The Anzac legend has shaped Australia's national identity for more than a century. Yet many Australians' experiences of war do not fit comfortably within this mythic narrative.

In Challenging Anzac, leading historians explore these stories: the diggers who contested the dominance of politically conservative veterans; soldiers whose war experience led them to later radical protest; military personnel denied recognition as Anzacs by their non-traditional service or behaviour; and men for whom the dissonance in their postwar lives was so profound that they took their own lives. Stories that deviated from the Anzac legend have been erased, elided and adapted to 'fit' the legend.

Edited by award-winning historians Mia Martin Hobbs, Carolyn Holbrook and Joan Beaumont, this anthology examines how the reality of warfare has always been at odds with mythic representation, and explains why, despite this, the Anzac legend has survived.