Kate Forsyth's Blog, page 43
July 8, 2014
SPOTLIGHT: Juliet Marillier's top tips for writers
Today on the blog I welcome Juliet Marillier, one of my all-time favourite writers. Her books are things to be treasured - so warm and beautiful and wise - and so I'm very eager to hear her tips on how to be a better writer. Please welcoem her with lots of virtual applause and comments, please!
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Aspiring writers often hear the same snippets of advice: Show, don’t tell. Kill your darlings. Write what you know. But what do they actually mean, and are they essential?
Show, don’t tell: Excellent general advice for all of us – not only for fledgling writers. To improve the pace and flow of your story and to deepen characterisation, let your characters’ actions and reactions and their speech show the reader what they are thinking and feeling. Avoid loading down your prose with descriptive passages, and remember that your reader likes to give his or her imagination a workout, so leave it to him or her to fill in the gaps. Go easy on the adjectives and adverbs; think of other ways to paint a picture. Sometimes, of course, you will need to do a bit of telling, especially if you are writing a book of epic scale. But keep it to a minimum if you want your reader to stay engaged.
Kill your darlings: It can be tempting to hold on to something in your manuscript that you are especially fond of – a lovely descriptive passage full of clever figures of speech, a funny dialogue between your two favourite characters, or scenes featuring a character whom you love above all others. But when it comes to the crunch, you may find these beloved sections are slowing the pace of your book and adding nothing much to the story. When you’re editing your own work, ask yourself whether a scene or passage is essential to move the plot forward, or necessary for the understanding of a character. If not, it should go. I love writing descriptive passages, usually about nature – the forest, the river, the mountains – and if I didn’t rein myself in, my language would get out of control. I am improving. My recent novels are much shorter than the doorstop-sized tomes I started out with. Mind you, some readers would like my books to be longer. But publishers like them streamlined!
Write what you know: this can be interpreted in different ways. It certainly need not mean a writer must only write about what is in his or her own personal experience, or must stick to writing about times, places and cultures in which he or she has actually lived. That would be to say goodbye to historical fiction and to all kinds of speculative fiction, not to speak of crime fiction and thrillers. However, writing about the familiar is a good exercise for beginning writers. A keen eye and ear, and an interest in the world about us, are essential for writers of fiction of all kinds. Learn to see the wonder in everyday things and to capture it on the page.
My love of traditional stories – myths, legends, folklore and fairy tales – certainly contributes to the content and style of my writing, as does my interest in history. But the core of a great story lies in real life. No writer creates believable characters without getting out into the world and learning what makes people tick. Great scenes and great plots develop from our observations of what happens from day to day, not only in our personal world, but in the world at large. I write historical fantasy mostly set in medieval Europe, which may seem far away from my everyday life in 21st century Australia. Yet the difficulties my characters face and the ways in which they solve them are often not much different from situations in today’s world. Here are some examples.
The Shadowfell series is about young rebels mounting a challenge to a tyrannical regime. The idea came from the popular uprisings in the Middle East that were taking place when I was planning the series.
In the third book, The Caller, a fighter suffers a terrible head injury. He’s tended to by his comrades while the authorities decide whether he’s to be kept alive with perhaps little hope of returning to his old self. Here in Perth, Western Australia, we’ve seen a lot of young men suffer paralysis or brain damage as a result of ‘one punch’ assaults, often by strangers. I had been thinking about the fallout from such a situation, not only for the victim, but for everyone who cares about him. So this confronting situation made its way into a story set in ancient Scotland (or a place rather like it.)
I’ve also been reading a lot about Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, especially as experienced by soldiers on return from deployment to war zones. The military connection that exists in my family increased my wish to find out more about PTSD, and I ended up including it in my story. I was fairly sure that even if the Shadowfell rebels were successful in their quest to topple the tyrant, those who had served the rebel cause long-term would suffer lasting psychological damage as a result of the actions they’d had to take along the way.
In a sense, then, I am writing about what I know. I’m basing my stories on issues and themes that are important to me, and choosing to build them into a type of story I am confident I can write effectively. For the aspiring writer, my interpretation of ‘Write what you know’ is this: keep your characters psychologically true, and make your situations real to the reader. How? Go out and mingle with all kinds of people; experience and learn about the real world, because that world is bursting with great story ideas.
I've reviewed the Shadowfell trilogy here and here is a link to an interview I did with Juliet a couple of years ago.
PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT - I LOVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK!
