Kulturstreit – Streitkultur: German Literature since the Wall

Book Cover: Kulturstreit - Streitkultur: German Literature since the Wall
Editions:Paperback
ISBN: 9789042000926
Pages: 184

Thomas ANZ: Der Streit um Christa Wolf und die Intellektuellen im vereinten Deutschland. Ernst HANNEMANN: Geschichtsschreibung nach Aktenlage? Bemerkungen anlässlich der Debatte um die Stasikontakte von Christa Wolf und Heiner Müller. Ernst KELLER: Fallen Idols - German Intellectuals and Writers Facing the Demise of the GDR. Karl-Wilhelm SCHMIDT: Literaturdebatten des westlichen Feuilletons um Heiner Müller. Vom 'IM' zum `Neuen Rechten'. Helmut KREUZER: Zur literarischen Kultur im vereinigten Deutschland: Ein Überblick. Manfred JURGENSEN: Rehearsing the End: Christa Wolf's Störfall. Nachrichten eines Tages, Sommerstück and Was bleibt - A Kind of Trilogy? Judith M. SALLIS: The Search for Permanence in a Disintegrating World: Christa Wolf's Was bleibt. Alison LEWIS: The 'Phantom-Pain' of Germany: Mourning and Fetishism in Martin Walser's Die Verteidigung einer Kindheit. Peter HANENBERG: Hans Magnus Enzensberger. Ein Versuch über Aporien, Fehler und Krisen. Dieter WELZ: On Reconnaissance in the Former GDR. Interventionist Strategies of the Narrative in Gabriele Göttle's Deutsche Sitten: Erkundungen in Ost und West. John MILFULL: What's Left? The German Application of an English Pun.

Published:
Publisher: Brill
Reviews:Reinhard K. Zachau, German Studies Review wrote:

Insbesondere in Kellers und Lewis’ distanzierenden Beiträgen wird ein neuer Ansatz zur Beschäftigung mit der DDR-Literatur erkennbar, der über die anfängliche Identifikation mit Wolf und Müller und die reflexhafte Betroffenheitshaltung vieler Germanisten der frühen neunziger Jahre hinausgeht. Der vorliegende Sammelband gibt ein gutes Bild dieser Veränderungen.

Carl Niekerk, Seminar wrote:

This collection does offer valuable analyses for a better understanding of the German aesthetic-political landscape in the early nineties.


Dear Dr Janzow : Australia’s Lutheran churches and refugees from Hitler’s Germany

Book Cover: Dear Dr Janzow : Australia's Lutheran churches and refugees from Hitler's Germany
Editions:Paperback
ISBN: 0975831305
Size: 16.00 x 25.00 cm
Pages: 116

On 18 November 1938 a short but extraordinary report appeared in the Times of London. It claimed that a certain Dr Janzow, President of the Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Australia, was offering a haven in Australia to refugees from Hitler’s Germany. Appearing as it did just days after the notorious Night of Broken Glass, the offer appeared to throw a timely, yet almost incredible, lifeline to Europe’s despairing Jews and others.

This book is about those who schemed to rescue refugees from Hitler, and those who wrote in desperate hope to Dr Janzow. It reproduces many of the letters, extraordinarily moving documents of those bleak times, and it goes in search of the fate of those who wrote them.

Published:
Publisher: Australian Humanities Press
Reviews:Volker Stolle, Lutherische Theologie und Kirche wrote:

Die Arbeit bietet eine wichtige Horizonterweiterung in der Beschäftigung mit der Zeit des Nationalsozialismus.

Lyall Kupke, The Lutheran wrote:

As we reflect on the deeds of our Lutheran ancestors, it gives us reason to examine our own response to the many refugees who have fled for their lives and sought freedom in our land.

Christoph Barnbrock, Concordia Journal wrote:

This study collects many parts of a puzzle, including biographical details of single persons as parts of political information, and puts them together in one picture. Of course, this effort has to be incomplete. But the special value of this study is not only that it remembers the victims of the racial policy but also that the proceedings are shown from an Australian point of view. Bu that Lutheran churches from abroad are focused, and it becomes clear that they have been not only spectators but they have been affected themselves. Monteath has been working carefully and gives sensible judgment.


