Nevil Shute’s classic apocalyptic 1957 novel about the end of the world, On the Beach, was set, as such horror stories should be, in Melbourne.
Let’s be absolutely clear about this, even without a potential nuclear holocaust in the Northern Hemisphere, Victoria remains a failed, lifeless state without hope or future.
While dictator Dan steers the ship of state towards Pyrrhic victory as Premier for Life, it is still the perfect setting to sit out the end of the world.
Shute, a pilot and aeronautical engineer, served in two wars and was director of the doomed British R100 hydrogen blimp program.
In 1948, he...
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