[image error]
Aspiring writers often hear the same snippets of advice: Show, don’t tell. Kill your darlings. Write what you know. But what do they actually mean, and are they essential?
Show, don’t tell: Excellent general advice for all of us – not only for fledgling writers. To improve the pace and flow of your story and to deepen characterisation, let your characters’ actions and reactions and their speech show the reader what they are thinking and feeling. Avoid loading down your prose with descriptive passages, and remember that your reader likes to give his or her imagination a workout, so leave it to him or her to fill in the gaps. Go easy on the adjectives and adverbs; think of other ways to paint a picture. Sometimes, of course, you will need to do a bit of telling, especially if you are writing a book of epic scale. But keep it to a minimum if you want your reader to stay engaged.
Kill your darlings: It can be tempting to hold on to something in your manuscript that you are especially fond of – a lovely descriptive passage full of clever figures of speech, a funny dialogue between your two favourite characters, or scenes featuring a character whom you love above all others. But when it comes to the crunch, you may find these beloved sections are slowing the pace of your book and adding nothing much to the story. When you’re editing your own work, ask yourself whether a scene or passage is essential to move the plot forward, or necessary for the understanding of a character. If not, it should go. I love writing descriptive passages, usually about nature – the forest, the river, the mountains – and if I didn’t rein myself in, my language would get out of control. I am improving. My recent novels are much shorter than the doorstop-sized tomes I started out with. Mind you, some readers would like my books to be longer. But publishers like them streamlined!
Write what you know: this can be interpreted in different ways. It certainly need not mean a writer must only write about what is in his or her own personal experience, or must stick to writing about times, places and cultures in which he or she has actually lived. That would be to say goodbye to historical fiction and to all kinds of speculative fiction, not to speak of crime fiction and thrillers. However, writing about the familiar is a good exercise for beginning writers. A keen eye and ear, and an interest in the world about us, are essential for writers of fiction of all kinds. Learn to see the wonder in everyday things and to capture it on the page.
My love of traditional stories – myths, legends, folklore and fairy tales – certainly contributes to the content and style of my writing, as does my interest in history. But the core of a great story lies in real life. No writer creates believable characters without getting out into the world and learning what makes people tick. Great scenes and great plots develop from our observations of what happens from day to day, not only in our personal world, but in the world at large. I write historical fantasy mostly set in medieval Europe, which may seem far away from my everyday life in 21st century Australia. Yet the difficulties my characters face and the ways in which they solve them are often not much different from situations in today’s world. Here are some examples.
The Shadowfell series is about young rebels mounting a challenge to a tyrannical regime. The idea came from the popular uprisings in the Middle East that were taking place when I was planning the series.
In the third book, The Caller, a fighter suffers a terrible head injury. He’s tended to by his comrades while the authorities decide whether he’s to be kept alive with perhaps little hope of returning to his old self. Here in Perth, Western Australia, we’ve seen a lot of young men suffer paralysis or brain damage as a result of ‘one punch’ assaults, often by strangers. I had been thinking about the fallout from such a situation, not only for the victim, but for everyone who cares about him. So this confronting situation made its way into a story set in ancient Scotland (or a place rather like it.)
I’ve also been reading a lot about Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, especially as experienced by soldiers on return from deployment to war zones. The military connection that exists in my family increased my wish to find out more about PTSD, and I ended up including it in my story. I was fairly sure that even if the Shadowfell rebels were successful in their quest to topple the tyrant, those who had served the rebel cause long-term would suffer lasting psychological damage as a result of the actions they’d had to take along the way.
In a sense, then, I am writing about what I know. I’m basing my stories on issues and themes that are important to me, and choosing to build them into a type of story I am confident I can write effectively. For the aspiring writer, my interpretation of ‘Write what you know’ is this: keep your characters psychologically true, and make your situations real to the reader. How? Go out and mingle with all kinds of people; experience and learn about the real world, because that world is bursting with great story ideas.
I've reviewed the Shadowfell trilogy here and here is a link to an interview I did with Juliet a couple of years ago.
PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT - I LOVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK!
July 7, 2014
BOOK REVIEW: The Shadowfell Trilogy by Juliet Marillier
Nothing makes me happier than a new Juliet Marillier book! She is best known for her gorgeous thick historical fantasy novels for adults, but she has also written smaller novels for young adults (no less gorgeous, however!)
