Honest History ‘Young people and the Anzac tradition today’, Honest History e-Newsletter No. 3, August 2013 Young Australians have differing views on Anzac and related matters. Two university students and an entrant in a secondary schools essay competition are quoted.…
Watters, Chris: Anzac, Vimy Ridge, Monash and the education of children
Watters, Chris ‘Anzac, Vimy Ridge, Monash and the education of children’, Honest History e-Newsletter No. 5, September 2013 Towards the end of the 20th century there was an increase in claims that battles fought in World War I defined national…
Stanley, Peter: Gallipoli Club address
Stanley, Peter ‘Gallipoli – 98 years on’, Honest History e-Newsletter no. 4, August 2013 Professor Stanley answers these questions: How important is Gallipoli to Australians? Is the Gallipoli story just a national myth? Is Gallipoli’s importance based on tenuous history?…
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Stephens, David: Tangled up in red, white and blue
Stephens, David ‘Tangled up in red, white and blue’, Honest History e-Newsletter no. 5, September 2013 We choose our own history, which bits of the past we wish to burnish and which we prefer to leave alone.We are doing war…
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Davison, Graeme: Narrating the nation
Davison, Graeme Narrating the Nation in Australia: Menzies Lecture 2009, Menzies Centre for Australian Studies, Kings College London, The Australia Centre, London, 2009 Explores four narratives or foundation myths of settler societies such as Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa…
Abbott, Tony: Legacy address 2013
Tony Abbott Address to Legacy Clubs of Australia 2013 National Conference, Brisbane, 18 October 2013 The new prime minister spoke about the Anzac tradition. Yes, as all of us know, Gallipoli was in a sense, the cauldron that helped to…
Stephens, Tony: View beyond the battlefield
Stephens, Tony ‘The view beyond the battlefield‘, Sydney Morning Herald, 26 August 2005 Arguing that ‘Australia’s national identity must be defined by more than its wartime history’ the author asks: ‘Wouldn’t it be nice if Australians looking to recommend the…
Meaney, Neville: Australian defence and foreign policy
Meaney, Neville A History of Australian Defence and Foreign Policy, 1901-23: Vol. 1: The Search for Security in the Pacific, 1901-14: Vol. 2: Australia and World Crisis, 1914-23, Sydney University Press, Sydney, 2nd edition, 2009; Vol. 1 first published 1976…
Schreuder, Derek & Stuart Ward, ed: Australia’s empire
Schreuder, Derek & Stuart Ward, ed. Australia’s Empire: Oxford History of the British Empire Companion Series, Oxford University Press, Oxford & New York, 2010; first published 2008 The volume examines the meaning and importance of empire in Australia across a…
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Darian-Smith, Kate, Patricia Grimshaw & Stuart Macintyre, ed.: Britishness
Darian-Smith, Kate, Patricia Grimshaw & Stuart Macintyre, ed. Britishness Abroad: Transnational Movements and Imperial Cultures, Melbourne University Press, Carlton, Vic., 2007 Britishness Abroad explores the cultural, economic and political aspects of Britishness in Australia, New Zealand, New Guinea, Canada and…
Cahill, Rowan: Alec Campbell
Cahill, Rowan ‘Alec Campbell, 1899-2002‘, The Hummer (Australian Society for the Study of Labour History), 3, 8, Winter 2002 Gives an honest perspective on Campbell, ‘the last Anzac’, whose military career lasted less than a year (including just six weeks…
Fractured nation
‘During World War 1 Australia lost its way. Its enmeshment in the European war fractured the nation’s soul.’ Marilyn Lake In the year 1913 Canberra was born as our national capital on the very eve – as we now know…
Ashenden, Dean: Neglected wars
Ashenden, Dean ‘The Australian wars that Anzac Day neglects‘, Eureka Street, 21 April 2013 Notes that the frontier wars are not recognised at the Australian War Memorial and other memorials and argues that ‘public and popular history should record the…
Hirst, John: Oddity from the start
Hirst, John ‘An oddity from the start: convicts and national character‘, The Monthly, July 2008 Argues against the idea that our convict heritage made us an anti-authoritarian people. Includes criticism of the Russel Ward thesis in his The Australian Legend…
McKenna, Mark: History and inheritance
McKenna, Mark ‘Australian history and the Australian “national inheritance”’, Australian Cultural History, 27, 1, 2009, pp. 1-12 Over the last decade, there has been an increasing push from political parties, both conservative and Labor, and sections of the political class—opinion…
Davison, Graeme: Habit of commemoration
Graeme Davison ‘The habit of commemoration and the revival of Anzac Day’, Australian Cultural History, 22, 2003, pp. 73-82 A recent survey on ‘Australians and the Past’ questioned the assumption that ‘public celebrations are a clue to private sentiments’. (p.…
Robson, LL: First AIF
Robson, LL The First A.I.F: A Study of Its Recruitment 1914-1918, Melbourne University Press, Carlton, Vic., 1970; paperback edition 1982 Tells the story of the early recruiting drives, the failure of the voluntary system, the conscription referendums and the division…
Lockhart, Greg: Race fear
