The Ghost at the Wedding
Shortlist year:
2010
Shortlist category:
Non-fiction
Published by:
Penguin Random House (Viking)
About the book
The young men who worked in the cane fields of northern New south Wales in 1914 couldn’t wait to set off for the adventure of war. The women coped as best they could, raised the children and lived in fear of an official telegram. They grieved for those killed, and learnt of worse things than death in combat.
The Ghost of the Wedding chronicles events from both sides of war: the horror of the battlefields and the women left at home. Walker’s depictions of those are grittily accurate, their reverberations haunting.
About the author
Shirley Walker
After a long career as a lecturer in Australian literature at the University of New England, Shirley Walker is now an Honorary Fellow at the institution.
She is a past President of the Association for the Study of Australian Literature, the Founding Director of the Centre for Australian Language and Literature Studies at University of New Englan, and the author of four books and numerous critical articles.
She now lives on the far north coast of New South Wales, between the escarpment and the sea.