Today on the blog I am reviewing the three books in her YA fantasy trilogy SHADOWFELL. My review of the first book was published in The Sydney Morning herald, and the reviews of the second two on my blog:
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J.R.R. Tolkien once said, ''The realm of fairy-story is wide and deep and high and filled with many things. All manner of beasts and birds are found there; shoreless seas and stars uncounted; beauty that is an enchantment, and an ever-present peril; both joy and sorrow as sharp as swords''.
Of all the fantasy writers in Australia and, perhaps, even the world, I think Juliet Marillier best captures this view of the realm of the faerie as a place of beauty and wonder and danger.
Her latest fantasy novel for young adults, Shadowfell, is an exquisitely written tale of love, fear, faith and difficult choices. It is set in a world where the Good Folk - fey creatures with strange, magical powers - live hidden in the trees, rocks and shadows.
One young woman, named Neryn, has the gift of Canny Eyes, which allows her to see the Good Folk even when they wish to stay out of sight. But this gift puts Neryn in peril, for her world is ruled by a usurper-king who fears and despises any magic. The king's soldiers hunt down fairy creatures and any human who has a magical gift, subjecting many to the terrible practice of mind-scraping, which turns them into halfwits.
The king knows of Neryn and her gift, and has set his soldiers to hunt her down. A young man, Flint, helps her escape the soldiers, but his past is shadowed with mystery and Neryn must choose whether it is safe to trust him. Her journey towards the rebel stronghold of Shadowfell becomes a series of tests, in which she must prove herself worthy of an old prophecy for the salvation of the land.
Reduced to a few lines, the plot of Shadowfell seems familiar to anyone who has read a great deal of young-adult fantasy, but as with any novel, it is the execution of the story that makes it sing. Marillier is a consummate craftswoman.
The book is perfectly composed, and the writing is lyrical and full of grace. Fifteen-year-old Neryn's confusion and fear will speak to any girl of the same age, and the mystery around the true identity of her rescuer is handled masterfully.
Born in New Zealand but now living in Western Australia, Marillier has won numerous awards, including the YALSA 2007 Best Book for Young Adults for Wildwood Dancing, and in 2008 the Sir Julius Vogel Award for Best Young Adult Novel for its sequel, Cybele's Secret. She has also won numerous Aurealis Awards for her adult historical fantasy novels, including Daughter of the Forest and Heart's Blood.
In a lifetime of reading and study, Marillier has steeped herself in myth, legend and folklore, and her intuitive knowledge of the patterns and motifs of storytelling underpin the whole novel.
Marillier has said, ''Many fantasy stories … tap into the archetypal themes of mythology, which involve the highest stakes - defeating evil, saving the world, being happy ever after … [however] that need not involve slaying a dragon or saving the whole of Middle Earth, it can be an individual, personal journey to enlightenment''.
Since Shadowfell is both a heroic quest and a coming-of-age story with a gently handled romance element, it is bound to appeal to any girl aged 13 or above. I cannot recommend this book highly enough.
[image error]
Raven Flight – Juliet Marillier
Juliet Marillier is one of my all-time favourite authors and a new book from her is always reason to celebrate. So when Raven Flight appeared in my mailbox, I gave a little jump of joy and read it straightaway. Raven Flight is Book 2 in the Shadowfell series. I loved Shadowfell and it made my List of Best Books 2012 - the books are classic old-fashioned high fantasy with a quest at its heart. The writing is beautiful and limpid, the setting is an otherworldy Scotland, and the story mixes danger, magic and romance - sigh! I loved it. This is YA fantasy at its absolute best.
[image error]
The Caller – Juliet Marillier
This is the third and last book in Juliet Marillier’s gorgeous YA fantasy Shadowfell trilogy. I have really enjoyed these books, which are, as always with Juliet’s books, filled with wit, warmth and wisdom. You must read them in order – Shadowfell, Raven Flight, then The Caller – as the books tell the story of the continuing adventures of Neryn and her journey to understand and control her magical talents as a Caller. Set in a land very much like ancient Scotland, with all manner of extraordinary faery creatures, the Shadowfell books weave together history, fantasy, folklore and ancient wisdoms to create a beautiful and powerful story. These books are a perfect read for a dreamy, romantic teenage girl – I love them now but oh! How I would have loved them when I was fifteen.
You may enjoy an interview I did with Juliet Marillier a couple of years ago ... and later this week I'll be running a guest post from her on ways to improve your writing, plus another quick interview.
PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT - I LOVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK!