Lockhart, Greg ‘Race fear, dangerous denial‘, Griffith Review: Wicked Problems, Exquisite Dilemmas, 32, May 2011 Detailed historiographical discussion of the lead-up to the commitment of Australian forces to World War I, drawing upon evidence that there was secret imperial planning from…
Clark, Anna: Teaching national narratives
Clark, Anna ‘Teaching national narratives and values in Australian schools‘, originally published, Agora (History Teachers Association of Victoria), 43, 1, 2008, pp. 4-9 Discusses the Howard Government’s education agenda, attitudes to it and the varying attitudes of students to the…
Hannaford, John & Janice Newton: Sacrifice
Hannaford, John & Janice Newton ‘Sacrifice, grief and the sacred at the contemporary “secular” pilgrimage to Gallipoli‘, Borderlands, 7, 1, 2008 Looks at Gallipoli travel from a religious perspective. The authors were from the Australian College of Ministries and the…
McKay, Jim: Battlefield tourism
McKay, Jim ‘A critique of the militarisation of Australian history and culture thesis: the case of Anzac battlefield tourism‘, Portal, 10, 1, January 2013 Criticises the authors of What’s Wrong with Anzac? for their ‘top-down’ approach and assumptions that the…
Gerster, Robin: Big-noting
Gerster, Robin Big-noting: the Heroic Theme in Australian War Writing, Melbourne University Press, Carlton, Vic., 1987; reprint with different pagination 1992 The author is critical of CEW Bean and many others, writers of both fiction and non-fiction from World War…
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Mitchell, Natasha, Bruce Scates & Damien Williams: Anzac memories
Mitchell, Natasha, Bruce Scates & Damien Williams ‘Anzac memories‘, ABC Life Matters, 25 April 2013 (audio; no transcript) Natasha Mitchell talks with Monash academics, Bruce Scates and Damien Williams, who describe their work on ‘100 stories‘ and ‘Anzac remembered‘. There…
Australian War Memorial: Australians at War
Australian War Memorial Australians at War Massive store of materials, under concise summaries, relating to the colonial period and 14 theatres of war. Includes links to the complete text of the official histories of the two World Wars, the Korean…
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Whimpress, Bernard: Creeping Anzacism
Bernard Whimpress* ‘Creeping Anzacism: a paper delivered to the 15th State History Conference, Adelaide, 28 May 2006‘ Bernard Whimpress is an Adelaide-based historian best known as a sports writer. However, he has also written books and articles on city heritage,…
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Baker, Mark: Ride
Baker, Mark ‘Taken for a ride?‘ Sydney Morning Herald, 7 March 2013 Report on the federal government inquiry into whether John Simpson Kirkpatrick, the Man with the Donkey, should posthumously receive a Victoria Cross. The article describes how journalists, false…
Daley, Paul: Peace not war
Daley, Paul ‘A contest about peace not war‘, Canberra Times, 21 April 2013 Contrasts the Anzac Day AFL match with an Anzac Day parade in a small town. My view has always been that Anzac commemoration, while largely a communal…
McKernan, Michael: Here is their spirit
McKernan, Michael Here is Their Spirit: A History of the Australian War Memorial 1917-1990, University of Queensland Press in association with the Australian War Memorial, St Lucia, Qld, 1991 Describes the transformation of the vision of CEW Bean and John…
Rundle, Guy: Anzac 2013
Rundle, Guy ‘The one day of pure form‘, Overland, 211, Winter 2013, pp. 61-64 The author argues that Anzac Day has previously been noted for ‘trumpeting of a white imperialism, for its militarism, for its idolisation of masculinity. Some of…
Stockings, Craig: Bardia
Stockings, Craig Bardia: Myth, Reality and the Heirs of Anzac, University of New South Wales Press, Sydney, 2009 The author suggests this battle, in North Africa against the Italians in January 1941, has been relatively neglected by Australians when it…
Stockings, Craig & John Connor, ed.: Before the Anzac dawn
Stockings, Craig & John Connor, ed. Before the Anzac Dawn: A Military History of Australia before 1915, NewSouth, Sydney, 2013 This book provides a comprehensive and compelling account of Australian military history before any soldier set foot on Gallipoli. It…
Stockings, Craig, ed.: Zombie myths
Stockings, Craig, ed. Zombie Myths of Australian Military History: The Ten Myths that Will Not Die, NewSouth, Sydney, 2010 Over the years many books on Australian military history have given rise to a host of …‘zombie’ myths – myths that…
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Stockings, Craig, ed.: Dirty dozen
Stockings, Craig, ed. Anzac’s Dirty Dozen: 12 Myths of Australian Military History, NewSouth, Sydney, 2012 Myth busting by military historians and other authors on a wide range of topics, including denials that our military history begins at Gallipoli, that our…
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Truesdale, Roxanne: What rot
Truesdale, Roxanne ‘Aw! What rot!‘ Australian War Memorial Blog, 10 May 2013 Working on material rejected for The Anzac Book, the author found a piece by a New Zealand soldier reflecting on the issue of cowardice under fire. She comments:…
Bowers, Mike: So much to remember
Bowers, Mike ‘So much to remember‘, The Global Mail, 24 April 2012 Photojournalism ‘from a lifetime of wondering and wandering amid the Anzacs’. Depicts ‘the long shadow of Australia’s great war’ with images from France, Palestine and Gallipoli.
