AUSTRALIAN WAR STORY

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 69, 14 December 1935, Page 29

AUSTRALIAN WAR STORY

“Crucible,” by J. P. McKinney (Sydney: Angus and Robertson), “Crucible” does not naturally fall into the ordinary class of “war stories.” In spite of individual interest and differences, there is a certain sameness about many of these which are weakened, though this point will no doubt be disputed, by being written in the first person. Mr. McKinney has added considerably to the power of his story by giving it a. third-person viewpoint. The subject of the narrative, John Fairbairn, is described as “an average young man.” Perhaps be is a little more serious, more introspective, more narrow and puritanical than the ordinary run of young men, perhaps it took a little longer for him to reach the stage where he was “not so sure of himself as he used to be." Although the reader is spared nothing of the familiar physical detail of war, the cold, the discomfort, the agony and the nerve-shattering noise, the author has succeeded in showing this through new eyes. His main concern is with the carefully-noted psychological effect of it all on his “average young man” who, though wounded more than once, returns in the end to Australia, to his Laura, and to a “confession” which many men might have considered unnecessary. One is interested enough in John Fairbairn to wonder as to his psychological reactions to peace, and as to the character of the Australian woman to whom has fallen the share of waiting. The minor soldier characters who come and go in the war life of Fairbairn are sketched with humour and understanding, as are also the French peasants with whom lie has dealings, but the interest centres on tlie man himself, his vital response to rapidly changing values, and his weary uncertainty about it all in the end. Under the title “Over the Top.” this book won the'prize given for an Australian war novel by the Victorian branch of the Returned Soldiers’ League.