The name of the narrator, William Bradshaw, is drawn from Isherwood's full name, Christopher William Bradshaw Isherwood. In subsequent novels Isherwood changed the narrator's name to "Christopher Isherwood", having come to regard "William Bradshaw" as a "foolish evasion". Isherwood did not explicitly claim that he was William Bradshaw although the novel describes Isherwood's own experiences. He sought to make the narrator as unobtrusive as possible so as to keep readers focused on Norris. Although Isherwood was living more or less openly as a homosexual, he balked at making Bradshaw homosexual as well. In part this was to help the average reader identify with the narrator by minimising the differences between the narrator and the reader. Not to do so meant that "The Narrator would have become so odd, so interesting, that his presence would have thrown the novel out of perspective. ... The Narrator would have kept upstaging Norris's performance as the star." Isherwood's decision had a more pragmatic reason as well; he had no desire to cause a scandal and feared that should he cause one his uncle, who was financially supporting him, would cut him off. Yet Isherwood had no interest in making Bradshaw heterosexual either, so the Narrator has no scenes of a sexual nature.