Inglis, KS: Australian military tradition (1988)
Inglis, KS ‘The Australian military tradition’, John Lack, ed., Anzac Remembered: Selected Writings by K.S. Inglis, History Department, University of Melbourne, 1998, pp. 120-47; first published, Current Affairs Bulletin, 64, 11, April 1988 Describes how the Australian military tradition or…
Inglis, KS: Return to Gallipoli (1966)
Inglis, KS ‘Return to Gallipoli’, John Lack, ed., Anzac Remembered: Selected Writings by K.S. Inglis, History Department, University of Melbourne, 1998, pp. 43-62; first published, ANU Historical Journal, 3, October 1966 Describes a pilgrimage to Gallipoli on the 5oth anniversary…
Inglis, KS: Anzac tradition (1965)
Inglis, KS ‘The Anzac tradition’, John Lack, ed., Anzac Remembered: Selected Writings by K.S. Inglis, History Department, University of Melbourne, 1998, pp. 18-42; first published, Meanjin, 100, March 1965 Considers at length writings inspired by Anzac, stressing CEW Bean’s descriptions…
Inglis, KS: One day will endure (1964)
Inglis, KS ‘Anzac Day: the One Day will endure’, John Lack. ed., Anzac Remembered: Selected Writings by K.S. Inglis, History Department, University of Melbourne, 1998, pp. 13-17; first published, The Age, 25 April 1964 Discusses early arguments about Anzac Day,…
Inglis, KS: Little boy from Manly (1964)
Inglis, KS ‘The Little Boy from Manly grows up’, John Lack. ed., Anzac Remembered: Selected Writings by K.S. Inglis, History Department, University of Melbourne, 1998, pp. 9-12; first published, The Age, 24 April 1964 Discusses early Australian attempts to find…
About Anzac analysed
Click here for all items related to: Anzac analysed Why has Anzac become so important to Australians and what are the implications of this for our country in the 21st century? Contributions and references come from contemporary historians, journalists and…
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Fox, Sharon: Gallipoli
Fox, Sharon ‘The Gallipoli experience – a traveller’s reflection’, Online Opinion, 21 April 2011 Balanced view by a mature age student of a pilgrimage to Gallipoli, noting both the manipulation of the Anzac myth and the losses suffered on both sides.…
Rundle, Guy: Anzac Day 2012
Rundle, Guy ‘Anzac Day and why we need to question “myths” of war‘, Crikey, 24 April 2012 Anzac-based nationalism from the Labor Government is related to the commitment to the Afghanistan war and specifically to Labor’s need to show its…
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McKernan, Michael: Anzac Day
McKernan, Michael ‘True meaning of Anzac Day‘, Canberra Times, 7 May 2013 The author writes of a relative, disabled in the Vietnam War. His article warns about overglamourising Anzac Day, risking the loss of its real meaning, and confusing the…
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MacInnes, Scott: Remembrance
MacInnes, Scott ‘Observing Remembrance Day: a personal reflection‘, The Drum (ABC ), 11 November 2011 The author discusses the significance of 11 November. There were 28 reader comments. Remembrance Day has always tended to concentrate more on the suffering and…
MacInnes, Scott: Anzac values
MacInnes, Scott ‘Aussie, Christian or universal values?‘ The Drum (ABC), 25 April 2011 Those values Australians celebrate on Anzac Day – courage, bravery, solidarity and compassion for the fallen – are exactly the same values the Turkish, Japanese, Vietnamese, Iraqi…
Carlton, Mike: Anzac abyss
Carlton, Mike ‘Staring at the abyss, thank God for Alan‘, Sydney Morning Herald, 20 April 2013 The second part of the article is a meditation on Anzac Day, which the author feels has virtually become ‘Anzac Week’. ‘The remembrance of…
Ziino, Bart: Mourning and commemoration
Ziino, Bart ‘Mourning and commemoration in Australia: the case of Sir W. T. Bridges and the Unknown Australian Soldier’, History Australia, 4, 2, December 2007, pp. 40.1-40.17 The article discusses the significance of the return to Australia of the only…
Ziino, Bart: Who owns Gallipoli?
Ziino, Bart ‘Who owns Gallipoli? Australia’s Gallipoli anxieties 1915-2005’, Journal of Australian Studies, 88, 2006, pp. 1-12 Since the Australian departure from Gallipoli in December 1915, there has been an ambivalent relationship with the Turkish authorities regarding care of ground…
Ziino, Bart: Distant grief
Ziino, Bart A Distant Grief: Australians, War Graves and the Great War, University of Western Australia Press, Crawley, WA, 2008 The book ‘examines the role of war graves and cemeteries in private grief and mourning’. Given that the graves of…
Lake, Marilyn: Unequal to the task
Lake, Marilyn ‘Unequal to the task‘, The Age, 22 March 2012 Notes that Australian egalitarian principles were strongly in evidence before World War I, as seen, for example, in the work of HB Higgins (see also here). It is timely…
Green, Jonathan & Marilyn Lake: Newsmaker
Green, Jonathan & Marilyn Lake ‘Newsmaker: Marilyn Lake on Anzac and Aussie identity‘, ABC Sunday Extra, 1 April 2012 (audio and transcript) Marilyn Lake talks to Jonathan Green. Marilyn Lake makes clear that she has no objection to commemoration of…
Grey, Jeffrey: Commemoration
Grey, Jeffrey ‘The big idea: we are making a mess of commemorating WWI‘, Australian, 24 April 2013 The author says Australia historically is not very good at centenaries. ‘If Australia’s centenary observance is little more than a four year long…
Pryor, Sally: Australian War Memorial
Pryor, Sally ‘Nelson defends modernising memorial‘, Canberra Times, 6 April 2013 Australian War Memorial Director, Brendan Nelson, defended recent changes at the Memorial, noting that ‘keeping the younger generation engaged with history was key’. He described the Memorial’s overall mission…
Stephens, David: Australian War Memorial
Stephens, David ‘Memories and messages at the Australian War Memorial‘, The Drum (ABC), 29 April 2011 Thoughts provoked by a visit to the Australian War Memorial on Anzac Day, stressing particularly the effects of the normalisation of militarism. Notes also…
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Waterford, Jack: Gallipoli souvenirs: but wait, there’s more…
Jack Waterford ‘AWM and Gallipoli Souvenirs Inc‘, Canberra Times, 7 July 2013 Criticism of commercialised war commemoration.
Twomey, Christina: National service
Twomey, Christina ‘The national service scheme: citizenship and the tradition of compulsory military service in 1960s Australia‘, Australian Journal of Politics and History, 58, 1, March 2012, pp. 67–81 Between 1964 and 1972, the National Service Act 1964 required Australian…
Stanley, Peter: Mont St Quentin
Stanley, Peter Men of Mont St Quentin: Between Victory and Death, Scribe, Melbourne, 2009 Micro-study of some participants in one of the final battles of the Great War and of what happened to them after the war. The author describes…
Henderson, Gerard: Anzac Day
Henderson, Gerard ‘The lingering myth of Anzac Day‘, Sydney Morning Herald, 19 April 2005 Speculates about Anzac’s resurgence and denies the ‘left-wing’ view that Australians in 1915 were fighting someone else’s war.
