Download Books Online The General Danced at Dawn (McAuslan)

List Books Supposing The General Danced at Dawn (McAuslan)

Original Title:	The General Danced at Dawn
ISBN:	000617681X (ISBN13: 9780006176817)
Edition Language:	English
Series:	McAuslan

The General Danced at Dawn (McAuslan)

George MacDonald Fraser

Paperback | Pages: 192 pages

Rating: 4.21 | 366 Users | 29 Reviews

Relation Toward Books The General Danced at Dawn (McAuslan)

After the ponderous tome Blue Mars, I read this hilarious little short story collection in a couple of hours. It centres on fictional Highland battalion in the years after WWII. The attitudes are therefore, shall we say, of their time. There’s bit of racism, antisemitism, and general colonial arrogance, however as it is inevitably white men who come off looking like idiots, this can be treated as historical. The stories follow roughly chronological order, as the narrator gets into officer training, is assigned a battalion, and learns their quirks. Once said quirks become clear, the stories become very funny indeed. I even found a football match entertaining, mainly because of how much money was riding on it.

If you’ve enjoyed M*A*S*H in film, TV, or book forms, you’ll also enjoy ‘The General Danced at Dawn’. The tone and spirit are very similar, albeit Scottish rather than American. Thus the importance of kilts, whisky, and Highland dancing. Edinburgh Castle is the setting for the latter few stories. The most entertaining recurring character is Private McAuslan, the dirtiest soldier in the world. He stars in the final and best story, ‘McAuslan’s Court-Martial’. This farcical triumph of the underdog demonstrates the fundamental absurdity of the army and made me laugh aloud several times. The whole book is worth reading for that story alone, but to get its full impact you must be aware of everything that came before. I seem to recall reading the first Flashman book, also by George Macdonald Fraser, many years ago and finding the main character very unpleasant. ‘The General Danced at Dawn’ is much more fun, as it undermines the dignity and pretensions of every character with great wit and verve.

Present About Books The General Danced at Dawn (McAuslan)

Title	:	The General Danced at Dawn (McAuslan)
Author	:	George MacDonald Fraser
Book Format	:	Paperback
Book Edition	:	Special Edition
Pages	:	Pages: 192 pages
Published	:	January 8th 1996 by HarperCollins (first published January 1st 1970)
Categories	:	Fiction. Humor. Historical. Historical Fiction

Rating About Books The General Danced at Dawn (McAuslan)

Ratings: 4.21 From 366 Users | 29 Reviews

Evaluation About Books The General Danced at Dawn (McAuslan)

This is a set of linked short stories about an officer's experiences in the British army (Highland regiment) right after World War II. It was given to me by someone who knows I played the bagpipes, and the book is definitely for a reader who likes 1) Scottish personalities and dialects, 2) British army life, or 3) regimental humor. It IS funny, especially knowing some of the inside jokes, and I enjoyed reading the story about a legendary piper, because I knew all the tunes referred to.

It was due and I gave up.

Having finished up with Flashman I thought I'd give Fraser's McAuslin stories a go. Loosely based on Fraser's time as an officer in the post-WWII British army each book is a collection of humorous short stories. Overall this book was fine. It had its humorous moments. It was certainly a change of pace from Flashy. However, I think it may have been just a touch too Scottish for me. It's not that I got completely lost. But there was a lot going on both in language and in custom that was foreign to

This is funny and has a certain historic charm - I'm sure there aren't any Scottish soldiers who can't read and don't bathe these days. And you can't catch a train from Cairo to Jerusalem with a stops at Gaza now. I expanded my vocabulary , to include words like cromach and I was pleasantly entertained.

Mistook this as a Flashman series book, oops! Enjoyable, nevertheless.

A book full of stories about the military life.There's a note that it's all fiction, but if you read the whole series, the afterword to the third book explains the meaning of it. (His old colonel regarded that statement as a libelous lie. He wasn't fictitious.)How our narrator came to be an officer; it involved losing his pants. Also Hogomanay Night, various discipline problems within the ranks -- one of them with a full-blown court martial -- and our narrator's adventures with a train and a

Amusing tale of postwar Scottish regiment centers on degenerate-Pvt. MacAuslan. Fun, but not as clever as the books I have read in Fraser's "Flashman" series.