I decided to research the history of Istria because my biological mother was Istrian. It was a bad job from the start and it finished off worse. Nevertheless, I am reminded of the quote from Cicero: ‘To be ignorant of what occurred before you were born is to remain always a child.’ So I proceed with confidence. Here is what I had: Silvana was born in Tar, Istria (today’s Croatia) in 1920, educated in Udine and Florence in Italy, travelled to Australia in 1950 (and thereafter)

‘Posing for his sexual partner as a martyred saint, Gabriele d’Annuncio was titillating himself with the image of a young man tortured...

'Truth and memory [are] exceedingly fragile,’ writes Deborah Lipstadt in Denying the Holocaust, the Growing Assault on Truth and Memory....

By what convoluted route did an Australian come to write an historical novel about Slovenian Trieste? It’s a long story. Asking my birth...