Goodbye Soldier

War Memoirs #6

by Spike Milligan

In "Goodbye Soldier" the central pool of artists, now rechristened the combined services entertainment, complete with Gunner Miligan, now rechristened Lance-Bambardier, makes its way across Europe, via romantic Rome and verneral Venice, to Vienna where Spike continues to demoralize the troops from the stage despite frenzied protests from Eisenhower, Churchill and Stalin. Hastily discharged from the army in Austria, he returnes to naughty Naples for an interval of connubial bliss on Capri with Balerina. Maria Antoinette Fontana: 'All except for Eva Maria who I was keeping in reserve'. Finally, farewell to Rome, goodbye soldier and the prospect of return to dreary deptford where 'fortune, overdraft, income tax, mortgages, accounts, solicitors, house agents' awaited.

Genres: Humor, Biography, Nonfiction, Autobiography, History, War, Comedy

276 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1986

About the author

Terence Alan Patrick Seán Milligan, known as Spike, was a comedian, writer and musician. He was of Irish descent, but spent most of his childhood in India and lived most of his later life in England, moving to Australia after retirement. He is famous for his work in The Goon Show, children's poetry and a series of comical autobiographical novels about his experiences serving in the British Army in WWII. Spike Milligan suffered from bipolar disorder, which led to depression and frequent breakdowns, but he will be remembered as a comic genius. His tombstone reads 'I told you I was ill' in Gaelic.

Reviews

[Julian Worker · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the 6th of 7 (I think!) books written by Spike Milligan about his own experience of WWII and the immediate aftermath.

This book is quite sad because it's about a love affair that started immediately after the end of the war between Milligan and an Italian ballerina called Toni when they were travelling around in an old charabanc between Naples, Rome, Padua, Venice, and Vienna as part of a Combined Services Entertainment show. It seems like Milligan and Toni were never going to be a couple once Spike had to return to civilian life in the UK and reading this book it makes me wonder at what point both of them realised this.

The humour is very distinctive and possibly not for everyone, but the book works on so many levels as Spike travels past places where he fought in the war and remembers them from that time. There's the cameraderie between the actors and musicians in the troupe, all of whom managed to survive the war intact. There's a love story and descriptions of places they visited, which had also survived the war. It's a love story, a travel story, and a social commentary from a different time and is a compelling read.

[Dane Cobain · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the sixth, and as far as I can tell, final, book in Milligan’s war memoir series, although I’m not convinced that this one really counts because it takes place after the war has ended. Still, there’s a ton of good stuff, and it’s also pretty interesting because Milligan was knocking around as a musician both when he was in the army and after the war had ended.

Sure, there are a few bits here and there that are kind of uncomfortable because if they weren’t racist, they were close to it. Still, he was a product of his times, and I’m not surprised to see that terms that we deem as racist today were in common usage amongst front line soldiers. And for the most part, this is offset by Milligan’s humour, which is honestly just delightful. He’s very playful, and he uses a lot of little puns and plays-on-words that made me chuckle.

It’s also pretty cool that you don’t necessarily need to read these war diaries through in order, although I’m sure that probably helps. As for me, I just picked them up as and when I saw them going spare in charity shops, and that was good enough for me. To be honest, that’s probably the best thing to do, because I’m not sure if I’d go out of my way for them.

Still, it was pretty good for what it was and I also appreciated the little drawings, photos and other addons that helped to bring his adventures to life. It was pretty cool.

[Paul · Rating 3 out of 5]

This sixth volume in Spike Milligan's war memoirs doesn't really fit the description as it chronicles the period between the end of the war (that's World War II for those not paying attention at the back of the classroom) and Spike leaving the army and returning to the UK.

It mostly deals with his love affair with a lady called Toni and has as much romance as it does laughs. This probably reflects badly on me but I didn't enjoy this one quite as much as the previous volumes. I think a lot of what I liked about the previous books was that they were an ordinary bloke's experience of the war an, without the war element... well. let's just say an ordinary bloke's experience of swanning around Italy with his girlfriend wasn't quite as interesting.

There were still a lot of laughs here, though. I nearly wet myself at one point, which would have been very embarrassing as I was painting the iron railings at the front of my house at the time...

[Paul (Life In The Slow Lane) · Rating 2 out of 5]

"I say, Milligan. You're Irish aren't you?" "Yes, it was all I could afford."