Battle on 42nd Street: War in Crete and the Anzacs’ bloody last stand

Book Cover: Battle on 42nd Street: War in Crete and the Anzacs' bloody last stand
Editions:Paperback
ISBN: 9781742236032
Size: 153.00 x 234.00 mm
Pages: 272

At what point does the will to survive on the battlefield give way to bloodlust?

The Battle for Crete was at once the most modern and the most ancient of wars. For a week Australians and New Zealand forces were relentlessly hammered from the skies by the Luftwaffe and pursued across Crete by some of the most accomplished and best equipped forces Hitler could muster.

On the morning of 27 May 1941, however, all that was about to change. When a unit of German mountain troops approached the Allies’ defensive line – known as 42nd Street – men from the Australian 2/7th and 2/8th Battalions and New Zealanders from several battalions counter-attacked with fixed bayonets. By the end, German bodies were strewn across the battlefield.

Acclaimed historian Peter Monteath draws on recollections and records of Australian, New Zealand, British and German soldiers and local Cretans to reveal the truth behind one of the bloodiest battles of the Second World War.

Published:
Publisher: NewSouth Publishing
Reviews:Joan Beaumont wrote:

This is military history at its best: deeply researched, powerfully told and proving that the essence of war is men killing other men.

Jeff Popple, Canberra Weekly wrote:

Professor Peter Monteath’s examination of the ANZAC involvement in the battle for Crete during the early years of World War II is one of the most readable accounts of war I have encountered in a long time. In clear prose, he tracks the retreat of the ANZACs through Greece and onto the island of Crete where they eventually faced a superior invading force of German airborne troops. The central focus of Monteath’s book is the fearsome bayonet charges which occurred during the fighting and the allegations that the ANZACs acted outside the rules of war; claims which he examines in a fair and convincing way. A terrific piece of historical writing.

Hamish McDonald, The Saturday Paper wrote:

World War II continues to be mined for popular histories extolling Digger courage and endurance. At first glance Peter Monteath’s Battle on 42nd Street looks like such a book – but it is in fact a deeper, compelling narrative by an academic historian.


Flight to Fame: Victory in the 1919 Great Air Race, England to Australia

Book Cover: Flight to Fame: Victory in the 1919 Great Air Race, England to Australia
Editions:Paperback
ISBN: 9781743056400
Size: 156.00 x 234.00 mm
Pages: 180

Flight to Fame, a classic adventure story, tells the hair-raising tale of the world-first flight from England to Australia, in the words of the pilot, (Sir) Ross Smith.

In March 1919, Australia's prime minister announced a prize of £10,000 for the first successful flight from Great Britain to Australia in under 30 days. Late that same year, the victorious pilots, Ross and Keith Smith, landed in Darwin to international acclaim. The New York Times gushed: 'Captain Ross Smith has done a wonderful thing for the prestige of the British Empire. He must be hailed as the foremost living aviator.' Their achievement was the forerunner to the age of international air travel.

During the race, Ross and his brother Keith (his co-pilot and navigator) wrote in their diaries daily, recording the journey of their four-man crew in their Vickers Vimy G-EAOU twin-engine plane, its open cockpit exposing them to snow, sleet, hail and unbearable heat. Originally published as 14,000 Miles Through the Air (1922), Ross Smith's book recounts their danger-ridden, record-breaking journey - a mere 16 years after the Wright brothers first defied gravity for just a few seconds.

This richly illustrated edition, published to coincide with the flight's centenary, is introduced and edited by historian Peter Monteath.

Published:
Publisher: Wakefield Press

Colonialism, China and the Chinese

Book Cover: Colonialism, China and the Chinese
Editions:Hardcover
ISBN: 9781138389403
Size: 156.00 x 241.00 mm
Pages: 210
eBook
ISBN: 9780429423925
Pages: 210

This book explores the place of China and the Chinese during the age of imperialism. Focusing not only on the state but also on the vitality of Chinese culture and the Chinese diaspora, it examines the seeming contradictions of a period in which China came under immense pressure from imperial expansion while remaining a major political, cultural and demographic force in its own right. Where histories of China commonly highlight episodes of conflict and subjugation in China’s relations with the West, the contributions to this volume explore the complex spaces where empires and their peoples did not merely collide but also became entangled.

