The Examiner 1978 review of Across The Bridge

Anatoly Dimarov’s ACROSS THE BRIDGE is a first in Australian publishing – a collection of stories by the Ukrainian author translated by Yuri Tkacz […]. 

The short stories in the main section of Across the Bridge are simple folk tales of childhood, poignant, simple in the telling, rather reminiscent of Alan Marshall’s childhood stories.

Clear prose style A long short story, “Dry Dock”, shows the range of the author – it tells of the frustrations of a Soviet young scientist in an engineering plant and his experiments on a dry dock which must be towed to its destination.

Other stories tend to the sentimental (“Mother and Son”, “Woman with a Child”), yet are never mawkish, because of the clear, almost transparent prose style.

I’m no judge of the translation as a translation, but it reads fluently without any awkwardness, and seems beautifully appropriate to each story. Worth any trouble you may have in acquisition.

Yoni Ryan, 11.02.1978, The Examiner