This Was Then

The 60s was an era of new-fangled gadgets. But in the process of proofing Aphrodite’s Children the following named ‘inventions’ had to be changed.

P184	“... looking like photocopies carbon copies left out in the rain.” Carbon copies was substituted for photocopies because in 1969, when the novel begins, ‘Xeroxing’ (as photocopying was known for a while until the Xerox Corporation asked for the term’s removal from the dictionary) was purely office-based. The new university where the story starts would have used spirit-based duplication, run through a Banda machine.
P95	“A pocket search produced a broken ruler, a dog whistle, a Rubik’s Cube log table and a yellow-edge notebook ...” Rubik’s Cube wasn’t invented until 1974, so it was replaced by log table.
P273	“... Paul Dalveen and Theresa Childs received a large, faintly scented, recycled reused envelope.” Recycled was changed to reused because that was the word in common use in 1969.

But the following items/ideas, when checked, were found to exist in 1969:

P189	bin bags
P24	leggings
P86	“Games people play,” he replied ─ the book by the same title, written by Eric Berne, was published in 1964. It started transactional analysis.

However, some of the musical references had to be changed. ‘Tubular Bells’ became ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ because Mike Oldfield’s album didn’t come out until 1973. But the famous words 'We are the people your mother warned you against', often credited to Jimmy Buffett in 1985, were retained in the belief that the phrase originated with Abbie Hoffman.

Next:Abbie Hoffman

---

Being there...

• This Was Then
• Abbie Hoffman
• Hoffman and Syd Barrett
• And away with the Fairies
• Pirate Radio, the Last Frontier
• The Art of Excess
• OZ Magazine
• From Aphrodite's Children