Published:
Publisher: Routledge

Captured Lives: Australia’s Wartime Internment Camps

Book Cover: Captured Lives: Australia's Wartime Internment Camps
Editions:Paperback
ISBN: 9780642279248
Size: 170.00 x 230.00 mm
Pages: 272

Captured Lives peers behind the barbed wire drawn around people deemed threats to Australia's security during the two world wars. Civilians from enemy nations, even if born in Australia, were subjects of suspicion and locked away in internment camps. Prisoners-of-war were shipped from the other side of the world and shut away in camps in country Australia.

No matter how unjust their internment or how severe the privations, most internees and POWs worked out ways to relieve their discomfort, physical and mental, and their boredom. Internees devoted their time to creative pursuits like theatre, musical ensembles, art and photography, while others involved themselves in sporting activities, gardening or studying.

Captured Lives mentions over 30 of the main camps that were spread across Australia during the two world wars. Included are sketches, watercolours and photographs made by internees serve as references of the conditions and life in the camps from an insider's perspective.

Published:
Publisher: National Library of Australia
Reviews:Troy Lennon, in the Daily Telegraph wrote:

This amazing book gives accounts of many internees and how they lived behind the barbed wire in Australian internment camps. Profusely illustrated and a fascinating read.

Ruth Balint, in the Sydney Morning Herald wrote:

Monteath’s is an important work of social history that pays special attention to personal stories to document individual experiences as migrants and captives. Many had been living in Australia for years, sometimes generations, and suddenly found themselves objects of suspicion and hatred because of their "enemy" origins.


Savage Worlds: German encounters abroad, 1798-1914

Book Cover: Savage Worlds: German encounters abroad, 1798-1914
Editions:Paperback
ISBN: 9781526123404
Size: 166.00 x 233.00 mm
Pages: 272

With an eye to recovering the experiences of those in frontier zones of contact, Savage Worlds maps a wide range of different encounters between Germans and non-European indigenous peoples in the age of high imperialism. Examining outbreaks of radical violence as well as instances of mutual co-operation, it examines the differing goals and experiences of German explorers, settlers, travellers, merchants and academics, and how the variety of projects they undertook shaped their relationship with the indigenous peoples they encountered.

Whether in the Asia-Pacific region, the Americas or Africa, within Germany’s formal empire or in the imperial spaces of other powers, Germans brought with them assumptions about the nature of extra-European peoples. These assumptions were often subverted, disrupted or overturned by their own experience of frontier interactions, which led some Germans to question European ‘knowledge’ of these non-European peoples. Other Germans, however, signally failed to shift from their earlier assumptions about indigenous people and continued to act in the colonies according to their belief in the innate superiority of Europeans.

Examining the multi-faceted nature of German interactions with indigenous populations, the wide-ranging research presented in this volume offers historians and anthropologists a clear demonstration of the complexity of frontier zone encounters. It illustrates the variety of forms that agency took for both indigenous peoples and Germans in imperial zones of contact and poses the question of how far Germans were able to overcome their initial belief that, in leaving Europe, they were entering ‘savage worlds’.

Published:
Publisher: Manchester University Press

Sailing with Flinders : The Journal of Seaman Samuel Smith

Book Cover: Sailing with Flinders : The Journal of Seaman Samuel Smith
Editions:Paperback
ISBN: 9781876247133
Size: 130.00 x 190.00 mm
Pages: 86
Audiobook
ISBN: 1876247134

On the 18th July 1801 a young man from Manchester by the name of Samuel Smith set sail for Terra Australis. He had taken his place as a mere Landsman - the lowest rank in the Royal Navy - aboard the Investigator. Under the command of the indefatigable Matthew Flinders, Smith was about to participate in one of the great voyages of discovery.

Happily Smith was eager to share his experiences with posterity. His journal, published here for the first time, gives an invaluable 'history from below the decks' account of the voyage which gave Australia its shape and name.

