Nation
Terry Pratchett's background research for Nation involved discovering some extraordinary stories about the Krakatoa disaster, some of which may even be true.
For more on Krakatoa, visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krakatoa
The Barbara Thompson story is a fascinating one. In 1844, a cutter called The America was wrecked in Endeavour Strait and all on board drowned except a Scottish woman called Barbara Thompson. Mrs Thompson was saved by the Kaurareg with whom she lived on Muraleg (Prince of Wales) Island. They knew her as Giom and she lived there for five years until, in 1849, she was discovered at Cape York by the crew of a British naval survey ship, HMS Rattlesnake, and returned to Sydney. Oswald Brierly, the ship’s artist, wrote an account of her life with the Kaurareg. According to Mrs Thompson, the island with the friendliest relations with passing ships in the southern Torres Strait was Naghir, where she said ships often anchored overnight while the crew went ashore.
Terry Pratchett didn’t know the story of Barbara Thompson while he was writing Nation but, in one of those bizarre coincidences which seem to occur with Pratchett’s books (for example, the Northern Rock crisis was announced shortly after the publication of Making Money), soon after the text of Nation had been sent to the printers, Ray Mears used her extraordinary survival story as his theme in an episode of Ray Mears Goes Walkabout called Torres Strait.
In this episode, Ray Mears travelled to the Torres Strait Islands to learn how the island lifestyle has helped the people to retain much of their bushcraft and knowledge. He found how these skills helped them to survive during the Second World War and told the story of Barbara Thompson, a young woman who was shipwrecked in the mid-nineteenth century and survived despite the islands’ reputation for cannibalism at the time.
For further information about the Torres Strait islands, please visit:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torres_Strait_Islands
http://www.tsra.gov.au/the-torres-strait/general-history.aspx
http://www.torres.qld.gov.au/council/AboutCouncil.shtml
NATION REVIEWS
"The funny side of truth on an island of lost souls" - The Independent
Read the review.