| Anzac landed on the Gallipoli Peninsula on 25 April in 1915. Although the Gallipoli campaign was ended with failure during the Great War, it created the most famous national myth----Anzac Legend. The day that Anzac landed on Gallipoli Peninsula had become an important day----Anzac Day----for commemorating the Australian fallen soldiers and gradually became a national public day. Anzac Legend experiences a developping process----formation, consolidation, development, decline and revival, which reflect the changes of the Australians’memory towards the Great War.The thesis contains four chapters. The first chapter mainly expounds the emergence of the Anzac Legend in the Gallipoli campaign during the Great War and Charles Bean who had played a key role in making the legend. The second chapter dicusses the consolidation of the Anzac Legend during the 1920s and 1930s, which concludes the different arguements about Anzac Day and the main stream. The third chapter relates and analyzes the challenges and declines of the Anzac Legend. First, it introduces the representations of the Anzac crisis. Then it analyze the objections from three important groups----the returned soldiers, feminists and the Australian aboriginals. Finally, the thesis rethinks the critiques. The last chapter is concerned about the revival of the Anzac Legend since the 1980s. This chapter main analyzes the performance of the revival and the reason why the legend took to the road to the revival.The changes of the Anzac Legend embody the Australian different memories towards the Great War in different periods in Australia history. Anzac Legend is not a simple national myth, which contains the politics, gender, race questions and history memory of Australia society after the Great War. However, as the most important national myth in Australia, Anzac Legend shapes the Australia history profoundly. Anzac Legend constructs the past war experiences in a relatively relaxed method and leads a good way to the future for Australia. |
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