Today on the blog I am reviewing the three books in her YA fantasy trilogy SHADOWFELL. My review of the first book was published in The Sydney Morning herald, and the reviews of the second two on my blog:
[image error]
J.R.R. Tolkien once said, ''The realm of fairy-story is wide and deep and high and filled with many things. All manner of beasts and birds are found there; shoreless seas and stars uncounted; beauty that is an enchantment, and an ever-present peril; both joy and sorrow as sharp as swords''.
Of all the fantasy writers in Australia and, perhaps, even the world, I think Juliet Marillier best captures this view of the realm of the faerie as a place of beauty and wonder and danger.
Her latest fantasy novel for young adults, Shadowfell, is an exquisitely written tale of love, fear, faith and difficult choices. It is set in a world where the Good Folk - fey creatures with strange, magical powers - live hidden in the trees, rocks and shadows.
One young woman, named Neryn, has the gift of Canny Eyes, which allows her to see the Good Folk even when they wish to stay out of sight. But this gift puts Neryn in peril, for her world is ruled by a usurper-king who fears and despises any magic. The king's soldiers hunt down fairy creatures and any human who has a magical gift, subjecting many to the terrible practice of mind-scraping, which turns them into halfwits.
The king knows of Neryn and her gift, and has set his soldiers to hunt her down. A young man, Flint, helps her escape the soldiers, but his past is shadowed with mystery and Neryn must choose whether it is safe to trust him. Her journey towards the rebel stronghold of Shadowfell becomes a series of tests, in which she must prove herself worthy of an old prophecy for the salvation of the land.
Reduced to a few lines, the plot of Shadowfell seems familiar to anyone who has read a great deal of young-adult fantasy, but as with any novel, it is the execution of the story that makes it sing. Marillier is a consummate craftswoman.
The book is perfectly composed, and the writing is lyrical and full of grace. Fifteen-year-old Neryn's confusion and fear will speak to any girl of the same age, and the mystery around the true identity of her rescuer is handled masterfully.
Born in New Zealand but now living in Western Australia, Marillier has won numerous awards, including the YALSA 2007 Best Book for Young Adults for Wildwood Dancing, and in 2008 the Sir Julius Vogel Award for Best Young Adult Novel for its sequel, Cybele's Secret. She has also won numerous Aurealis Awards for her adult historical fantasy novels, including Daughter of the Forest and Heart's Blood.
In a lifetime of reading and study, Marillier has steeped herself in myth, legend and folklore, and her intuitive knowledge of the patterns and motifs of storytelling underpin the whole novel.
Marillier has said, ''Many fantasy stories … tap into the archetypal themes of mythology, which involve the highest stakes - defeating evil, saving the world, being happy ever after … [however] that need not involve slaying a dragon or saving the whole of Middle Earth, it can be an individual, personal journey to enlightenment''.
Since Shadowfell is both a heroic quest and a coming-of-age story with a gently handled romance element, it is bound to appeal to any girl aged 13 or above. I cannot recommend this book highly enough.
[image error]
Raven Flight – Juliet Marillier
Juliet Marillier is one of my all-time favourite authors and a new book from her is always reason to celebrate. So when Raven Flight appeared in my mailbox, I gave a little jump of joy and read it straightaway. Raven Flight is Book 2 in the Shadowfell series. I loved Shadowfell and it made my List of Best Books 2012 - the books are classic old-fashioned high fantasy with a quest at its heart. The writing is beautiful and limpid, the setting is an otherworldy Scotland, and the story mixes danger, magic and romance - sigh! I loved it. This is YA fantasy at its absolute best.
[image error]
The Caller – Juliet Marillier
This is the third and last book in Juliet Marillier’s gorgeous YA fantasy Shadowfell trilogy. I have really enjoyed these books, which are, as always with Juliet’s books, filled with wit, warmth and wisdom. You must read them in order – Shadowfell, Raven Flight, then The Caller – as the books tell the story of the continuing adventures of Neryn and her journey to understand and control her magical talents as a Caller. Set in a land very much like ancient Scotland, with all manner of extraordinary faery creatures, the Shadowfell books weave together history, fantasy, folklore and ancient wisdoms to create a beautiful and powerful story. These books are a perfect read for a dreamy, romantic teenage girl – I love them now but oh! How I would have loved them when I was fifteen.
You may enjoy an interview I did with Juliet Marillier a couple of years ago ... and later this week I'll be running a guest post from her on ways to improve your writing, plus another quick interview.
PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT - I LOVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK!
July 1, 2014
BOOK LIST: Books I Read in May 2014
Its been such a busy time for me lately that I haven't had much time for blogging! I hope you'll all forgive me ... the good news is that I've been working on a new novel.
I always have time for reading, though - here's my May roundup of what Books I've Been Reading.
May is festival time in Sydney, and so I spent a lot of time talking about, and listening to other writers talk about, books and writing. It was wonderful to see the festival precinct at the wharves so alive and buzzing with book-lovers, and I bought a great pile of books that I shall be slowly working my way though in the upcoming weeks.
A lot of my reading time is still being taken up by research, but I managed to read a few other lovely books as well.
[image error]
The Sequin Star – Belinda Murrell
Many of you may know that Belinda Murrell is my elder sister, and so I have to admit to a strong partiality to any book I read of hers. The Sequin Star is the latest in her very popular timeslip series for teenage girls. The action follows a modern-day Australian girl named Claire who finds herself thrown back in time to a Great Depression-era circus in 1932. She is rescued by a warm-hearted girl named Rosina who is riding on the back of an elephant. Claire has no way of getting back to her own time, and so begins to work in the circus. As well as Rosina and her pet monkey, Claire makes friends with two boys from very different backgrounds. Jem’s family is dirt-poor and living in a shanty town, while Kit has a chauffeur and lives in a mansion. Kit comes to the circus night after night to watch Rosina ride her beautiful dancing horses, not realising he is putting himself in danger. When Kit is kidnapped, Claire and her friends have to try and work out the mystery in order to save him. The Sequin Star is exactly the sort of book I would have loved to have read in my early teens (in fact, any time!), and is gives a really vivid look at life in Sydney in the early 1930s. Loved it!
[image error]
Gift from the Sea – Anne Morrow Lindbergh
After reading and enjoying Melanie Benjamin’s wonderful novel about the life of Anne Morrow Lindbergh in The Aviator’s Wife, I was inspired to go back and read ‘Gift from the Sea’, the most famous of Lindbergh’s numerous books. It’s a small, delicate and wise book, full of meditations on the life of women. I first read it when I was sixteen, and am now thinking I shall pass it on to my daughter at the same age.
[image error]
The Unlikely Spy – Daniel Silva
I love a good spy thriller, particularly when its set during World War II, and Daniel Silva did not disappoint. The unlikely spy of the title is an amiable history professor and he is on the track of a ruthless Nazi spy working undercover in Great Britain in the lead-up to D-Day. This is more a novel of psychological suspense than an action-packed page-turner, but I enjoyed seeing the action from all sides, and found the historical details fascinating.
[image error]
Ingo – Helen Dunmore
I’ve been meaning to read this book for so long, but only picked it up this month because I was doing a talk on retellings of mermaid tales, and thought I should catch up on recent additions to the genre. I am so glad I did – I loved this book! It’s a very simple story – after a girl’s father disappears and is believed drowned, she finds her brother beginning to be drawn irresistibly to the sea as well. In time, the girl (whose name is Sapphire) learns of the mysterious realm of Ingo, the world of the mermaids that lies in the depths of the ocean. Its enchanting siren song is dangerous, however, and Sapphire will find it hard to escape its spell. What lifts this novel out of the ordinary, however, is the beauty of the writing. Helen Dunmore is a poet as well as an Orange Prize-winning novelist for adults. Her writing is both lyrical and deft, and I’m looking forward to the rest in the series.
[image error]
The Winter Bride – Anne Gracie
Anne Gracie is my favourite living romance novelist; she never disappoints. The Winter Bride is the second in a Regency-times series featuring four plucky young women trying to make their own way in the world, and finding all sorts of trouble along the path towards true love. Read The Autumn Bride first, but have this one close to hand as once you’ve read one, you’ll want more. I’m just hanging out for the next in the series now.
[image error]
The Chalet School in Exile – Elinor Brent-Dyer
Elinor Brent-Dyer was an extraordinarily prolific author who wrote more than 100 books in total, many of them in the famous Chalet School series about a 1930s girls’ school set in the Austrian Tyrol. I’ve been collecting them for years and had been searching for this one in particular – the rare The Chalet School in Exile, set during the Nazis’ Anschluss of Austria. The girls of the school fall foul of the Gestapo after trying to save an old Jewish man from being beaten to death, and have to escape Austria on foot through the Alps. It’s an extraordinarily vivid snapshot of a time and a place, and one of the few children’s books of the era to deal directly with the terror of the Nazis. I read it when I was about 10, and it made a deep impression on me at the time. An original first edition hardback with the original dust-jacket showing a SS officer confronting the girls is worth over $1,000 (though this is cheap compared to the almost $4,000 you need to fork out for a first edition copy of the first book in the series, The School at the Chalet). I however bought my copy from Girls Gone By publishers which re-issue the rarer editions at a much more affordable price (and feature the famous dustjacket as well).
