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Bill Scott

Would it surprise you to know that a number of our well-known writers write to please themselves? Probably not. If there’s no pleasure, or challenge, or stimulus, the outcome would probably not be worth the effort. If this effort is writing, it seems especially unlikely that someone would engage in the activity without enjoying the chance to be their own audience.

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Boori by by Bill Scott

by
May 1979, no. 10

The exploits of legendary heroes, so deeply rooted in particular cultures, very often suffer diminution by being retold in another language. Heroic deeds need no justification or explanation for the original audience, who share with the teller the same aspirations, the same fears, and the same codes of behaviour. The explanatory footnote and the authorial aside to mitigate strangeness in a new version are just as fatal to authenticity as those turn-of-the-century illustrations showing Jason and Perseus looking like upper-class British Empire builders, exemplars of the Baden-Powell ethos.

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