If you don't find that funny, then this book isn't for you. By this time, the war has been over for a short while, and Milligan and his Army mates have formed a band and joined a small troupe of performers travelling through Germany, Austria and Italy performing for the locals. Milligan finds love, and loses it. That's about it.

He rehashes a lot of old jokes, which I'm a bit tired of and don't find funny. Fair dinkum, I've heard funnier stuff at trivia night at the local bowls club. Those bowlers, they're a funny bunch of drunkards!

Not Milligan's best work by a long way.

[Adz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Milligan Memoirs no 6

Enjoyable follow on from vol. 5. Always fascinating, interesting to see how Spike and others adapted even in the short period here following the end of WW2, a cynical optimism is apparent and peoples attitudes have changed significantly since vol. 1. Next vol back in Britain.

[Ron · Rating 5 out of 5]

So !! What happened to Toni (Maria Antoinetta Fontana)? she is in a hundred photos all over this book, surely it wasn't goodbye Italy, goodbye Toni, and goodbye soldier

[Bob · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brill

[Josh Clubley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another book discussing Spikes post war antics. This time focusing on his relationship with Toni.

[Gary · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not as funny as the previous volumes, this one deals mainly with Spike's life and romance in Italy in 1946 until his return to England on the last page. I can't wait to know if he keeps in touch with or marries Toni, so I'll be reading the last volume, 'Peace Work', next to find out.

[Mike Steven · Rating 2 out of 5]

Following the end of the war, Spike spends some time touring as part of 'The Bill Hall Trio', playing jazz with an army entertainment unit. During this time, he falls in love with a dancer called Toni and this book covers their romance and the time Milligan spends with Toni while awaiting his return to England.

I'm pleased that Spike had this period in his life as he was clearly incredibly happy and he deserved it after the hard times he'd experienced in the war (see war memoirs #1-5). However, an account of a man alternately playing the trumpet and trying to get his girlfriend into bed is obviously less interesting that the events of the Second World War.

I'm glad I read this but it's simply not as interesting or exciting as the earlier memoirs.

[Reds_reads · Rating 3 out of 5]

Book 6 in the series of Spike Milligan's wartime memoirs (although strictly, this book is about the immediate post-war period) Spike is on tour in Italy, entertaining troops still stationed there and much of the book concerns this and his Italian girlfriend, a ballerina on tour with them.

I found this book similar to the previous one, i.e. less satisfying than the wartime memoirs. Again, the attitudes of the time (sexism, casual racism) seem to grate more - you feel less sympathy for the man claiming to be head-over-heels in love, but seemingly unable to keep his trousers on. However, I had to admire the honesty of the book - he knows he doesn't always behave well, and the historical detail of this immediate post-war time is vividly described

[Kerry · Rating 3 out of 5]

Spike leaves the army, tours Europe with his new band, and is in love. It is an enjoyable book but doesn't quite have the gravity, the edge, or even the humor of the previous war diaries. I can see, life is changing after 5 years in the army, with his regiment, being under fire, there is a whole different tone. Maybe some of the dark humor is missing because it is an altogether different situation. Still, it was an enjoyable read and I expect I'll keep going on to the next one.

[Ben Shepherd · Rating 4 out of 5]

A slightly more 'balanced' book than some of the previous war diaries. It's the end of the war and Spike is touring Italy with his band, and pursuing a budding romance. The gag rate is just as unrelenting as before, but there's more of a tender side to it now with the love story. Looking forward to the final book!

[Johan Kruger · Rating 3 out of 5]

The final installment of Spike Milligan's war memoirs, this is set in post-war Italy and Austria. This book has less of the absurdity humour of wartime and is more of a love story, which gives it a different kind of charm to the other books in the series. Unfortunately this also makes it feel like it doesn't really fit in.

[Carol Hart · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a teenager whilst travelling to and from uni on the train I used to read the Spike Milligan war diaires (of which this is one), and used to laugh out loud. For a while after reading them I too used to annotate my photo albums with captions a la Mr Milligan. Happy days!

[Andy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Peacetime, the concert party's final tour wows Italy, Spike is besotted with the beautiful Toni, romance is in the air... or is that the smell of pile ointment! DO NOT read out of sequence - 3.5 stars.

[Rob Pearson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not the best.

