Book dossier

The sound of war

by Peter Stursberg

Fifty years ago, on 10 July 1943, Canadian troops landed in Sicily. It was the first full-scale action of the Second World War involving Canadians (apart from Dieppe), and Peter Stursberg covered the action as a CBC war correspondent. He went on to cover the Italian campaign, the invasion of southern France, the liberation of the Netherlands, and the entry of the Allies into Berlin. The Sound of War is a highly personal account from a journalist who was on the front lines, observing the men in battle. It is an insider's account of what war was like on a day-to-day basis, in London, Algiers, Sicily, Italy, and northwestern Europe. Stursberg, whose voice from the war became well known in Canada, also participated in another historic event. The establishment and organization of the CBC's overseas news reporting during the war formed the basis for the creation of a national news service. Radio, with its immediacy and impact, became a significant medium for the carrying of war information to the home front; its more dramatic coverage challenged that of the print news. Stursberg explains how the CBC's approach to broadcasting from the front outdid that of its rivals in radio, the BBC and the American networks.