Almost twenty years ago, towards the end of my year as visiting senior fellow at the National University of Singapore, my wife and I had a couple of Scottish friends over for dinner. My friend Donald returned my copy of James Rutherfurd’s London, which he had earlier borrowed. As he did so, he commented that someone should write a book like that about Glasgow or Edinburgh. My immediate response was that someone should write a book like that about Singapore. Once the thought was out, it became an obsession. That night I could not sleep, and rose at 2 am to write the story of Moon Ling and the pirates that forms the opening chapters of this work. So, the first person I have to thank is Donald McDermid.
Over the course of the following years I continued to write portions of the book, while amassing as much literature as I could on the history of Singapore, and returning from my regular visits to the city-state with a suitcase stuffed full of books (before the airlines became difficult about weight restrictions). Progress was slow because at the time I was serving as Executive Officer in the PhD Program in Philosophy at the City University of New York Graduate Center. At the same time, I was committed to producing two academic books on the history of psychology. Realizing I would never finish the book under these conditions, I asked my wife if she would agree to let me return to Singapore as a visiting professor so that I might complete my research and, eventually, the book. Although we knew this separation would involve considerable hardship for us both (she did not want to leave her job in order to accompany me), she told me to follow my dream. I will be eternally grateful to Shelagh for that.
When I started writing the book, my intention was to cover the first hundred years of Singapore. Half a million words later, I had only covered the first fifty years, and the narrative had extended outwards to China, Borneo and India. Two dear friends, Arne Addland and Stella Fog, both avid readers of historical fiction, volunteered to read the monster, and gave me invaluable critical comments and suggestions, including saving me from various historical, geographical and weaponry embarrassments. Beverly Swerling, the bestselling historical novelist, persuaded me that no one was going to publish a half a million-word historical novel by an unknown author, and so she helped me reshape and reduce the first third of the manuscript into the present work. I am indebted to Beverly for her enthusiastic moral support and editorial wisdom.
I also want to thank the National University of Singapore for providing me with the opportunity to spend the academic year 2008-2009 as visiting professor in the Department of Philosophy, where, in addition to my academic duties, I was able to pursue my research on the history of Singapore and draft most of the chapters of the present work. I especially want to thank the staff at the circulation desk of the NUS library who tracked down microfiche copies of the early Singapore newspapers, the Singapore Chronicle and the Singapore Free Press, and who helped me with technical difficulties I sometimes encountered with the equipment. I spent many a happy hour in the tiny blackened and air conditioned room in the heart of the library, poring over these newspaper stories of the early years of Singapore while the tropical sun beat down outside. Some of these stories provided the germ of plotlines that later made their way into this work.
Of the many books I read about the history of Singapore and the surrounding region, two deserve special mention. The first is Charles Burton Buckley’s An Anecdotal History of Old Times in Singapore (Fraser and Neave, 1902). While it covers the same material as the newspaper accounts in the Singapore Chronicle and Singapore Free Press, it provided an invaluable double check on my narrative timeline. The second is Owen Rutter’s The Pirate Wind: Tales of the Sea-Robbers of Malaya, (Oxford University Press, 1986), which provided excellent source material on the Illanun pirates who play such a large role in the novel, as well as inspiring some of the characters and plot-lines. Where the other stories came from I do not know, but I hope they ring true, and do due credit to the early pioneers of Singapore.
I have done my best to maintain historical accuracy with respect to the real characters and episodes, to the best of my knowledge and reasonable belief, with only one exception. I have exercised artistic license by having the main protagonist Ronnie Simpson join Raffles and Farquhar in the longboat from the Indiana when they travelled to meet the Temenggong of Singapore on Monday, January 18, 1819. Ronnie is a fictional character and was not in the longboat, although I suspect that if he had been aboard the Indiana, Raffles and Farquhar might well have welcomed him to come along.
John D Greenwood