Searching the Silences of War: A Creative and Theoretical Exploration consists of
two parts: Part One, the creative component Finding Sophie, is a young adult novel
and Part Two, Searching the Silence, is the accompanying exegesis. Both the novel
and the exegesis explore the Anzac myth’s impact on war narratives, the omission of
women’s experiences in those narratives and silences in official versions of
Australia’s history of war presented to young adults: the truth of the war experience;
the Defence Force’s strategy to present only a favourable image; the censorship of the
media; the hero myth; the impact of war on women and families; and the lack of
representation of, and writing by, women about the Vietnam War. -- Part One, Finding Sophie the novel, set in Werribee in 1997, is told from the
perspective of seventeen year old Sophie recovering at her grandparents’ farm after a
serious illness. Her grandmother was a protestor during the Vietnam War, her greatuncle,
who also lives on the farm, fought as a member of the Australian Army
Training Team Vietnam. Unexpected events lead to a questioning of the family’s
highly regarded military history, the shattering discovery of a World War II family
secret and the voicing of silences and shame with a particular focus on the Vietnam
War. -- Part Two, Searching the Silence the exegesis, explores young adult fiction dealing
with war and its repercussions and the use of narrative devices which engage and
influence young adult readers. It documents the challenges associated with being a
woman writing a young adult novel about war, a novel which subverts the traditional
war narrative and aims to address the issues of invisibility and omission, the gaps and
slippages in popular war narratives. Finding Sophie is based on extensive research on
Australia’s involvement in war and on the way that involvement has been narrated –
some aspects mythologised and silenced. In this exegesis those aspects of the research
that have shaped the novel are discussed: official history and the ‘hero myth’;
emotional repression; between generations, shame and guilt; the lack of agency and
repression of women’s stories.