AustLit

Although acknowledging that Carey's True History of the Kelly Gang is a 'stunningly compelling and suspenseful narrative in highly imaginative and original prose', Clancy argues that 'Carey's use of historical fact is not only subjective and selective but it is also highly partisan. The changes he has made to historical fact mostly lie in one direction - a perpetuation of the comfortable and undisturbing myth of Kelly as a much put upon victim ... It is the version American reviewers accepted uncritically and which many Australians will continue to pay homage to, at the expense of an historical Ned Kelly who was a far more complex and ambiguous figure.'