Johanna at Daybreak — R.C. Hutchinson

A note prefacing this complex novel intimates that R.C. Hutchinson's interest was aroused originally by an article in a Dutch journal. The story of Johanna von Leezen was truly puzzling: was she a criminal hiding a corrupt past under the pretence of amnesia, or were her anxieties and hallucinations caused by the shock of her experiences of war? Hutchinson was constrained to begin a search for 'Johanna'; and by degrees he learnt her strange and moving story.



Johanna at Daybreak is a fictional exploration of the events which lead to the discovery of a middle aged woman in a Dutch refugee home, who could not recollect any account of her past, yet trembled at the thought of going to Germany. Her stupefying fear of arrest and trial for a capital offence inspired the authorities and doctors to get down to the root of her mystery. Little by little the truth comes out, half grey reality, half nightmare.



Johanna at Daybreak, first published in 1969, is an at times dark, at times touching exploration of self-identity in the traumatic post-war reality.