Masters, Chris: Uncommon Soldier
Masters, Chris Uncommon Soldier: The Story of the Making of Today’s Diggers, Allen & Unwin, Crows Nest, NSW, 2012 ‘Moving away from our ongoing fascination with Anzac story, he looks at the rich and illuminating present to write a character…
Carlyon, Les: Gallipoli
Carlyon, Les Gallipoli, Pan Macmillan, Sydney, 2002; first published 2001 The epitome of large war remembrance books, written for a general audience. The author was a member of the Australian War Memorial Council for some years.
O’Neill, Sharon & Alan Seymour: One Day of the Year 2003
O’Neill, Sharon & Alan Seymour ‘The one day of the year‘, ABC Stateline NSW, 25 April 2003 (transcript) The revival of the 1960 play occasions a look at changing attitudes towards Anzac. Reporter Sharon O’Neill interviews author Alan Seymour.
Scates, Bruce: Return
Scates, Bruce Return to Gallipoli: Walking the Battlefields of the Great War, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and Melbourne, 2006; later editions, including e-book One of a number of publications by this author seeking to reconstruct the reality of war by…
Waterford, Jack: Nelson
Waterford, Jack ‘Nelson flying wrong flags‘, Canberra Times, 26 April 2013 Columnist critical of new Australian War Memorial Director for allegedly ill-judged changes at the Memorial also makes some general points about commemoration and the role of Anzac. The last…
Beaumont, Joan: Declining sense of grief
Beaumont, Joan ‘Comment: declining sense of grief over Anzac‘, SBS News, 25 April 2013 ANU historian Joan Beaumont says that, with the passage of time Anzac Day grief may have been replaced by a ‘much more sentimental nostalgia about the…
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Lake, Marilyn et al Wheeler Centre debate: April 2013
Lake, Marilyn, Graham Wilson, Jeff Sparrow, Brendan Nelson, John Martinkus, Nicholas Jans ‘Intelligence Squared Debate: Anzac Day is More Puff Than Substance, 30 April 2013‘, The Wheeler Centre (video, audio, no transcript) The plucky bravery of the Anzacs is one…
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Manne, Robert: War myth
Manne, Robert ‘The war myth that made us‘, The Age, 25 April 2007 Asks why Anzac Day has become our most important national day. Manne suggests, with John Hirst, that the Gallipoli landing helped Australians overcome a sense of colonial…
Keating, PJ: Unknown Soldier speech
Keating, PJ ‘Remembrance Day, 1993‘ He is all of them. And he is one of us … The Unknown Australian Soldier we inter today was one of those who by his deeds proved that real nobility and grandeur belongs not…
Keating, PJ: Anzac Day 1995
Keating, PJ Statement by the Prime Minister, the Hon. PJ Keating MP, Anzac Day 1995 This is the eightieth anniversary of the event from which Anzac Day derives, the landing at Gallipoli and the tragic and disastrous military campaign which…
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Gillard, Julia: Lone Pine ceremony 2012
Gillard, Julia Lone Pine ceremony, Gallipoli, 25 April 2012 Our federal bond was young when the Anzacs came to this place. The laws and institutions of our nation were laid down in 1901. But here, in 1915, its spirit and…
Gillard, Julia: Anzac Day 2012
Gillard, Julia Dawn Service, Gallipoli, 25 April 2012 We come back. As we will always come back. To give the best and only gift that can matter anymore – our remembrance. We remember what the Anzacs did in war. And…
Rudd, Kevin: Anzac Day 2008
Rudd, Kevin Anzac Day National Ceremony Address to the National War Memorial Canberra, 25 April 2008 So what would this brave company of men and women – these hundred thousand voices – have to say to us today? What would…
Rudd, Kevin: Anzac Day 2010
Rudd, Kevin Prime Minister speech at the ANZAC Day national ceremony, Australian War Memorial, Canberra, on the commemoration of the centenary of ANZAC, 25 April 2010 The Prime Minister announced the formation of the commission to consider how to commemorate…
Hawke, RJ: Anzac Day 1990, Dawn Service
Hawke, Robert Speech by the Prime Minister, Dawn Service, Gallipoli, 25 April 1990 While the military objectives of the Australians at Gallipoli were not achieved ‘because of the courage with which they fought, because of their devotion to duty and…
Hawke, RJ: Anzac Day 1990, Lone Pine
Robert Hawke Speech for the Prime Minister, Lone Pine ceremony, Gallipoli, 25 April 1990 It is not in the waste of war that Australians find the meaning of Gallipoli then or now. I say “then or now” for a profound…
Howard, John: Anzac Day 2005, Gallipoli
John Howard Address at Anzac Day Dawn Service, Gallipoli, 25 April 2005 Those who fought here in places like Quinn’s Post, Pope’s Hill and the Nek changed forever the way we saw our world and ourselves. They bequeathed Australia a…
Howard, John: Anzac Day 2001, Canberra
John Howard Transcript of the Prime Minister, the Hon. John Howard MP, address at the Anzac Day parade, Canberra, 25 April 2001 The transcript is headed, ‘The Anzac tradition’ and the then Prime Minister noted that Australians are drawn together…
Keating, PJ: After Words: The Post-Prime Ministerial Speeches
PJ Keating After Words: The Post-Prime Ministerial Speeches, Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 2011 Notable for the former Prime Minister’s distinction, following George Orwell, between nationalism and patriotism. He prefers the latter, which is ‘belief in a particular place and its…
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Gartrell, Adam: Rudd, Keating ‘at war’ over Gallipoli
Adam Gartrell ‘Rudd, Keating “at war” over Gallipoli‘, Sydney Morning Herald, 31 October 2008 The former Prime Minister, Paul Keating, had said it was ‘utter and complete nonsense’ that Australia was redeemed or born again at Gallipoli in 1915, that…
Ramsey, Alan: What you get for having a shot at Keating
Alan Ramsey ‘What you get for having a shot at Keating‘, Sydney Morning Herald, 1 November 2008 Text of the then former Prime Minister’s response to the remark of the then Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, that Keating was wrong to…
Londey, Peter: Managed memories
Peter Londey ‘Managed memories‘, H-net Book Review (27 May 2005); originally published H-war, January 2005 The book reviewed is Liz Reed, Bigger than Gallipoli: War, History and Memory in Australia, University of Western Australia Press, Perth, 2004. The reviewer worked…
Masters, Chris, et al: The great history war
Chris Masters ‘The great history war‘, ABC Four Corners, 10 November 2008 (transcript) Presenter Chris Masters talks to academics, war historians, military tourists and descendants of soldiers. The scenes are Gallipoli and the Western Front. Among the remarks: PROF. JOAN…
Prior, Robin: Gallipoli: The End of the Myth
Robin Prior Gallipoli: The End of the Myth, UNSW Press, Sydney, 2009; first published Yale University Press, 2009 Argues that the Dardanelles campaign was unwinnable, on land or at sea.