Unlike previous voljmes this one is more of anintroverted love story.
The humour is more subdued and strained.
A good yarn, but not the best in the series by a long chalk.
Stil looking forward to the next book to see if Spike and Toni met again.

[nicdavdi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another gift from one of the funniest men that ever lived.

[Simon · Rating 4 out of 5]

An idyllic end to the war for our Spike. Lots of reasons for giving it less than four stars. Two reasons for giving them anyway; a story I didn't expect and it made me laugh...often.

[Rik · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful, heartbreaking, poignant. A perfect coda to the saga of war.

[Martyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

The 6th volume of Milligan's war diaries sees him fall in love with an Italian singer as he spends his last days as a soldier now that the war is won.

Funny, touching, and sad.

[Gordon Watson · Rating 5 out of 5]

A most enjoyable read, with some laugh out loud moments. It makes you mourn for the past. An Italy pre tourism, not the war.

[Andrew · Rating 5 out of 5]

I couldn’t tell you how many times I’ve read ‘Goodbye Soldier’, Milligan’s penultimate volume of autobiography, and the first to follow his life through his transition from soldier to civilian. This is undoubtedly one of my favourites in the series, and also one of my favourite Spike Milligan books overall. Hell, it’s one of my favourite books. Whilst all of his preceding autobiographical works are enjoyable and tell the reader so much about what it was like for Milligan, during his active service years in the British Army, this volume shows us a Spike who is absorbed by the experience of romantic love. Yes, the absurd humour is still there, peppered with his personal journey as an entertainer for the troops. There is still the influence of the barrack room and the theatrical stage on Spike’s writing, but when all is said and done this is Milligan telling the tale of his great love for an Italian ballerina named Toni Fontana. And it is this that takes ‘Goodbye Soldier’ above the earlier entries in Milligans autobiographical books. The horrors, the stupidly, even the laugh-or-you-will-cry aspects of Spike’s WW2 experiences are replaced by his nostalgic trip back to that time when he and Toni were in each other’s thrall. It’s a beautiful tale.

That this great romance that Spike Milligan had with Toni is filtered through his inimitable style helps make ‘Goodbye Soldier’. The juxtaposition of his description of what he experienced with his Italian lover, and the stream of consciousness humour that has always been associated with his public persona means that this is not a saccharin, sweet, sickly yarn. It can be bawdy at times, and there is a freshness to what Spike relates about he and Toni that helps one appreciate the universality of what he felt for her. At times Milligan ‘lapses’ into silly, crude and rather carnal jokes. In almost similarly frequent moments Soike speaks about he and Toni as if their relationship is beyond his experience or his understanding. Underpinning it all is his own youthfulness and the manner in which Milligan sees himself transitioning out of his own previous idea as to who he was. The anarchic gunner with a flair for raucous jokes, jazz and taking the piss becomes a man who wants to revel in his love for Toni, and hers for him.

It must be said that Spike Milligan‘s work is not always palatable or indeed, politically, correct, particularly for more contemporary readers. There is also at times a bit of the braggart in Milligan’s writing about his life; he is looking back in a time when it might be said his life was golden; he had no responsibilities, the love of a beautiful young woman, the approval of hundreds if not thousands of theatre goers and a way of living that seemed to present no real hardship. Spike might be writing with rose tinted glasses and he might be talking up this time in his life with no false modesty, but that’s okay. This might be the only book written by Milligan where his happiness and sense of pleasure at being who he is is given almost total free rein. This is another reason why I count ‘Goodbye Soldier’ among my favourites; it is such a positive, affirming text.

There are other aspects of ‘Goodbye Soldier’ that deserve recognition, Milligan catches the pleasures and the silliness of his concert party experience in a way that makes this book damned funny. He also writes with the curious intelligence that one can appreciate about Italy and the Italians just after WW2. For those of us, who are Spike Milligan fans, there is quite a bit to take away in terms of understanding what happened in his career during the peak of his work with the Bill Hall Trio. Spike also introduces the reader to some fascinating characters, most notably his fellow concert party artistes, and some that would not have looked out of place in one of his surreal comedy texts. There is more to ‘Goodbye Soldier’ than just his love affair with Toni.

