Author NotesA speaker was touring the world, accompanied at every location by a local translator. At one stage he became concerned that every translated sentence was much longer than what he had said, so he turned to the translator and asked, ‘Are you sure you’re saying exactly what I’m saying?’
‘Oh no sir,’ said the translator. ‘I am very much improving upon it.’
The above joke precisely demonstrates my attitude toward actual historical people and places. Real life is all very well, but I take it as a suggestion at best. My own mental health cannot deal with writing realistically about racism, sexism, and homophobia, so I have dramatically toned down the real historical attitudes. I have also used the offensive word ‘native’ to refer to Aboriginal Australians, in part as a nod to the ra