McKenna, Mark: Patriot act
Mark McKenna ‘Patriot act’, Australian, 6 June 2007 (also in the Australian Literary Review) Long (5000 words) article anticipating the author’s chapter in What’s Wrong with Anzac? Contains seminal critique of the Anzac myth as a political tool, wielded by…
Lake, Marilyn: We must fight free of Anzac
Marilyn Lake ‘We must fight free of Anzac, lest we forget our other stories‘, Age, 24 April 2009 Rehearses many of the arguments put in What’s Wrong with Anzac? Looks at the troubles of soldier settlers after World War I,…
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Rose, James: Here’s looking at us #1: the Australian War Memorial
James Rose ‘Here’s looking at us #1 – the Australian War Memorial‘, Crikey, 13 August 2013 Blogger reviews the Memorial and asks whether we should see the dead commemorated there ‘as the War Memorial encourages us, as young men and women…
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Reynolds, Henry: Forgotten War
Henry Reynolds Forgotten War, New South, Sydney, 2013; new edition 2022 The book (winner of the Victorian Premier’s award for non-fiction) chronicles in relentless detail the frontier war between settlers and Indigenous Australians, which saw upwards of 30 000 Aborigines…
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Peake, Ross: Move soon on Anzac centenary
Ross Peake ‘Move “soon” on Anzac centenary‘, Canberra Times, 17 April 2013 Reports Coalition criticism of delays in Gillard government response to Anzac Centenary Advisory Board report and notes the suggestion that a second Colmar Brunton report was commissioned after…
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Price, Jenna: The holiest thing our nation has (Dawn service)
Jenna Price ‘The holiest thing our nation has‘, Canberra Times, 23 April 2013 Columnist’s meditation about the Anzac Day Dawn Service. She insists that politicians (who commit soldiers to war) should attend the Service and goes on what the majority…
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Kelly, Paul: The next Anzac century
Paul Kelly ‘The next Anzac century‘, The Australian, 23 April 2011 Kelly is interested first in the differing attitudes of intellectuals and others towards Anzac. The re-energising of Anzac has become the central organising principle of Australia’s past and how…
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Australian Government: Response to the Report of the Anzac Centenary Advisory Board
Australian Government Government Response to the Report of the Anzac Centenary Advisory Board on a Program of Initiatives to Commemorate the Anzac Centenary The response accepted 22 recommendations in full and three in principle. (The ‘in principle’ responses were to…
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Anzac Centenary Advisory Board: Report to government March 2013
Anzac Centenary Advisory Board Report to Government: 1 March 2013, Department of Veterans’ Affairs, Canberra, 2013 The Board’s Chair is Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston (Ret’d), former Chief of the Australian Defence Force. The report is of great interest for…
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Stephens, Alan: Acts of remembrance or expressions of nationalism?
Alan Stephens ‘Acts of remembrance or expressions of nationalism?‘ The Drum (ABC), 25 April 2013 Article (attracting 185 comments by readers) by an historian of the RAAF, arguing that [a]t the start, Australia needed Anzac Day. We were a small,…
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Brissenden, Michael: Should Anzac Day inspire more than just fervour?
Michael Brissenden ‘Should Anzac Day inspire more than just fervour?’ ABC The Drum, 25 April 2013 Includes 100 comments showing a wide spectrum of views. Quotes Clare Wright, historian, that ‘Anzac Day has grown in appeal in inverse proportion to…
Gower, Steve: Remembrance and commemmoration: Coates Oration 2008
Steve Gower Remembrance and commemoration: speech (Sir Albert Coates Oration) delivered by Steve Gower AO AO (Mil) ME, Director, Australian War Memorial on 25 November 2008 at Ballarat University The speaker touches on individual stories (Coates, Sir Edward ‘Weary’ Dunlop,…
Stanley, Peter: Why does Gallipoli mean so much? (25 April 2008)
Peter Stanley ‘Why does Gallipoli mean so much?‘ ABC News, 25 April 2008 (written 2006) Historian Peter Stanley tries to answer this question. ‘Nations’, he says, ‘create the history they need’. After Anzac was neglected for many years, an assertive…
Bendle, Mervyn F.: Gallipoli: second front in the History Wars
Mervyn F. Bendle ‘Gallipoli: second front in the History Wars‘, Quadrant Online, LIII, 6, June 2009 Lengthy article with many citations taking to task historians like Joan Beaumont, Marilyn Lake, Mark McKenna, Robin Prior and Peter Stanley and commentators such…
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Brissenden, Michael, et al: Importance of Anzac Day: 25 April 2013
Michael Brissenden, et al ‘Importance of Anzac Day‘, ABC Lateline, 25 April 2013 (video, transcript) Participants are Michael Brissenden (ABC), Bob Hawke (former Prime Minister), Brendan Nelson (Director, Australian War Memorial), Clare Wright (author). Hawke and Nelson support the role…
McKenna, Mark: Lest we inflate
Mark McKenna ‘Lest we inflate: Why do Australians lust for heroic war stories?‘ The Monthly, December 2012 The author notes the proliferation of military books in the last decade, including some 150 with ‘Anzac’ or ‘Gallipoli’ in the title, and…
Lester, Tim & Marilyn Lake: What’s wrong with Anzac?