Meanwhile, I’ve continued with my own research into the Nazi era. I’ve read another half-a-dozen non-fiction books on the subject. Here are three of the best I’ve read this month:
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Between Dignity & Despair: Jewish Life in Nazi Germany – Marion A Kaplan
This powerful and heart-rending book draws on many different memoirs, diaries, letters and post-war interviews to give us an extraordinary insight into what it was like to be a Jew in Germany during the Nazi years. It shows how the many small humiliations and unkindnesses of the early years gradually began to drag the Jewish community inexorably towards the horror of the Holocaust, and gives a sense of how that horror continues to shadow those that survived.
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Hitler’s Furies: German Women in the Nazi Killing Fields – Wendy Lower
This book was so chilling that I could only read it in parts. It tells the stories of the active role played by Nazi women in the Third Reich: nurses and secretaries and wives, as much as the already well-known horrors of the female camp guards. Some of the events seem impossible to believe, except that they have been documented in the Nuremberg court of law.
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Hitler’s Spy Chief: the Wilhelm Canaris Mystery – Richard Bassett
Wilhelm Canaris was the enigmatic head of the Abwehr, the German secret service. He was executed for treason in a Bavarian concentration camp only days before the Allies’ reached the camp and liberated it. He had been involved in the failed assassination of Hitler immortalised in the movie ‘Valkyrie’, but many researchers believe that he had been working to undermine the Third Reich from before the beginning of the war. This detailed and in-depth examination of his life and work is not for the casual reader (it assumes a wide knowledge of the Nazi era and the Valkyrie plot), but it is utterly fascinating and convincingly argues that Canaris had been feeding secrets to the British for many years and was in fact protected to some extent by them.
Want more? Here's my list of Books Read in April
PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT - I LOVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK!
I always have time for reading, though - here's my May roundup of what Books I've Been Reading.
May is festival time in Sydney, and so I spent a lot of time talking about, and listening to other writers talk about, books and writing. It was wonderful to see the festival precinct at the wharves so alive and buzzing with book-lovers, and I bought a great pile of books that I shall be slowly working my way though in the upcoming weeks.
A lot of my reading time is still being taken up by research, but I managed to read a few other lovely books as well.
[image error]
The Sequin Star – Belinda Murrell
Many of you may know that Belinda Murrell is my elder sister, and so I have to admit to a strong partiality to any book I read of hers. The Sequin Star is the latest in her very popular timeslip series for teenage girls. The action follows a modern-day Australian girl named Claire who finds herself thrown back in time to a Great Depression-era circus in 1932. She is rescued by a warm-hearted girl named Rosina who is riding on the back of an elephant. Claire has no way of getting back to her own time, and so begins to work in the circus. As well as Rosina and her pet monkey, Claire makes friends with two boys from very different backgrounds. Jem’s family is dirt-poor and living in a shanty town, while Kit has a chauffeur and lives in a mansion. Kit comes to the circus night after night to watch Rosina ride her beautiful dancing horses, not realising he is putting himself in danger. When Kit is kidnapped, Claire and her friends have to try and work out the mystery in order to save him. The Sequin Star is exactly the sort of book I would have loved to have read in my early teens (in fact, any time!), and is gives a really vivid look at life in Sydney in the early 1930s. Loved it!
[image error]
Gift from the Sea – Anne Morrow Lindbergh
After reading and enjoying Melanie Benjamin’s wonderful novel about the life of Anne Morrow Lindbergh in The Aviator’s Wife, I was inspired to go back and read ‘Gift from the Sea’, the most famous of Lindbergh’s numerous books. It’s a small, delicate and wise book, full of meditations on the life of women. I first read it when I was sixteen, and am now thinking I shall pass it on to my daughter at the same age.
