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War and peace and fire in her blood as well as the redemption of love

Literature & Art Across Frontiers: Hazzard county
In the Great Fire, one of the leading characters speaks of his joy in escaping from Mosman to embark on the great journey, the pilgrimage, to Europe. Only when the equator had been passed did he feel safe. Hazzard points out that she is not bashing Australia, but attempting to portray the boredom of the late 1940s, when the only way to leave was on a ship that took six months.
World War I was called the great adventure. The young men must have had the feeling of so little to lose. They were destined to toil, as their fathers had toiled. There must have been the feeling that 'I could just go on having the life that everyone was having around me ... I would have gone, [but] not the second time to the Second World War.
In conversation, and in The Great Fire, Hazzard stresses the word trapped when talking of those times. Trapped, you were trapped. You couldn't leave ... This idea that there was no future.
· Shirley Hazzard: Characters who can't wait to escape [Elsewhere A diplomat's daughter ]
[Elsewhere with Jana Wendt The Great Fire I nearly died there. I died spiritually there]
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