Tim Lester & Marilyn Lake ‘What’s wrong with Anzac?‘ The Age: Breaking Politics, 25 April 2013 (video) Tim Lester interviews Professor Marilyn Lake about aspects of commemoration. Professor Lake suggests the treatment of Anzac has been characterised by commemoration without…
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Green, Jonathan, Paul Daley & Clare Wright: Imagine Australia without Anzacs
Jonathan Green, Paul Daley & Clare Wright ‘Imagine Australia without Anzacs‘, ABC Sunday Extra, 21 April 2013 (audio, no transcript) Paul Daley and Clare Wright talk with Jonathan Green and try to imagine Australia without the Anzac legend. Who would…
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Hillman, Roger: A transnational Gallipoli?
Roger Hillman ‘A transnational Gallipoli?‘ Australian Humanities Review, 51, November 2011, pp. 25-42 (free download) ‘Changing perceptions of Gallipoli’, the author argues, ‘are an instructive case study in a world of increasingly transnational perspectives’. (p. 25) Considers the views of…
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Hawkins, Jo: Lest we forget what?
Jo Hawkins ‘Lest we forget what?‘ historypunk, 26 August 2013 (blog) Discussion of aspects of Anzac commemoration, including two videos, one addressing the appropriateness of the AFL Anzac Day Match as a form of commemoration.
Hawkins, Jo: Why is military history so popular?
Jo Hawkins ‘Why is military history so popular?‘ historypunk, 5 March 2013 (blog) ‘Military history is the best-selling genre of historical writing in Australia, yet remains unpopular with historians, many of whom feel uncomfortable with the kinds of narratives disseminated…
Hede, Anne-Marie & Ruth Rentschler, ed.: Reflections on Anzac Day
Anne-Marie Hede & Ruth Rentschler, ed. Reflections on ANZAC Day: From One Millennium to the Next, Heidelberg Press, Heidelberg, Vic., 2010 Articles from a conference in 2006 under the headings, ‘Myth’, ‘Custodians’, ‘Heritage and pilgrimage’ and ‘New forms of engagement’.…
McKenna, Mark & Stuart Ward: ‘It was really moving, mate’
Mark McKenna & Stuart Ward ‘“It was really moving, mate”: The Gallipoli pilgrimage and sentimental nationalism in Australia‘, Australian Historical Studies, 38, 129, 2007, pp. 141-51 Commences with a picture of Australian tourists in Turkey and their reaction to visiting…
Wellings, Ben: The politics of Great War commemoration (video)
Ben Wellings ‘The politics of Great War commemoration‘ (18 May 2012), Australian National University video (no transcript) Wellings (formerly ANU, now Monash University) chairs a discussion with three European academics on issues of comparative commemoration, including the politics attending commemoration…
National Commission on the Commemoration of the Anzac centenary: report
National Commission on the Commemoration of the Anzac Centenary How Australia may Commemorate the Anzac Centenary, Department of Veterans’ Affairs, Canberra, 2011 The Commission was chaired by former Prime Ministers Fraser and Hawke and received 600 submissions. This is the…
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Colmar Brunton: Phase II report
Colmar Brunton Department of Veterans’ Affairs: ‘A Century of Service’: Community Research Phase II: Report (August 2011) Report of focus group research on how Australia should commemorate the Anzac centenary. An issue raised in the report of the Anzac centenary…
Shanahan, Dennis: Migrants revived nation’s story
Dennis Shanahan ‘Migrants “revived nation’s story“‘, The Australian, 26 April 2012 Then Prime Minister Gillard, interviewed at Gallipoli, repeats the thoughts in her speech there that Gallipoli ‘marks the time when a fledgling nation got a real sense of itself’.…
Noone, Richard: Leaping to false idea on Anzacs
Richard Noone ‘Leaping to false idea on Anzacs‘, Daily Telegraph, 27 March 2012 Vox pop, including diverse comments from non-Anglo-Celtic Australians about the importance of Anzac Day. (The Colmar Brunton report suggested, among other things, that the Anzac Day centenary…
JM Talkback: Anzac Day under PC attack March-April 2012
JM Talkback ‘Anzac Day under PC attack‘, 979 FM Community Radio, Melton, Vic., 29 March, 4 April 2012 Comments on the reaction to the Colmar Brunton report on public opinion about how the Anzac centenary should be commemorated. (Prime Minister…
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Daley, Paul: ‘As long as we always remember them’ (Remembrance Day 2010)
Paul Daley ‘As long as we always remember them…‘, Sydney Morning Herald, 14 November 2010 Compares Australian attitudes to Remembrance and Anzac Days, suggesting this grew from the early attitudes of the Diggers, who felt the former day was more…
Jones, Tony, et al: Anzac Day special: Anzac Day 2010
Tony Jones, et al ‘Anzac Day special‘, ABC Q & A, 26 April 2010 (video, transcript, questions, summary, biodata of panellists) Panellists were Germaine Greer, General Peter Cosgrove, Peter FitzSimons, Brigadier Alison Creagh and Professor Henry Reynolds, with Tony Jones.…