[image error]
The Unlikely Spy – Daniel Silva
I love a good spy thriller, particularly when its set during World War II, and Daniel Silva did not disappoint. The unlikely spy of the title is an amiable history professor and he is on the track of a ruthless Nazi spy working undercover in Great Britain in the lead-up to D-Day. This is more a novel of psychological suspense than an action-packed page-turner, but I enjoyed seeing the action from all sides, and found the historical details fascinating.
[image error]
Ingo – Helen Dunmore
I’ve been meaning to read this book for so long, but only picked it up this month because I was doing a talk on retellings of mermaid tales, and thought I should catch up on recent additions to the genre. I am so glad I did – I loved this book! It’s a very simple story – after a girl’s father disappears and is believed drowned, she finds her brother beginning to be drawn irresistibly to the sea as well. In time, the girl (whose name is Sapphire) learns of the mysterious realm of Ingo, the world of the mermaids that lies in the depths of the ocean. Its enchanting siren song is dangerous, however, and Sapphire will find it hard to escape its spell. What lifts this novel out of the ordinary, however, is the beauty of the writing. Helen Dunmore is a poet as well as an Orange Prize-winning novelist for adults. Her writing is both lyrical and deft, and I’m looking forward to the rest in the series.
[image error]
The Winter Bride – Anne Gracie
Anne Gracie is my favourite living romance novelist; she never disappoints. The Winter Bride is the second in a Regency-times series featuring four plucky young women trying to make their own way in the world, and finding all sorts of trouble along the path towards true love. Read The Autumn Bride first, but have this one close to hand as once you’ve read one, you’ll want more. I’m just hanging out for the next in the series now.
[image error]
The Chalet School in Exile – Elinor Brent-Dyer
Elinor Brent-Dyer was an extraordinarily prolific author who wrote more than 100 books in total, many of them in the famous Chalet School series about a 1930s girls’ school set in the Austrian Tyrol. I’ve been collecting them for years and had been searching for this one in particular – the rare The Chalet School in Exile, set during the Nazis’ Anschluss of Austria. The girls of the school fall foul of the Gestapo after trying to save an old Jewish man from being beaten to death, and have to escape Austria on foot through the Alps. It’s an extraordinarily vivid snapshot of a time and a place, and one of the few children’s books of the era to deal directly with the terror of the Nazis. I read it when I was about 10, and it made a deep impression on me at the time. An original first edition hardback with the original dust-jacket showing a SS officer confronting the girls is worth over $1,000 (though this is cheap compared to the almost $4,000 you need to fork out for a first edition copy of the first book in the series, The School at the Chalet). I however bought my copy from Girls Gone By publishers which re-issue the rarer editions at a much more affordable price (and feature the famous dustjacket as well).
Meanwhile, I’ve continued with my own research into the Nazi era. I’ve read another half-a-dozen non-fiction books on the subject. Here are three of the best I’ve read this month:
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Between Dignity & Despair: Jewish Life in Nazi Germany – Marion A Kaplan
This powerful and heart-rending book draws on many different memoirs, diaries, letters and post-war interviews to give us an extraordinary insight into what it was like to be a Jew in Germany during the Nazi years. It shows how the many small humiliations and unkindnesses of the early years gradually began to drag the Jewish community inexorably towards the horror of the Holocaust, and gives a sense of how that horror continues to shadow those that survived.
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Hitler’s Furies: German Women in the Nazi Killing Fields – Wendy Lower
This book was so chilling that I could only read it in parts. It tells the stories of the active role played by Nazi women in the Third Reich: nurses and secretaries and wives, as much as the already well-known horrors of the female camp guards. Some of the events seem impossible to believe, except that they have been documented in the Nuremberg court of law.
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Hitler’s Spy Chief: the Wilhelm Canaris Mystery – Richard Bassett
Wilhelm Canaris was the enigmatic head of the Abwehr, the German secret service. He was executed for treason in a Bavarian concentration camp only days before the Allies’ reached the camp and liberated it. He had been involved in the failed assassination of Hitler immortalised in the movie ‘Valkyrie’, but many researchers believe that he had been working to undermine the Third Reich from before the beginning of the war. This detailed and in-depth examination of his life and work is not for the casual reader (it assumes a wide knowledge of the Nazi era and the Valkyrie plot), but it is utterly fascinating and convincingly argues that Canaris had been feeding secrets to the British for many years and was in fact protected to some extent by them.
Want more? Here's my list of Books Read in April
PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT - I LOVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK!
