Silver Lies, Golden Truths

Christine Ellis, Silver Lies, Golden Truths (Wakefield Press, 2015)Silver Lies, Golden Truths is a biography written by Christine Ellis about her grandfather, Reinhold (Jack) Schuster, a German migrant who lived out World War I and World War II in Broken Hill. Jack was born in 1885 in Saxony, Germany. In 1912 he found work as a trimmer on a steamship bound for Australia. When the ship docked in Perth, Jack was fed up with being confined to the boat and jumped overboard to swim ashore in order to explore Perth. While it is not known whether Jack intended to stay put or if he simply missed the ship once it moved on, thereafter he built a life for himself in outback Australia. Ellis knew she wanted to write her grandfather's story after hearing her mother's stories about him. She chose a narrative form for the biography because she 'wanted to write more than Jack's biography - [she] wanted to tell his story' (293).It is Jack as a person, rather than the events of Jack's life, that makes this biography an engaging read. Ellis highlights the fact that it is Jack's disposition that enabled him to endure two World Wars as a German in Broken Hill, and she constructs the narrative around Jack's demeanour: 'The Broken Hill legend of Jack Schuster began with Duke's account of his selflessness in helping the injured Italian and grew over the weeks with tales of the small man's strength and dogged hard work' (51). Jack lived in Broken Hill during a time when the community 'was so unwilling to accept its emerging multiculturalism' (57) and whose 'perceived acceptance of foreigners - provided they could speak English - did not extend to the "Afghan" cameleers who lived on the edge of town' (56).Jack earned the respect of the community despite the community's wariness towards foreigners and, during the wars, towards Germans in particular. The community was trapped between their love and respect of an individual and their hatred for that individual's race as a whole. When Jack, as a foreign alien, obediently registers himself as required at the local police station, he is not imprisoned as other Germans in the community are. In addition, Jack 'had quietly been given his job back at the British Mine, unlike many of the "aliens" along the line of lode' (87). Ellis's portrayal of how wellloved Jack was in the community suggests Jack's qualities as a person saved him from much suffering during the wars.Ellis tells the first half of the biography from Jack's perspective, but then shifts the narrative focus from Jack to one of Jack's beloved daughters, Maisie. …