McKernan, Michael & Virginia Trioli: Diggers in France (Anzac Day 2008)
Michael McKernan & Virginia Trioli ‘Historian Michael McKernan tells the story of the Diggers in France‘, ABC Lateline, 26 April 2008 (transcript) Dr McKernan compares the reverence for Australian exploits at Gallipoli with the relative lack of awareness of what…
Gammage, Bill & Peter Spearritt, ed.: Australians 1938
Bill Gammage & Peter Spearritt, ed. Australians 1938, Fairfax, Syme & Weldon Associates, Broadway, NSW, 1987 One of the volumes in Australians: A Historical Library. Dozens of contributors, historians and others, present sections under the headings ‘Pioneers on Parade’, ‘Aborigines’,…
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Waterford, Jack: Gallipoli souvenirs , exploits or exploitation
‘But wait there’s more’, Honest History e-Newsletter No. 3, August 2013 Jack Waterford has written trenchantly in the Canberra Times about the growth in the Gallipoli souvenir industry, everything from shavings of the Lone Pine to ‘the Legend of Gallipoli…
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Stanley, Peter: In the Shadow of Gallipoli reviewed
Peter Stanley In the Shadow of Gallipoli reviewed, Canberra Times, 20 April 2013 Robert Bollard, In the Shadow of Gallipoli: The Hidden History of Australia in World War I, New South, 224 pp. $32.95 My erstwhile institution, the National Museum…
Honest History: Military history is not war history
Honest History ‘Military history is not war history: we owe it to future generations not to airbrush out the non-heroic parts’, Honest History e-Newsletter No. 1, May 2013 A temporary emphasis on our military past may be inevitable during the…
Morrison, David: UN speech on ADF sexism
David Morrison ‘United Nations International Women’s Day Conference: Address by the Chief of Army Lieutenant General David Morrison, AO at the United Nations International Women’s Day Conference, 8-9 March 2013‘ The speech contains some musing about the impact of the…
Summers, Anne: The Misogyny Factor
Anne Summers The Misogyny Factor, New South, Sydney, 2013 Provoked by attitudes towards Australia’s first female Prime Minister, the book raises questions about Australian attitudes to women’s participation in economic and political life. ‘Having our first woman Prime Minister’, the…
Watters, Chris: Anzac, Vimy Ridge, Monash and the education of children
Chris Watters* ‘Anzac, Vimy Ridge, Monash and the education of children’, Honest History E-newsletter No. 5, September 2013 Towards the end of the 20th century there was an increase in claims that battles fought in World War I defined national…
Inglis, KS: The Australian Colonists
KS Inglis The Australian Colonists: An Exploration of Social History 1788-1870, Melbourne University Press, Carlton, Vic., 1974 While the subject matter is ostensibly people, war and peace, holidays and ‘the stuff of history’ in the years nominated, the book begins…
Stephens, David: Tangled up in red, white and blue
David Stephens* ‘Tangled up in red, white and blue’, Honest History e-Newsletter no. 5, September 2013 War remembrance and days of commemoration bring out extremes of rhetoric, little gems of hyperbole that even the speaker might reconsider had they given…
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Hetherington, Michelle, ed.: Glorious Days: Australia 1913
Michelle Hetherington, ed. Glorious Days: Australia 1913, National Museum of Australia Press, Canberra, 2013 The book of the exhibition marking the centenary of Canberra. Chapters on ‘Australia in the world’ (Nicholas Brown), Mawson in Antarctica (Tom Griffiths), ‘Dreams of Empire’…
Megalogenis, George: The Longest Decade
George Megalogenis The Longest Decade, Scribe, Melbourne, 2006; revised and updated edition 2008 Economics and politics under Keating and Howard from 1991 to the mid noughties. Megalogenis describes them as ‘the twin architects of the revolution that has taken Australia…
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Keneally,Thomas: Australia Vol. II
Thomas Keneally Australians Vol. II: Eureka to the Diggers, Crows Nest, NSW, 2012; first published 2011 Keneally’s second volume of three and continues in the style of the first, except that the cast of characters march more chronologically in chapters…
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Broadbent, Harvey: A simple epic: Gallipoli and the Australian media
Harvey Broadbent ‘A simple epic’: Gallipoli and the Australian media (The 2009 Lone Pine Anniversary Lecture) Media includes newspapers, radio and television, internet, cinema, theatre and books. The article covers the whole period 1915-2009. ‘Media … was involved from the…
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Bongiorno, Frank & Grant Mansfield: Whose war was it anyway?
