Against the Sun

AGAINST THE SUN The AIF in Malaya, 1941-42

Janet Uhr

Published by Allen and Unwin 1998,  $29.95

This book is both interesting and annoying.

It is interesting in the deeper perspective that it gives to the AIF campaign in Malaya in 1941-42 and in the descriptions of many individual members of the AIF, a force now largely forgotten by Australian society.  Janet Uhr gives more emphasis to the operations of the AIF on the east coast of Malaya than the Official History does, and I found these parts of the book extremely interesting.  Although I had previously read both the Official History and Major General S. Woodburn Kirby’s 1971 book Singapore The Chain of Disaster, I had not previously understood the intensity of the operations carried out there.  For this insight alone, I would recommend this book to those with an interest in Australia’s military history.

To an extent the book falls between two thematic positions, involving as it does both discussion of the broader sweep of the campaign and an intimate description of the actions of junior participants.  That said, I found the battle descriptions, which switch between the perspective of commanding officers and the ‘worm’s eye’ view of the men on the ground, gave me an understanding of the events of the Malayan campaign as they were recalled by the participants at both levels.

The book is annoying, however, in a number of essentially minor ways.  The writing style does not flow as smoothly as it might, largely because the author has a habit of mixing tenses.  Quotes from participants describing particular incidents come in the expected past tense, but descriptions of actions are sometimes given in the present tense and sometimes in the past.  While this might be a stylistic artifice of the author, I found it distracting.

I also feel that the author missed some opportunities to give an insight into the make up of the AIF (in many ways quite different to the peacetime force with which we are more familiar).  Many family relationships get a mention, with several pairs of father and son, including the Varleys (one the CO of the 2/18th Battalion, the other a platoon commander in the 2/19th Battalion, with a second son serving in the Middle East).  The fate of the senior Varley (lost in the sinking of the Rakuyo Maru in September 1944) is detailed, but that of his son (who survived the prison camps to return to Australia) is not, while other ‘characters’ such as Ringer Edwards of the 2/26th Battalion, said to have been the model for the character played by Peter Finch and Bryan Brown in the two film versions of Neville Shute’s novel A Town Like Alice, pass but briefly across the pages.

Overall, worth reading, as the insights provided more than outweigh the stylistic annoyances.

JOHN DONOVAN