By 1918, Australians had been told for four years that winning the war would usher in an era of unprecedented security and prosperity. They’d heard that the enormous sacrifices made would be justified by a better world.

The joy was unrestrained when the Armistice was signed on 11 November. Hopes of a better world rested with the peacemakers at Versailles, returning Australian troops, and the crushing of the only apparent threat to the British Empire’s sovereignty in world affairs.

In this talk, Michael McKernan looks at the nation that emerged after the war – and finds an Australia that was less secure, less coherent and almost overwhelmed by grief. He suggests that the legacy of World War I endured to the end of the twentieth century and beyond.