his personal experience working as a teacher in Malaya.