In 26 of his 38 plays, Shakespeare includes a war. Reading them, one is tempted to ask ‘when will we ever learn?’ rather than pronounce, ‘lest we forget’.
A close friend of John Curtin, Dame Mary Gilmore wrote poems on topics such as colonial violence and the plight of the koala. How has her great, great nephew, Scott Morrison, chosen to remember her?
By pushing the timing of approval back to April, likely just before the election, the government has put itself in a position to use the curriculum to score political points.
Public debates about the Australian Curriculum are arguably a sign of democracy at work. Suggesting that some things, such as Anzac Day, are sacred and beyond critical inquiry is not.
Royal New Zealand Returned and Services' Association Collection, Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington, NZ (Tiaki reference number 1/4-009458-G)
As trans-Tasman borders re-open and in the wake of the Christchurch attacks, Anzac Day gains new meaning and presents new challenges – just as it has always done.
Avenues of Honour were planted to remind us of the sacrifice and suffering of our servicemen and women. But as the years wore on, many declined or disappeared.
Amid the trauma and boredom of war, soldiers turned to reading — often magazines they wrote themselves.
Crowds ahead of the dawn service at Canberra’s National War Memorial in 2018. Attendance at the service fell from 120,000 in 2015 to 35,000 in 2019.
Rohan Thomson/AAP
When the honour of Australia’s revered soldiers is questioned, so, too, is the national self-image. But war is an ugly business, and we pay a price for tethering it so tightly to our identity.
As Spanish flu ravaged the world in 1919, Australians found novel ways to commemorate Anzac Day, and they will do so again this year.
Japanese internees starting to leave the train which brought them from Hay on their way to the Loveday Internment Camp Group in the Barmera area (1943, Renmark, South Australia).
Australian War Memorial/Photo: Hedley Keith Cullen
Reflecting on the wartime treatment of two Japanese Australians (or Nikkei) raises the spectre of our racist past - and can prompt us to consider the vulnerabilities of Asian Australians today.
War movies are an enduring genre, making hundreds of millions at the box office. With Anzac Day approaching, we ask: does Hollywood go too far in obscuring the true horrors of battle?
Anzac biscuits are the perfect treat to bake in COVID-19 isolation. Recipes emerged from another world-changing crisis, the first world war, yet we can still bake together online.
Nettie Palmer’s ’s 1916 poem, Birds, was a love song from a wife to a soldier-husband.
photographer unknown. State Library of Victoria
An anthology of Victorian women poets is a window into their thoughts and feelings during the first world war.
Descendants of soldiers who fought in the Australian Light Horse Brigade took part in a reenactment to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the battle of Beersheba in Israel in October 2017.
Dan Peled/AAP
In Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, Anzac stories are often coloured by racism and ongoing injustices that negate the myth of Anzac ‘mateship’.
Christmas hard tack biscuit: Boer War. Australian War Memorial. Accession Number: REL/10747.
Courtesy of the Australian War Memorial
Army ration biscuits known as ‘Anzac tiles’ were durable but bland - as Australian war archives show, they served as stationery, Christmas cards and as the basis of art.