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In the winter of 1948, a post-war darkness felled Britain and
happiness, like sweets, was tightly rationed. So begins Harry
Leslie Smith's bitter-sweet memoir: The Empress of Australia which
depicts life in post-war Yorkshire. Recently demobbed from the RAF,
Smith and his German war bride must try to adjust to a civilian
society that is scarred from not only the war but the harsh reality
of living in peacetime Britain. At first, Harry Leslie Smith finds
himself ill equipped for this brave new world where Britain has
lost its empire and is bankrupt. Yet, like so many other returning
veterans from the Second World War, Smith stumbled onwards through
the era known as the "Age of Austerity" to confront the horrors of
his childhood and the innate injustice of a society divided by
class. Harry Leslie Smith sketches a real, sometimes amusing and
sometimes melancholic portrait of Britain in the late 1940s. In his
book, Smith speaks for all generations who have faced untold
hardships in their quest for dignity and purpose during times of
financial, political and familial upheaval. The Empress of
Australia is a personal history of one man's journey towards self
discovery and freedom from row house Britain. Sometimes, after the
war, peace is the hardest battle to survive.
To say that Harry Smith was born under an unlucky star would be an
understatement. Born in England in 1923, Smith chronicles the
tragic story of his early life in this first volume of his memoirs.
He presents his family's early history-their misfortunes and their
experiences of enduring betrayal, inhumane poverty, infidelity, and
abandonment. 1923: A Memoir presents the story of a life lyrically
described, capturing a time both before and during World War II
when personal survival was dependent upon luck and guile. During
this time, failure insured either a trip to the workhouse or burial
in a common grave. Brutally honest, Smith's story plummets to the
depths of tragedy and flies up to the summit of mirth and wonder,
portraying real people in an uncompromising, unflinching voice.
1923: A Memoir tells of a time and place when life, full of raw
emotion, was never so real. The sky is clear. I am in the back of a
truck, in a long convoy of vehicles. We are moving like an enormous
centipede up a two lane road. There are 15 men in each lorry.
Woodbine cigarettes and Capstans dangle from our mouths. The straps
to our tin helmets hang loosely around our chins. We are cocksure
and unafraid. We are survivors and conquerors pushing our way
through northern Germany. Opposite our convoy, there is an endless
procession of refugees. They are pushing their scant possessions in
hand carts or dragging along worn luggage with ropes wrapped around
them. The procession contained men and women, the young and the
old. Thin, cadaverous horses followed the throng dragging their
hoofs in the thin soil beside the road. The jetsam was a mixture of
forced labourers, ex prisoners, ex concentration camp inmates and
the Diaspora from Germany's eastern provinces. They were all moving
southward, as if believing that their homes still existed or that
they still had relatives alive to give them shelter. If the
Netherlands and Belgium were any example to me, there was little
left of Europe. What had not been bombed had been looted and what
had not been looted had been burned to the ground.
'A kind of epic poem, one that moves in circular fashion from
passionate denunciation to intense autobiographical reflection ...
should be required reading for every MP, peer, councillor, civil
servant and commentator. The fury and sense of powerlessness that
so many people feel at government policy beam out of every page.'
The Guardian 'It is not enough to read Harry's record of the
struggles and hopes of a generation - we have to re-assert his
principles of common ownership and the welfare state. If Harry can
do it, we should too!' Ken Loach, Director of I, Daniel Blake 'As
one of the last remaining survivors of the Great Depression and the
Second World War, I will not go gently into that good night. I want
to tell you what the world looks like through my eyes, so that you
can help change it.' In November 2013, 91-year-old Yorkshireman,
RAF veteran and ex-carpet salesman Harry Leslie Smith's Guardian
article - 'This year, I will wear a poppy for the last time' - was
shared over 80,000 times on Facebook and started a huge debate
about the state of society. Now he brings his unique perspective to
bear on NHS cutbacks, benefits policy, political corruption, food
poverty, the cost of education - and much more. From the
deprivation of 1930s Barnsley and the terror of war to the creation
of our welfare state, Harry has experienced how a great
civilisation can rise from the rubble. But at the end of his life,
he fears how easily it is being eroded. Harry's Last Stand is a
lyrical, searing modern invective that shows what the past can
teach us, and how the future is ours for the taking. 'Smith's
unwavering will to turn things around makes for inspirational
reading.' Big Issue North '[With] sheer emotional power ... Harry
Leslie Smith reminds us what society without good public services
actually looks and feels like.' New Statesman
'Harry Leslie Smith is a vital and powerful voice speaking across
generations about the struggle for a just society' Jeremy Corbyn
THIS A CALL TO ARMS FOR THE MANY, NOT THE FEW: DON'T LET THE PAST
BECOME OUR FUTURE Harry Leslie Smith is a great British stalwart. A
survivor of the Great Depression, a Second World War veteran, a
lifelong Labour supporter and a proud Yorkshire man, Harry's life
has straddled two centuries. As a young man, he witnessed a country
in crisis with no healthcare, no relief for the poor, and a huge
economic gulf between the North and South. Now in his nineties,
Harry wanders through the streets of his youth and wonders whether
anything has actually changed. Britain is at its most dangerous
juncture since Harry's youth - the NHS and social housing are in
crisis, whilst Brexit and an unpopular government continue to
divide the country - but there is hope. Just as Clement Attlee
provided hope in 1945, Labour's triumphant comeback of June 2017 is
a beacon of light in this season of discontent. Britain has
overcome adversity before and will do so again - a new nation will
be forged from the ashes of grave injustice. Moving and passionate,
Don't Let My Past be Your Future interweaves memoir and polemic in
a call to arms. Above all, this book is a homage to the boundless
grace and resilience of the human spirit.
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