30 Saturday Sep 2017
Posted in History, Scribbling
I think I’ve told you already how Writer Unboxed is one of my favourite writerly sites. That’s mostly because it provides a wonderful mix of thought-provoking discussion and practical stuff, musings and resources, theory and exercises… All of it interesting and useful. Continue reading
16 Tuesday Aug 2016
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I told you about Bryher’s The Player’s Boy, didn’t I?
Well, to this lovely, melancholy novel my Paris Press edition adds a wonderful afterword, consisting of a letter that Bryher wrote to a friend to explain her fascination with Elizabethan literature and history. It’s a charming little piece about growing up, reading, cultivating one’s imagination, finding strength in literature and history, and being slightly eccentric… It’s well worth reading in its entirety.
My favourite part, though, has to be the final musing on the historian’s perspective: Continue reading
02 Tuesday Aug 2016
Posted in Things
Ah, the joys and sorrows of research…
We all know how it goes. A story – be it a trilogy of door-stoppers, a play or a tiny short – is a world, and, to misquote Benedick, the world must be researched. And you can not find the stuff you need, or you can find too much and get lost in the meanders of it, or you can think you found the right stuff – and painfully discover later that you didn’t… Continue reading
25 Thursday Feb 2016
Posted in Things
Tags
candlelight, candles, fire, historical novel, research, rushlight
Shall we call it field research?
A few days ago, a malfunctioning and a very grey day combined to send me back in time. With no power and no heating, I found myself depending on candles for light and the fireplace for warmth – all through one afternoon and night. Besides, my laptop’s battery was running low, so there was nothing for it, but sit by the fire and write in longhand and read by candlelight… Continue reading
08 Tuesday Dec 2015
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Annie Whitehead, Henslowe's Diary, historical novels, Internet, Mercedes Rochelle, Philip Henslowe, research
There is no doubt that, when it comes to researching historical novels, there is a Before the Internet and an After the Internet.
I daresay the same applies to a lot of fields – but let me stick to mine: I’m old enough to remember a time when, if you were Italian and wanted, say, to read Henslowe’s Diary, your best option was a trip of several hundred kilometres – to read the book in Bologna or Venice, supposing someone had told you that Nineteenth Century copies of JP Collier’s edited version were to be found there at all… Continue reading