Frank Bongiorno & Grant Mansfield ‘Whose war was it anyway? Some Australian historians and the Great War’, History Compass, 6, 1, January 2008, pp. 62-90 Examining the debate over the Australian response to the outbreak of war in Europe in…
McGirr, Michael: Bypass
Michael McGirr Bypass: The Story of a Road, Picador, Sydney, 2004 Ostensibly, the story of a cycle trip down the Hume Highway by a former Jesuit. ‘In some ways’, McGirr says, ‘the Hume Highway is one long war memorial’ (p.…
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Inglis, KS, assisted by Jan Brazier: Sacred Places
KS Inglis, assisted by Jan Brazier Sacred Places: War Memorials in the Australian Landscape, Melbourne University Press, Carlton, Vic., third updated edition, 2008; first published 1998; other editions Takes the Australian history of war memorials from the colonial period, through…
Horne, Donald: The Lucky Country
Donald Horne The Lucky Country, Penguin, Ringwood, Vic., third revised edition, 1974; first published 1964; later editions Classic analysis of the emerging ‘modern’ Australia of the 1960s, touching on Anzac along the way, as it seemed to the author 50…
Horne, Donald: Looking for leadership
Donald Horne Looking for Leadership: Australia in the Howard Years, Viking, Ringwood, Vic., 2001 Almost his last book. Among wide ranging comment on the Australia of 2001, he asks ‘What use is the Anzac myth?’. In response, he writes of…
Gammage, Bill: The Broken Years
Bill Gammage The Broken Years: Australian Soldiers in the Great War, Penguin Books, Ringwood, Vic., 1975; first published ANU Press 1974; illustrated edition Penguin 1990; illustrated paperback edition Melbourne University Publishing 2010; other editions The groundbreaking use of 1000 soldiers’…
Fewster, Kevin, ed.: Bean’s Gallipoli
Kevin Fewster, ed. Bean’s Gallipoli: The Diaries of Australia’s Official War Correspondent, Allen & Unwin, Crows Nest, NSW, 3rd edition, 2007; first published 1983; paperback edition 2009 Covers the period October 1914 to December 1915. Bean landed at Anzac Cove…
Birmingham, John: A time for war
John Birmingham ‘A time for war: Australia as a military power‘, Quarterly Essay 20, December 2005 Traces a revival of Australian militarism in the 1990s and early 2000s, partly associated with the increase in ‘breathless idolatry’ and ‘nostalgic urgency’ accorded…
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Bean, CEW: Official History of Australia in the War of 1914-18: Vol. 1 Anzac
CEW Bean Official History of Australia in the War of 1914-18: Vol. 1 The Story of Anzac, Angus & Robertson, Sydney, ninth edition, 1939; first published 1921 Takes the story from the outbreak of war to the end of the…
Adam-Smith, Patsy: The Anzacs
Patsy Adam-Smith The Anzacs, Sphere Books, Melbourne, 1981; first published 1978; later editions Based on thousands of letters and diaries of World War I soldiers. It is time to strip the film from honour-dimmed eyes and face the uncomfortable, terrible…
Underwood, Peter: Anzac Day speeches
[Peter Underwood] Anzac Day speech by the Honourable Peter Underwood AC, Governor of Tasmania, The Cenotaph, Hobart, Thursday, 25th April 2013 ‘Australia needs to drop the sentimental myths that ANZAC Day has attracted.’ We should tell our children what war…
Pollard, Ruth: Islamic rewrite of Gallipoli legend
Ruth Pollard ‘Islamic rewrite of Gallipoli legend’, Sydney Morning Herald, 24 April 2013 Shows how the current Turkish Government is reinterpreting for political purposes the Gallipoli campaign as an Islamist defence against infidels.
Lake, Marilyn, Henry Reynolds et al: What’s wrong with Anzac?
Marilyn Lake & Henry Reynolds with Mark McKenna and Joy Damousi What’s Wrong with Anzac? The Militarisation of Australian History, New South, Sydney, 2010 The book caused considerable controversy on its release and since, although many of the themes in…
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Gare, Deborah & David Ritter, ed.: Making Australian history
Deborah Gare & David Ritter, ed. Making Australian History: Perspectives on the Past since 1788, Thomson Learning, South Melbourne, 2008 Includes an introduction on ‘making history and the politics of the past’ and articles by Mark McKenna on ‘values and…
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Clark, Anna: History’s Children: History Wars in the Classroom
History’s Children: History Wars in the Classroom, NewSouth, Sydney, 2008 ‘The classroom has become the battleground of the “history wars”, yet no-one ever asks the children what they think about Australian history and what they like – or don’t –…
Cahill, Rowan: Martial matters
Cahill, Rowan ‘Martial matters’, Radical Sydney/Radical History, 29 August 2012 A collection of blogs 2006-09 ‘relating to the Anzac tradition, and to the Australian martial tradition generally’ which ‘represent views of the Australian martial experience at radical odds with mainstream…
Cahill, Rowan: Martial love
Rowan Cahill ‘Martial love’, The Guardian (London), 7 May 2003 (reprint) ‘Part of the Anzac Myth is the proposition that Australia is a Peace-loving nation, that Peace is the preferred option of the Australian people, that as a nation, Australia…
Cahill, Rowan: The dirty digger
Rowan Cahill ‘The dirty digger’, Green Left Weekly, 451, 6 June 2001 A selective and mythologised account of the past draws young people to Anzac Day celebrations. The chief of the armed forces is the Australian of the Year. Parliament…
Beaumont, Joan: Gallipoli and Australian national identity
Joan Beaumont ‘Gallipoli and Australian national identity’, Neil Garnham & Keith Jeffery, ed., Culture, Place and Identity, University College Dublin Press, Dublin, 2005, pp. 138-51 The article notes ‘the degree to which a conservative state continues to see Anzac as…
Bollard, Robert: In the Shadow of Gallipoli
Robert Bollard In the Shadow of Gallipoli: The Hidden History of Australia in World War I, New South, Sydney, 2013 Bollard urges us to revise the accepted “distorted, or at least unbalanced” view of the Great War. He looks at…
Broadbent, Harvey: Gallipoli: One great deception?
Harvey Broadbent ‘Gallipoli: One great deception?’ ABC The Drum, 24 April 2009 Considers geopolitical motivations for the Gallipoli invasion. ‘The proposition is that it was the intention of the British and French Governments of 1915 to ensure that the Dardanelles…
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Gang-gang on Gallipoli
Ian Warden, Gang-gang columnist in the Canberra Times, writes about our e-newsletter No. 4 and particularly Peter Stanley’s article/speech to the Gallipoli Memorial Club. Ian also takes the point that there was a vibrant Australian nation before 1915. 23 August 2013
Stanley, Peter: Gallipoli – 98 years on: Gallipoli Club address
Peter Stanley Gallipoli – 98 years on: Professor Peter Stanley’s speech to Gallipoli Memorial Club symposium, 7 August 2013 (posted to site, 28 October 2013) On 7 August (the anniversary of the August offensive on Gallipoli) the Gallipoli Memorial Club…
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