Lambert's new nove

on Eureka Stockade ©

SUNDAY morning, Decem-

ber 3, 1854. Above the crazy
stockade ubilt in the Austral-
ian goldfields flies a flag made
from a woman's blue dress.
On it are sewn the five bright
stars of the Southern Cross.

Behind the stockade sleep
the diggers. There should be
more but many have left the
stockade believing that there
will be no attack on the Sab-
bath. Sleepy-eyed sentries
stare into the mist.

One spots a movement. He
cries the alarm and fires a
shot into the air. The diggers
tumble from their tents and
rush- to defend themselves
against 300 police and soldiers
who are moving into the at-
tack.

But the surprise is too great.
The battle is “bloody but
short. The flag is cut down
and trampled underfoot. The
police, in particular, start a
riot of murder. Wounded men
are burned alive.

That morning is now part
of Australia’s history: Eure-
ka Stockade, a defeat which
was at the same time a vic-
tory.

For it forced the adminis-
tration into a realisation that
the diggers’ demand for an
end to the-harsh licence tax
and the right of all men to

vote without any property
qualifications could not be
put down.

In The Five Bright Stars
(Australasian Book Society)
Eric Lambert retells in vivid
fiction the story of those who
fought and died.

It is a story of which the la-
bor movement in all English-
speaking countries can be
proud. Many of those who died
at the stockade had started the
fight for freedom in Ireland
or in the Chartist movement
in Britain. Some were from
Canada.

Transportation did not kill
their ideas. This connection is
brought out clearly by Lam-
bert who uses his fiction as a
means- of bringing out the
basic facts. Or, in his own
words, “to render the truth
more eloquent.”

The story is not written with
the same white-hot passion
which made his war novel
The Twenty-Thousand Thieves
such gripping reading — but
then Lambert was writing
straight from his own experi-
ence.

The traditions of Eureka
live on in Australia just as
those of Chartism and Tol-
puddle live in Britain. Once
lit, the torch can never be put
out.

LEEW GARDNER

Biography of man who
retrieved 5,000 songs

HE study and collecting of
folk songs has become an

exact science and the. appre-
ciation of folk song and folk
lance has become so wide-
spread that even television
sponsors are not averse to
featuring it.

There is a tendency there-
fore, particularly among young
enthusiasts to look down on
the work done by Cecil Sharpe,
the pioneer collector of folk
songs. :

And yet, during the last
50 years, every single devel-
opment in the study and pop-
m of the folk music
of Britain and the United
States springs directly from his
work.

It is 20 years since the first
edition of Sharp’s biography
was published and during that
time a great. deal has hap-
pened.

Folk musie is now. a regu-
lar feature of radio broadcasts;
it even finds its way occasion-
ally into Hollywood films;
concerts featuring folk -art-
ists are increasingly popular
and the folk ensembles of the
Peoples’ Democracies can fill
the largest Western theatres
for weeks at a time.
publication of the
eecond edition of Ceeil Sharpe
by A. H. Fox Strangeways and

So the

Maud Karpeles (Oxford Uni-
versity Press) comes at a most
opportune time.

The portrait of Sharpe which
emerges is fascinating; here
is no pedant preoccupied with
his own scholarship, but a man
of great humanity passionate-
ly in love with the people’s
music and with the men and
women who create it.

Unlike many of his contem-
poraries, Cecil Sharp did not
subscribe to the view that
taste, creativeness and_ the
ability to express profound
emotions* and ideas are the
exclusive attribute of a priv-
ileged class.

Time and again he asserted
“that every human being is a
potential artist and all forms
of artistie utterance are natural
and inborn.”

Admiration for the working
people and their music, coupl-
ed with brilliant musical tal-
ents, made Sharp an incompar-
able collector, and in ‘the
quarter of a century which ne
devoted to the task he noted
down close on 5,000 songs.

The authors have produced
a book which is important
not only for students of folk
music but for all who care
about our great popular tra-
ditions,

EWAN MacCOLL

WE NEED ANOTHER

CALLING
ALL CLU

754 SUBS

TO REACH OUR TARGET

GREATER VANCOUVER

CLUB QUOTA. ACHIEVED
Advance: 25 15 31
AC Ee Smith ee 20 12
Brordwaye = 2 30 22
Building Trades ---- 15 4
Dry Dek 15 13
East. Engi oes ---- 10 5
Electrical 2-2 35 12
Geopeia =. ee 10 4
Grandview —-=----=-- 45 19
Hastings East. -=------ 35 23
Kensington ~~ =.---= 25 9
Watsang a Ss Fe 35 18
Little Mountain --_--- 15 3
Mount Pleasant __-_--- 15 16
Niilo Makela _---~---- 15 2
NORQuUayY, 22-5 35 10
Oye a ee 10
Reny Pai 22 = 2
Point=Grey: 22 2 + 40 23
Siravucona = 2-2 20
Siudents: = «co . 5 1
Victory Square ---.-- 50 13
Waterirony 4-5 15 12
West Bnd SS HB 12
North Burnaby ------ 55 20
South Burnaby __---- 50 9
North Vancouver -.-- 60 13
North WVan.: (District) 40 7
City Miscellaneous _-_ 40
TODA oa 750 358
\

NOVEMBER 15 IS THE DEADLINE |

oe

PROVINCE

CLUB

Aldergrove 2: =—_------
Permie..< oo
Fort: Langley 222 on

Haney. <2. ee

Kamloops 2. =
Wadner oe
Teanpley os fee Se
Maple: Ridge: =. -_-_-
Michel-Natal --------
Massion] — <=. ==>
Nelsonee 32-5
New Westminster ---
Notennill.._ 2 2 se
Powell River ---------
Steveston _____--- Sas
North. Surrey. -----<.
South Surrey -------
Trail-Rossland _--~---
Vernon he
Correspondence —-----

VANCOUVER
Albers. eo Sy
Campbell River --_----
Courtenay. << 2-2
Cumperiand > 4 se
Gowichan: ose et
Nandimo «= oe a
Parksville? ros
Victoria

PROVINCE MISC

TIANA rome
Copper Mountain __~-
Cranbrook. .:2]-e
Grassy Plains: =--~=--
Prince George -------
Prince Rupert -_------
Princeton be phe ah:
Salmon:-Arm:*=>_.s=—=
Sointnia 23s eee
Omers is 8 Ve eee

TODAI:: ..2- esas

GRAND TOTAL

QuoTA ACHIEVE?

5
15
25
15
15
15

15

10

ISLAND
45