Published:
Publisher: Corkwood Press
Reviews:Paul Brunton, Mitchell Library wrote:

The journal of seaman Samuel Smith is a fortuitous survival from the voyage of HMS Investigator, 1801-1803. It is the only journal of this landmark voyage of HMS Investigator, on which Matthew Flinders proved the Australian continent to be one landmass, which was not kept by an officer or by one of the scientists. It is a view of the voyage from below decks. The journal's history is unknown. It is like a note in a bottle which has been washed up on shore bringing fresh, but belated, information on famous events.


The Diary of Emily Caroline Creaghe, Explorer

Book Cover: The Diary of Emily Caroline Creaghe, Explorer
Editions:Hardcover
ISBN: 9781876247140
Size: 160.00 x 236.00 mm
Pages: 128
Hardcover (Italian)
ISBN: 9788877994493
Size: 140.00 x 210.00 mm
Pages: 160
Paperback - New Australian Edition
ISBN: 9781743056660
Size: 15.60 x 23.40 cm
Pages: 154

'We none of us ate any salt meat, or anything that would tend to give us a thirst. We are now on what is called the "Table-land", a flat piece of country on the top of a very high mountain. We are now in unexplored country where no white man has been before, so it is uncertain when we may see water again.'

So reads part of the entry in Caroline Creaghe's diary for Monday 23 April 1883. By that time, as the sole female member of an exploring party, she was already well acquainted with the privations and harshness of travel in Australia's north. Ahead lay territory unknown to Europeans, as well as numerous tests of endurance, strength and courage. Creaghe's diary, published here in full for the first time, is one of the most remarkable documents of Australian exploration, written by one of the rarest of explorers - a woman.

 

Italian edition:

Il Diario Di Emily Caroline Creaghe. Esploratrice, La vita felice, Milan, 2013

 

New Australian Edition:

Published: April 2021
Publisher: Wakefield Press

Published:
Publisher: Wakefield Press
Reviews:David Carment, Australian Journal of Politics and History wrote:

Peter Monteath must be congratulated for so carefully presenting the diary for publication and setting it in an appropriate context. A fascinating first hand description of Australian exploration, it deserves a wide readership.


Encountering Terra Australis: The Australian Voyages of Nicolas Baudin and Matthew Flinders

Book Cover: Encountering Terra Australis: The Australian Voyages of Nicolas Baudin and Matthew Flinders
Editions:Hardcover
ISBN: 9781862548749
Size: 168.00 x 230.00 mm
Pages: 480

Encountering Terra Australis traces the parallel lives and voyages of the explorers Flinders and Baudin, as they travelled to Australia and explored the coastline of mainland Australia and Tasmania. Unusually, the book takes its lead from the voyages of Baudin, rather than Flinders, providing a rather different interpretation than those presently circulating. Furthermore the authors have worked using their own totally fresh translation of Baudin's journals, sourcing original accounts including material which has never before been available in English.

Winner of the Frank Broeze Maritime History Prize

Published:
Publisher: Wakefield Press
Reviews:Jonathan King, Sun Herald wrote:

Written by an authoritative trio and beautifully illustrated from original artworks, it could become a definitive work.

Brendan Moran, The Adelaide Review wrote:

An enthralling account of European engagement with the beauties and complexities of Australia ... indispensable to anyone remotely interested in the history of this continent

Timothy Unwin, Modern and Contemporary France wrote:

This book is a remarkable achievement of scholarship.

Suzanne Rickard, Australian Historical Studies wrote:

[The authors] worked as a shipshape team to produce a thoroughly accessible yet authoritative work to engage experts and non-specialists alike.

Edward Duyker wrote:

Fornasiero, Monteath and West-Sooby have brought a variety of linguistic and other skills to their cooperative task. This book is handsomely produced with many beautiful illustrations.

Martin Ged, Reviews in Australian Studies wrote:

It is certainly rare to find a scholarly book that can obviously double as a Christmas present.

Rosemary Lloyd, The Modern Language Review wrote:

A highly readable and intelligent book