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Latest Issues
Includes
-
y
The Ridge and the River : A Novel
Sydney
:
Angus and Robertson
,
1952
Z869333
1952
single work
novel
war literature
A novel based on the author's experiences while serving with the 2/8 Australian Commando Squadron in New Guinea, New Britain and Bougainville during World War II.
Sydney
:
Angus and Robertson
,
1979
-
y
We Were the Rats
Sydney
:
Angus and Robertson
,
1944
Z207775
1944
single work
novel
war literature
'A novel recounting the lives of some of the troops who ended up caught in Tobruk, surrounded by the German army for some 242 days, from the time before they enlisted through to the eventual departure of the ones who survived. This is not a book on military history at all, but rather a story about soldiers' lives.' (Publication summary)
Ringwood : Viking O'Neil , 1991 -
y
No Moon Tonight
Sydney
:
Angus and Robertson
,
1956
Z242793
1956
single work
autobiography
war literature
Don Charlwood, a wartime navigator with the Royal Australian Air Force, was posted in the winter of 1942 to 103 Squadron at Elsham Wolds, Lincolnshire. Here he tells the breath-taking true story of a wartime bomber crew facing the hazards of bombing strongly defended targets such as Essen, Dusseldorf and Berlin, and writes sympathetically and understandingly of the hopes and fears of the crews as squadron losses mounted.
Ringwood
:
Penguin
,
1991
-
y
The Twenty Thousand Thieves
Melbourne
:
Newmont
,
1951
Z471118
1951
single work
novel
war literature
'Their officers called them a stinking, lazy, drunken rabble and their friends said they took the colonel prisoner, burnt down their officers' mess and drove off the military police with heavy rifle-fire. This is the unforgettable story of the gallant men of the A.I.F.: the fearless and fatalistic Diggers of the Western Desert.
'Twenty thousand men were on their way to the deserts of Egypt and Libya: some had joined up for adventure, some were on the run from the police, for others, the army meant three meals a day and a bed to sleep in. From an induction camp in Australia to the siege of Tobruk, the savage intensity of Second X Battalion's experiences is not for the faint hearted. How soon will death silence so many of these brave voices and how many will ring out beyond the brutality of the battlefield?'
Source: Publisher's blurb (Head of Zeus ed.)
Ringwood : Penguin , 1992 -
y
Green Armour
Sydney
:
Angus and Robertson
,
1945
Z1131073
1945
single work
autobiography
war literature
A story of soldiers in New Guinea and the Solomon Islands between February 1942 and July 1943.
Ringwood
:
Penguin
,
1992
-
y
The Ridge and the River : A Novel
Sydney
:
Angus and Robertson
,
1952
Z869333
1952
single work
novel
war literature
A novel based on the author's experiences while serving with the 2/8 Australian Commando Squadron in New Guinea, New Britain and Bougainville during World War II.
Ringwood
:
Penguin
,
1992
-
y
The Naked Island
London
:
Werner Laurie
,
1952
Z825855
1952
single work
autobiography
war literature
Ringwood
:
Penguin
,
1993
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
-
The Forgotten Few : The Portrayal of Aerial Combat in Australian Fiction
2010
single work
criticism
— Appears in: War, Literature, and the Arts: An International Journal of the Humanities , January vol. 22 no. 2010; (p. 216-230) 'Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, there appeared a comparatively new genre of Australian war novel which sought to give readers some insight about the unique dangers of aerial combat and the intense pressures faced by Australian aircrews that fought in World War II and the Korean War. Yet few, if any, of these novels have ever been admitted into the canon of great Australian war literature.
A key reason for such exclusion, it will be argued, was that the mechanised nature of air warfare, coupled with the class-conscious hierarchy of the air force itself, placed these novels in direct opposition to the enduring appeal of the ANZAC 'legend', which was underpinned by the image of the egalitarian Australian soldier—the archetypal 'digger'.
Another equally telling reason for their diminished artistic status is that many of these novels emanated from the ranks of 'popular' paperbacks, which were routinely shunned by contemporary critics and remain almost continually overlooked by present-day scholars.
However, as this article will demonstrate, such critical disdain fails to acknowledge how systemic changes to Australia's post-war publishing landscape made it possible for a new generation of Australian war novelist, such as William R. Bennett, to reach a truly mass audience, for whom tales of aerial combat were not so much a celebration of an outmoded martial ideal of the Australian soldier, but an exciting harbinger of the technological age in which they lived.' (p. 216)
-
The Forgotten Few : The Portrayal of Aerial Combat in Australian Fiction
2010
single work
criticism
— Appears in: War, Literature, and the Arts: An International Journal of the Humanities , January vol. 22 no. 2010; (p. 216-230) 'Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, there appeared a comparatively new genre of Australian war novel which sought to give readers some insight about the unique dangers of aerial combat and the intense pressures faced by Australian aircrews that fought in World War II and the Korean War. Yet few, if any, of these novels have ever been admitted into the canon of great Australian war literature.
A key reason for such exclusion, it will be argued, was that the mechanised nature of air warfare, coupled with the class-conscious hierarchy of the air force itself, placed these novels in direct opposition to the enduring appeal of the ANZAC 'legend', which was underpinned by the image of the egalitarian Australian soldier—the archetypal 'digger'.
Another equally telling reason for their diminished artistic status is that many of these novels emanated from the ranks of 'popular' paperbacks, which were routinely shunned by contemporary critics and remain almost continually overlooked by present-day scholars.
However, as this article will demonstrate, such critical disdain fails to acknowledge how systemic changes to Australia's post-war publishing landscape made it possible for a new generation of Australian war novelist, such as William R. Bennett, to reach a truly mass audience, for whom tales of aerial combat were not so much a celebration of an outmoded martial ideal of the Australian soldier, but an exciting harbinger of the technological age in which they lived.' (p. 216)
Last amended 10 Aug 2005 12:40:57