Look, I’m gonna be totally honest here. When it comes to this book, my review is utterly biased and a lot of this is because when I read this book for the first time I felt like I was given just a bit of an insight into what it was like to fall in love, and to have a great life, defining romance. Now, being a much older man, more chastened and perhaps no longer able to immerse myself in a loving relationship, I read ‘Goodbye Soldier’ and my own sense of nostalgia, my own displaced romantic feelings, my own pondering of what love us about are all exacerbated by Milligan’s narrative. Like Soike I find myself trying to recapture my youth and rediscover that first powerful revelation of true love.

Oh, Spike still makes me laugh as well.

I love this book, I love how it makes me feel and I love that Spike Milligan wrote this beautiful tale of the great love of his life to share with folk like me.

[Richard Olney · Rating 5 out of 5]

I would summarise this, the sixth volume of Spike Milligan's war memoirs as Milligan in Love.

It's a lovely story told in a lovely if sometimes even heart-breaking way. The true horror of the war has stopped for the period ins which this book is set but how Italy in particular and also Austria and through his contacts home Britain was coping with a sometimes worrying peace is brought over very clearly.

Milligan's touring party, where he meets his love tour up Italy, move into Austria and then back into Italy, staying in good hotels, bad hotels, playing to mostly adoring crowds, good food, drink and good times are had and Spike is in love. He also spends quite a lot of time ill, this seems to have been a recurring problem for him during his service. I hope his peacetime years were less troubled.

As Spike says more than once, looking back some thirty years after the events, he wishes it could have stayed as it was then forever. Not for the first time in this series of books, along with the regular dissolving into laughter at the timing and sharpness of the jokes it also he made me feel real sadness.

It might not have enough in it to qualify as a war memoir but it's still a wonderful, happy and sad book. And i whizzed through it in two days, forgive the cliche but it really was difficult to put down.

[Mike Booth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Perhaps not quite as funny or anarchic as previous volumes, particularly the first few, it's nevertheless still highly amusing, tinged with a little melancholy. I still found myself laughing out loud fairly often (much to the annoyance of my girlfriend who was trying to sleep during the first half, and presumably the other passengers on the very full train for the second half, judging from all the side eye).
There is something sad about the relationship between Spike and Toni, though. For all the joy of them being in love, there is the knowledge that at some point soon, he'll be going home, and she won't be going with him. It probably accounts for the days seeming to blend into one in this book more rhsn any of the rest, and is bittersweet to read.
Still, it's definitely worth it if you're interested in an everyman's account of the (post-) war period, and especially if you like Spike. It'll be interesting to see where the last one goes, but I suspect it might be a bit sad to see how much (or little) Toni features.

[Dennis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Re-reading the Milligan Memoirs continues to delight, because Spike really wrote so well. His descriptions of the scenery on Capri on a brief holiday with the then love of his life are an absolute delight as also are his colourful accounts of Rome on his walks with his Italian girlfriend Toni. This volume also sees the consolidation of his future direction into showbiz and his return to the UK, although after his descriptions of Toni and Italy I wondered why would he want to return to winter in a London in the midst of waretime recovery, including rationing. But this will make me want to read the next volume, which I started last night so there should be another riveting review coming up soon.

[Pam Keevil · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's 1946 and Spike Milligan is touring Europe with a band and in love with a ballerina called Toni. It is a typical Milligan romp with plenty of amusing anecdotes and comments but what comes across more than anything is the atmosphere post WW2. Yes there is plenty of positive cheeriness but the struggles of both the continent and the UK are evident. The war may have ended but the austerity years had begun.

[David Marriott · Rating 2 out of 5]

The sixth volume of Spike Milligan's war memoirs takes place after the war is over, and frankly, is less interesting than the earlier volumes that actually describe his experiences of WWII. The immediacy of combat is no longer present, and so this volume is really nothing more than than the life of a jazz trumpeter in post-war Europe. Even the humour is not as biting. For Milligan fans only.

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not really a war memoir but still an entertaining and interesting read.
This instalment covers Spike being demobbed and travelling mostly around Italy with his girlfriend Toni putting on shows with the rest of the troupe.
The book ends with his time with troupe ending and and travelling back to the UK.
1 more book in the series to go hoping it will still be as good as the rest.

[Vimal Indrasoma · Rating 5 out of 5]

A thicker and more serious read than the previous ones, this sixth installment of Spike Milligan's war memoirs take him up to his departure from Italy. It is a lot more emotional as well, but the occasional nugget of hilarious insanity still crops up in unexpected places.
Do not read this book while drinking anything, squirting hot coffee from your nostrils can be very painful.