Quick: pick your goods. No war? No poverty? A spirit of tolerance, community, better stewardship of the planet? Since human nature hasn’t altered in any fundamental way, any change is bound to be accompanied by new opportunities for suffering. Only a fool would be certain that this will be better than our world. But, knowing the twentieth century, it seems unlikely to be worse

In this other world, there are many changes from our own. To take one of the most minor: here, my great-uncle Leonard died at the much riper age of eighty-two.

I only met him once: at my grandparents’ ruby wedding anniversary in 1977 – the year of the Queen’s silver jubilee.

What I remember is this: his liver-spotted hands, the somewhat reddish colour of his remaining hair, his nut-brown skin and distinctive accent. When he said my grandfather’s name, Ray, it sounded like Rye: the strange – to me – vowels a product of long decades working at a steel mill in Wollongong, Australia.

The official history of Leonard was one of pioneering spirit, risk-taking, trials undergone, and a fortune made. He’d defied a long-running family tendency to insularity, uprooting himself and moving to Australia after the war. With the money from the steelworks that he earned and saved, he bought a general store: at one exhausting stage, he’d worked at both, subsidising his foray into retail with night shifts smelting ore. He’d had five children with a local woman. They and their offspring were too numerous to join him for the reunion. His brief visit left a little residual envy. It was felt he’d been too showy with his money and too openly critical of the British weather. He’d also spoken sharply to one of the catering staff at the pub where the anniversary was held for bringing him the wrong main course. This was a significant demerit in the eyes of my grandparents, who abhorred, above all, a fuss.

The largely wholesome version of his life was punctured when we received the order of service sent by his daughter after his death. It detailed the obsequies for one Leonard Price.

Our informal inquest was held at the dinner table that Christmas lunch. My father, who always took unseemly pleasure in provoking his in-laws’ discomfort, led the prosecution.

‘Why would he do a thing like that?’ my father asked. ‘Was he ashamed of his name?’

‘I think he did it for our sake,’ my grandfather said. ‘We don’t blame him.’

‘No, we don’t blame him,’ said my grandmother, siding with her husband instinctively. She doodled on the tablecloth with her fork and let out the noisy sigh that, even at the age of ten, I identified as the sound of her anxiety.

My father’s notable glee, my grandmother’s cornered expression, my grandfather’s efforts to dispense judgement with thoughtfulness and sobriety: all of it was at odds with the paper hats that they were wearing from the Christmas crackers.

‘He had shell shock,’ my grandmother said.