Really Random Thoughts
Sunday, June 13th, 2010
I’m sorry for the delay in posting a new blog, but life in Outremer has gotten very busy lately. Richard did something rather remarkable about two weeks ago. Well, my Richard did; the real Richard did it in October of 1191. After the battle of Arsuf, he sent the ineffectual King of Jerusalem, Guy de Lusignan (yes, one of those de Lusignans) back to Acre to collect their truant soldiers, who’d preferred to loiter in that sinful port city’s taverns and brothels rather than take part in a grueling 80 mile march under constant harassment by Saladin’s men. Guy, not surprisingly, failed; the chronicler Ambroise says they “responded with indifference.” So Richard went storming back to Acre to corral the miscreants himself, and not surprisingly, he succeeded. That wasn’t the remarkable part; Richard was like a force of nature in one of his Angevin tempers. But when he returned to Jaffa, he brought his queen and his sister with him.
Now Saladin had destroyed Jaffa rather than let it fall intact into Richard’s hands. So this meant Berengaria and Joanna and their ladies were trading life in the royal palace at Acre for a tent in an army encampment. Clearly Acre was both safer and more comfortable for them. But Richard wanted them with him, which indicates that he and Beregaria were getting along well, at least in the honeymoon stage of their marriage.
When I posted this on Facebook, a few readers seemed unhappy with this conclusion, although they could not come up with another plausible reason for his action. I am finding it quite interesting that Coeur de Lion stirs such passions so many centuries after his death. From some of the feedback I’ve been getting, I’ve concluded that there are readers who have made up their minds about Richard and they don’t seem comfortable having their views challenged. As I’ve said before, my research about Richard was something of a revelation to me, for the Richard I discovered was often at odds with the Richard of myth. The “Richard of myth” was the Richard who makes a brief appearance in Here Be Dragons, for I did not do substantial research about him for that book, in part because he was only a “bit player” and in part because I was not quite as obsessive-compulsive about such things back then; sadly, now I feel obligated to drag out the books even for characters with walk-on roles.
By the time I was writing Devil’s Brood, I had a different view of Richard, and the king in Lionheart is not substantially different from the rebellious younger son in DB. He gets much more time on center stage, of course, and I will be focusing upon aspects of his personality that were neglected in DB. For example, his sense of humor; he was so caught up in the family feuding in DB that he was usually in a hostile frame of mind. Now that he is king, he has more time to indulge the Angevin flair for irony and sarcasm, which Henry seems to have passed on to all his sons. I found it very interesting that Saladin’s chronicler, Baha al-Din, reported that in their talks with Richard, he had a bantering style of speaking, half-serious, half-in-jest. I feel truly blessed to have such rich resources to draw upon for this book, no less than three Saracen chronicles and half a dozen from Richard’s side. For a writer to be able to get first-person accounts of a medieval battle is amazing in and of itself; to be able to read both Saracen and crusader accounts of that same battle is as good as it gets for a historical novelist!
So Berengaria and Joanna and the Damsel of Cyprus have joined Richard at Jaffa. Their ladies in waiting are not as happy about this adventure, but then they didn’t get a vote; I have one of them grumbling about queens having to live like camp followers. I’ve certainly spilled enough fictional blood in the course of my books, but this is the first time that I’ve had women actually on the front lines. Joanna and Berengaria were witnesses to Richard’s first battle on Cyprus, and I enjoyed being able to describe events from a female perspective for once. I can still sympathize with their ladies, though, having to give up the comforts of Acre for a more Spartan life in an army camp. But Richard’s success in rounding up his fugitive soldiers was fleeting. It wasn’t long before ships began turning up at Jaffa, filled with Acre prostitutes following their customers.
That is the latest dispatch from Outremer. Now I want to remind readers that the new P.F. Chisholm mystery, A Murder of Crows, was published by the Poisoned Pen Press on June 1st, and they are having what is sure to be a very lively convention on June 24-25, attended by P.F. Chisholm, who also writes historical novels as Patricia Finney, and an impressive galley of authors, including two of my own favorite writers, Diana Gabaldon and Dana Stabenow. Here is their website with information about the conference; I am so sorry that I will not be able to be there. But book lovers within driving distance of Scottsdale, Arizona should mark these dates on the calendar. Oh, and it’s free, too! http://www.poisonedpenblog.com/2010/04/poisoned-pen-conference-so-far.html A Murder of Crows is the fifth mystery about Robert Carey, Elizabeth Tudor’s real-life cousin; his father was the love child of Henry VIII and Mary Boleyn. (Is it just me or does anyone else think it was really tacky of Henry to bed sisters?) The mysteries are always well plotted and readers really do feel as if they are walking the streets of Elizabethan London with Robert Carey, his dour Sergeant Dodd, and a balding young poet named Will Shakespeare who may or may not be a spy himself.
I’d also like to recommend a few websites that I’ve already mentioned on my various Facebook pages. I know some of you are leery of Facebook (I once was, too), but it is worth joining just to have access to the spectacular photos that readers have been posting on my Facebook Fan Club page of Wales and other places that were featured in my books. Here is the website for my favorite Welsh photographer, Dave O’Shea; Dave is a good friend who took several of the jacket photos for my books, including my favorite shot at Dolwyddelan Castle, which we used for When Christ and His Saints Slept. Dave captures the soul of Wales better than any photographer I’ve ever seen, and deserves some credit for my Welsh trilogy, as my house is decorated with his photos and I draw upon them for inspiration whenever I write about Wales. And yes, he does ship overseas! http://www.artistik.co.uk/
This next recommendation has nothing to do with the MA or books, but it is a remarkable glimpse of history, and when I posted it on Facebook, I got a huge, enthusiastic response, so I wanted to share it with my blogging buddies, too. It is a three minute video of VJ Day in Honolulu, Hawaii, August 14, 1945. It is very moving to see the joy of these young soldiers and sailors as they celebrate the end of the war. http://vimeo.com/5645171
I’d also like to recommend one of my favorite blogs, written by Nan Hawthorne, author of An Involuntary King, a Tale of Anglo-Saxon England. Nan’s blog tells us what happened on any given date in the MA; always useful to know, right? And as a bonus, she has a delightfully snarky sense of humor; for example, she notes on May 18, 1152 that Henry wed “a French divorcee.” http://todayinmedievalhistory.blogspot.com/
And Online Classes sent me an interesting article they posted on their website, in which they selected the 100 best historical fiction novels. Here is the link. http://www.onlineclasses.org/2010/06/01/100-all-time-best-historical-fiction-books/ A list like this is always a good way to get a discussion and/or argument going. I found many of my favorites there, some that surprised me, and one shocking omission—To Kill a Mockingbird. Anyone who loves books and history—and that includes every last one of us—will want to check out the list. And yes, one of mine made the cut, but you’ll have to see for yourselves which one!
Lastly, I am happy to report that Shadow, the new addition to my family, is thriving. I thought I knew all about Velcro dogs, having had three poodles, but Shadow makes them seem like aloof, canine Greta Garbos; I call him the love-sponge. He has made amazing progress in just six weeks, proving what I’ve always suspected—that the world would be a better place if people shared the dog’s gift for forgiving.
I just realized that I neglected to ask any questions in this blog. So feel free to pitch in with any random thoughts of your own, be they about the Angevins, the new Robin Hood film, your favorite and not so favorite books, that sickening oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, rescued dogs like Shadow, the World Cup and why Americans are the only people in the world to call it soccer, the ending of Lost, why the Tudors have managed to get such a stranglehold on the public imagination….Well, you can see I am casting a wide net here.
June 13, 2010