Nov 17, 2009

On the Beach | Introduction

The antiwar novel has a grand literary tradition. Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front (1929), Dalton Trumbo's Johnny Got His Gun (1939), and Norman Mailer's The Naked and the Dead (1948) are prime examples of novels that realistically portray the madness and brutality of war. While Nevil Shute's On the Beach is not as well-known as these other novels, it carries a powerful message about the dangers of nuclear warfare.

In his novel, Shute focuses on a group of ordinary people who wait for the inevitable radioactive fall-out of a devastating nuclear war to arrive in Melbourne, Australia. Many critics hailed the book as an insightful and humane cautionary fable. On the Beach continues to sell well for a forty-year-old novel, which suggests that the moral of the story remains relevant today.

On the Beach Summary

Chapter 1
On the Beach opens with Lieutenant Commander Peter Holmes of the Royal Australian Navy preparing for a new naval assignment. One year earlier, there had been a devastating nuclear conflict in North America, Europe, and Asia. As a result, billions of people have died from nuclear radiation, which will eventually reach Australia.

However, Peter is happy to be getting a new assignment. After he fetches milk for his wife, Mary, and his infant daughter, Jennifer, he travels to Melbourne to learn the nature of his new appointment.

In Melbourne, Peter is appointed as the liaison officer to the U.S. submarine, the U.S.S. Scorpion. He has met the captain, Commander Dwight Towers, and remembers him as a "... quiet, soft-spoken man of thirty-five or so with a slight New England accent."

When the war had erupted a year earlier, the Scorpion was cruising near Australia. When Towers was unable to raise a radio signal from the United States, he set course for Yap Island, a small cable post under U.S. control:

Here he learned for the first time of the Russian-Chinese war which had flared up out of the Russian-NATO war, that had in turn been born of the Israeli-Arab war, initiated by Albania.

Consequently, Towers placed his submarine under Australian command.

Peter decides to tour the submarine before his official posting begins. He informs Towers of their orders: to cruise north to Cairns, Port Moresby (New Guinea), and Darwin to search for signs of life. The Australian Royal Navy also has plans for a much longer voyage, but Peter doesn't know where.

He invites Towers to spend some time as a guest at his home in Falmouth near the beach. Towers agrees to spend a night so he can go for a swim. Later, Peter and Mary introduce him to Moira Davidson, a young family friend. Towers and Moira have a drink in town before going to the Holmes household.

Moira continually flirts with Towers, and he is surprised to find he still has his sense of humor. Later, after the party, a drunk Moira begins to cry because she will never be able to have a family like Mary. Towers sympathizes, but he is unable to bring himself to comfort her. He asks Mary to put her to bed.

Chapter 2
The morning after the party, Towers goes to church and reflects upon his late family. He and Moira arrange to meet again before the Scorpion leaves for their first mission.

When Towers returns to his submarine, he discovers that a civilian scientific officer has been assigned to the mission. A reserved, somewhat morose, young man named John Osborne is in charge of observing and recording radiation levels during the cruise through the northern Coral Sea. Osborne is described as having a "lean, intelligent face" and a "loose, ungainly figure."

Moira arrives the following day for a tour of the submarine. While changing her clothes in Towers's cabin, she sees photographs of his late family. She vows to herself to make their evening date fun. During their date, Towers suggests to her that she should go to school instead of spending most of her time drinking.

At the end of their date, he promises to call when he returns from his mission. The next day, he learns from the First Naval... » Complete On the Beach Summary