A.I.F., 1918

Press, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 23753, 26 September 1942, Page 7

A.1.F., 1918

CURRENT BOOKS

The Australian Imperial Force In France during- the Allied Offensive, 1918. By C. E. W. Bean. Angus and Robertson Ltd. 1099 PP. . J This superb volume, fully indexed, well illustrated, and equipped with abundant maps and diagrams, brings to a close the Official History of Australia in the War of 1914-18. To review it at length is impossible. The historian must, however, be praised for more than the lucidity, vigour, and brilliant use of detail with which he tells a story in essentials familiar—that of the period and the process in which the offensive advantage passed, finally, from the Germans to the Allies. There are important respects in which, drawing on new (especially German) sources, he illuminajingly corrects or completes previous versions of events. Two chapters have a singular topicality to-day; th?y review the four months during which, with an initiative largely derived from the ranks, the Australians exploited the tactics of aggressive defence with, as Sir Herbert Plumer said, invaluable destructive effect on the enemy’s morale.

STRENGTH OF JAPAN The Japanese Enemy. By Hugh Byas. Hodder and Stoughton. 88 pp. (3/6 net.) The longest of the six chapters in Mr Byas’s brief but well-filled book is devoted to the enemy’s social-politi-cal-military organisation, in which the power of the fighting services predominates. This is characteristic of the author’s merit in dealing with fundamentals. It is shown, also, in his treatment of strategic questions. Mr Byas soberly refuses to underestimate Japan’s strength or the difficulty of overthrowing it; but he insists, shrewdly, on one weakness. "Psychological rather than strategical myopia,” he says, "is the fatal Japanese handicap.” AUSTRALIAN POETRY Six Australian Poets. By T. Inglls Moore, Robertson and Mullens Led, 213 pp. (7/6 net.) Mr Moore’s general aim is to combat the “failure to distinguish between true poetry and mere verse” in Australia; his method, to “advance six poets as major figures in Australian literature, giving brief but intensive studies of their work.” The six are: Hugh McCrae, Shaw Neilson, Bernard O’Dowd. William Baglebiedge, Christopher Brennan, and R. D. Fitzgerald. Mr Moore’s work, recommended by the Advisory Board of the Commonwealth Literary Fund, is earnest and judicious; but it lacks what criticism of this sort most needs—the urgency that sends a reader to the poet criticised.