SECOND FRONT STORY

New Zealand Listener, Volume 19, Issue 477, 13 August 1948, Page 14

SECOND FRONT STORY

FROM THE CITY, FROM THE PLOUGH. By Alexander’ Baron. Jonathan Cape, London. HE men from city and plough form a typical cross-section of an infantry battalion in Britain’s Second Front army, and this book recounts their experiences from January, 1944, when they first went into training, until the final break-through at Caumont after two tough months of beach-head fighting. The story is told through a series of loosely-linked impressions of the men in training and battle, and the effect of the narrative is exciting and often very powerful, though spoilt by occasional patches of fine writing and sentiment that will irritate anyone who has gone through similar experiences. But apart from this tendency the book succeeds in presenting a highly dramatic and realistic picture of army life, with all its eddying emotional currents of comradeship, excitement, frustration, boredom, hatred, and fear. And although the author’s wittily or tenderly described types never quite succeed in becoming living individuals, much of the humour and pathos of their lives is caught vividly in his concise, colourful style. The book shows what army life must have meant to these fresh young farm-hands’ ahd office workers, and how nobly they reacted to one of the most severe baptisms of fire of the war. -P |W.