We are in Beechworth today. In the midst of ‘Kelly Country’.

Perhaps no other Australian narrative has been as polarising or emotive than the life of this iconic bushranger.

Not really knowing more than a bare sketchy outline of the Kelly story I visited the Ned Kelly museum and found it so compelling that I brought the book Ned Kelly a short life by Ian Jones (considered by many the definitive telling) to dig a little deeper into the life & times of the Kelly family.

I do not pretend that I have led a blameless life, or that one fault justifies another, but the public in judging a case like mine should remember that the darkest life may have a bright side, and that after the worst has been said against a man, he may, if he is heard, tell a story in his own rough way that will perhaps lead them to intimate the harshness of their thoughts against him, and find as many excuses for his as he would plead for himself.

Interview. The Age Newspaper 1880.