Book Jacket description -
Wilfred Burchett is a unique radical journalist, the only Western writer to have gained access to all the contending capitals of the world throughout the past half-century. From the thirties in Nazi Germany to the present day in war-torn south-east Asia, he has travelled the world in pursuit of the momentous stories of our time.
He was the first Western journalist to reach Hiroshima, just two days after Japan's surrender. He was with the forces spearheading the Allied invasion of Germany. He sat on the trial of Cardinal Mindszenty. He acted as Henry Kissinger's go-between with the Vietcong. His exclusive dispatches have captured the world's attention again and again. He helped smuggle Jews out of Germany; he traversed the famous Burma road; he met Chou-en-lai in China in the late forties. Through it all he was 'just doing his job' - reporting to the world what he saw.
This book is Wilfred Burchett's own life story. For forty years this non-conforming journalist has witnessed many of the crucial events that have shaped our lives. Always on the spot, Burchett has used his exceptional experience of crisis to distil and indelible survey of these racked decades. At The Barricades provides one of the most comprehensive and revealing pictures of the political and social realities of the twentieth century.