Passport to Hell.

By:

Hyde, Robyn

Contributor(s):

Smith, Dib

Material type: Text

text

Media type:

computer

Carrier type:

online resource

ISBN:

9781775588245

Subject(s):

Genre/Form:

Electronic books.

Additional physical formats: Print version:: Passport to HellDDC classification:

940.415

LOC classification:

D568.A2 -- .H934 2015eb

Online resources:

Click to View

Contents:

Cover -- Title page -- Copyright -- Contents -- Introduction -- Notes -- Acknowledgements -- Passport to Hell -- Author's Note -- Introduction to Starkie -- 1 Making of an Outlaw -- 2 Good-bye Summer -- 3 Ring and Dummy -- 4 Cup for Youth -- 5 The Khaki Place -- 6 Conjurer and Pigeon -- 7 Dawn's Angel -- 8 Bluecoat -- 9 Court Martial -- 10 The Noah's Ark Country -- 11 Suicide Club -- 12 Brothers -- 13 Passport to Hell -- 14 Le Havre -- 15 Runaway's Odyssey -- 16 Rum for His Corpse -- 17 Sunshine -- 18 London and Laurels -- 19 Last Reveille -- Notes -- Bibliography -- About the author and editor.

Summary: Passport to Hell is the story of James Douglas Stark-"Starkie"-and his war. Journalist and novelist Robin Hyde came across Starkie while reporting in Mt Eden Gaol in the 1930s and immediately knew she had to write his "queer true terrible story." Born in Southland and finding himself in early trouble with the law, the young Starkie tricked his way into a draft in 1914 by means of a subterfuge involving whisky and tea. He had a subsequent checkered career in Egypt, Gallipoli, Armentières, the Somme, and Ypres. Hyde took the raw horrors, respites, and reversals of Starkie's experiences and composed a work of literature much greater than a mere documentary of war. She portrays a man carousing in the brothels of Cairo and the estaminets of Flanders; looting a dead man's money-belt and filching beer from the Tommies; attempting to shoot a sergeant through a lavatory door in a haze of absinthe, yet carrying his wounded captain back across No Man's Land; a man recommended for the V.C. and honored for his bravery-but also subject to nine court martials. It is a portrait of a singular individual who has also been described as the quintessential New Zealand soldier. Robin Hyde was one of New Zealand's true literary trailblazers, and in this book she redefined the parameters of novel and memoir.

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Passport to Hell is the story of James Douglas Stark-"Starkie"-and his war. Journalist and novelist Robin Hyde came across Starkie while reporting in Mt Eden Gaol in the 1930s and immediately knew she had to write his "queer true terrible story." Born in Southland and finding himself in early trouble with the law, the young Starkie tricked his way into a draft in 1914 by means of a subterfuge involving whisky and tea. He had a subsequent checkered career in Egypt, Gallipoli, Armentières, the Somme, and Ypres. Hyde took the raw horrors, respites, and reversals of Starkie's experiences and composed a work of literature much greater than a mere documentary of war. She portrays a man carousing in the brothels of Cairo and the estaminets of Flanders; looting a dead man's money-belt and filching beer from the Tommies; attempting to shoot a sergeant through a lavatory door in a haze of absinthe, yet carrying his wounded captain back across No Man's Land; a man recommended for the V.C. and honored for his bravery-but also subject to nine court martials. It is a portrait of a singular individual who has also been described as the quintessential New Zealand soldier. Robin Hyde was one of New Zealand's true literary trailblazers, and in this book she redefined the parameters of novel and memoir.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, Michigan : ProQuest Ebook Central, 2024. Available via World Wide Web. Access may be limited to ProQuest Ebook Central affiliated libraries.

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