Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 156, May 21, 1919 — John Shaqi
Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 156, May 21, 1919Various
General
Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 156, May 21, 1919
Various
English wit and humor -- Periodicals
Books dealing with life at the Front have naturally somewhat slackened
in volume of late. Perhaps this accounts for some part of my interest
in _Pushed and the Return Push_ (BLACKWOOD). But more must be put down
to the lure of the subject, and most of all to the admirable way in
which the writer, who chooses to be known as "QUEX," has dealt
with it. Briefly, the book is a record of the two great sensational
movements of 1918, and of the writer's experiences as an officer of
an Artillery Brigade in the retreat forced upon the Fifth Army by the
break through of the Germans on March 21st, and subsequently in the
return push which broke the Hindenburg Lino and ended the War.
The publishers say that this is the only account yet written by a
participator in these happenings; I hardly think that any will appear
more vivid and moving. The amazing sequence of the events with which
it deals gives to the book the thrill of arranged drama, in which
disaster is balanced by the triumphant ending. However unskilfully
told, such a history could hardly fail of its effect; by good fortune,
however, it finds in "QUEX" a chronicler able to do it justice. Simply
and without apparent effort he conveys the suspense of the days before
the attack (a couple of chapters here are as breathlessly exciting as
anything that I have yet read in the literature of the War), the
long trial of the retreat, and finally the retaliation and the
ever-quickening rush forward from victory to victory that makes last
autumn seem like an age of miracles. It is essentially a soldier's
story, at times technical, throughout filled with the unflurried
all-in-the-day's-work philosophy that upheld our armies in every
change of fortune. For many reasons a volume that should find its
place in any collection of the smaller histories of the Great War.
* * * * *
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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