During WWII, Cretan resistance to the Nazis was augmented by the Special Operations Executive (otherwise known as "The Firm"), Churchill's secret arm of the British military, made up of lone fighters, "poets, professors, archaeologists — anyone who'd traveled a bit and knew is or her way around foreign countries." Dropped behind enemy lines to wreak havoc, these "lethal shadows" fought in tandem with the audacious, all but shoeless resistance. (Weapons of choice: sickles, axes and garden tools.)
MacDougall summons up an entertaining cast of characters: a one-eyed archaeologist named John Pendleburg, the penniless young artist Xan Fielding, and wandering playboy-poet Patrick Leigh Fermor. Then there are the home-grown resistance fighters, daring men with nicknames like "The Clown" — a shepherd turned bandit — the "wind boys" and Scuttle George.
By profiling these atypical commandos, McDougall redefines the heroic ideal, establishing heroism as a skill set rather than a virtue. "For much of human history," he writes, "the art of the hero wasn't left up to chance; it was a multidisciplinary endeavor devoted to optimal nutrition, physical self-mastery, and mental conditioning." Crete, it turns out, has a nickname: "the Island of Heroes."
Long-Distance Runner Was 'Indomitable Seeker'
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At the age of fifty, the author embraces Parkour, or freerunning, beginning by ricocheting off the bricks of a London housing project, loving the sense of flow. He learns about the supreme importance of the fascia, the "powerful connective tissue that is like your body's rubber band," which enable him to effortlessly bounce down mountainsides as he claims the ancient Greeks did. A Paleo diet (the Cretan version: wild greens, snails and boiled hay) allows him to utilize his body's fat for fuel and gives him the ability to scale steep mountaintops.
"The art of the hero," he discovers, "wasn't about being brave; it was about being so competent that bravery wasn't an issue."
The essential narrative here, the twisty tale of a kidnapping that incredibly goes right, is exciting. It is balanced out with the journalistic account of McDougall's entry into the world of the hero. His personal quest to "rewild the psyche" might seem an awkward fit with war storytelling. But under McDougall's sure hand the combination improbably works.
Kind of like kidnapping a German general on an island swarming with Nazi troops.
Read an excerpt of Natural Born Heroes
Jean Zimmerman's latest novel, Savage Girl, is out in paperback. She posts daily at Blog Cabin.