June 12, 2014
SPOTLIGHT: Sleeping Beauty
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History of the Tale
The earliest ‘Sleeping Beauty’ tale appears in oral tradition around 1300, in the tale 'Troylus and Zellandine'. In this tale, a disgruntled deity places a curse on the young Princess Zellandine that causes her to go into a deep slumber. Many years later, Prince Troylus happens upon the princess and rapes her in her sleep. As a result, she has a child. In 1528, the same story appears in print for the first time, in Paris, in a book of romances called Perceforest.
[image error]
The tale ‘Sun, Moon & Talia’ was written by Neapolitan writer and courtier Giambattista Basile in the early 1600s, and published posthumously in 1634 in a collection of stories called The Tale of Tales. This also included the earliest known versions of Cinderella and Rapunzel.
Basile's story is not as pretty as the tale we know. It features the rape of the sleeping beauty, attempted infanticide, forced cannibalism and the threat of being burned alive.
Here is a brief outline of Basile's tale:
It is prophesied at Talia’s birth that she will one day face great danger from a chip of flax. Her father orders that all flax be removed from the kingdom. When she is grown, Talia manages to find the only piece of flax in the entire kingdom, gets a splinter of it stuck beneath her fingernail, and falls into a deathlike sleep.
Her father, beside himself with grief, orders the palace and surrounding countryside be abandoned so he can put the event out of his mind.
Eventually, another king stumbles upon the abandoned kingdom, and finds Talia sleeping alone. Unable to wake her, he decides to have ex with her while she sleeps. Talia falls pregnant and, without waking, eventually gives birth to twins. While the babies try to suckle, one sucks on her finger and the flax splinter is loosened. Talia wakes up, and is overjoyed to find herself the mother of twins, which she names Sun and Moon.
The king returns and finds Talia awake and his twin childrenborn. A relationship develops between them.
The king’s wife learns of the affair and, pretending to be the king, sends for Sun and Moon. She gives them to the cook, and tells him to slaughter and roast them and serve them to the king. The cook, unable to kill the babies, hides the twins and serves up two baby lambs instead. The queen watches gleefully as the king devours the meal.
She then sends for Talia, and demands she be burned alive. The King hears Talia screaming, and rescues her just in time. The awful queen is thrown in the fire instead, and roasts to death. The cook then produces the twins, alive and well, and they all live happily ever after.
In one 14th century version of the tale, the sleeping princess tells off the king and points out her lack of consent before deciding to give him another chance.
[image error]
‘La belle au bois dormant’ was written by French author Charles Perrault in 1697, most probably drawing upon Basile’s stories which may have been brought to the French court in mid-1690s by an Italian publisher. Perrault's Mother Goose tales also included such well-known stories as Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Bluebeard, and Puss in Boots.
In Perrault's tale, a king invites seven fairies to bless his newborn daughter, and prepares golden plates and cutlery for them. One fairy was not invited because she was so old and no-one had seen her for so long. However, she comes anyway and then is angry because there is no golden plate for her. She curses the baby princess to prick her on a spindle finger & die. One of the other fairies saves her by changing the curse of death to the curse of sleeping for 100 years.
At the age of 15 or 16, the princess pricks her finger on a spindle and falls into an enchanted sleep. The fairy puts the whole castle to sleep as well. A prince hears the story of the sleeping princess and goes to find her – the wood that hides the castle shows him the path. He finds the princess and kneels before her. The princess wakes up (NB: there is no kiss in Perrault's story) and they are married.
Perrault's story does not end here. The prince keeps Sleeping Beauty hidden for a few years and they have two children called Morning & Day. At last he becomes king & takes his wife and children to his home. The prince’s mother is an ogress – she conspires to eat the children and the princess but is outwitted by the cook, in a similar fashion to Basile's story. The Ogress queen dies in a tub of toads and snakes.
The uninvited fairy motif goes back to Greek mythology when he goddess Eris is not invited to a wedding, but arrives anyway, and throws the Golden Apple of Discord amongst the other goddesses with the inscription ‘For the Fairest’ which causes an argument over whom should claim it, and leads to the Trojan War.
[image error]
'Dörnroschen' (Little Brier Rose) – Grimm Brothers
The story was told to Wilhelm Grimm by a young woman, Marie Hassenpflug, who had French ancestors and was included in the first 1812 edition.
The tale is different to Perrault's in the following ways:
Differences
- it has a much simpler style, closer to ‘oral’ traditions
- the Queen is told of her pregnancy by a crab (in later versions a frog)
- There are 13 fairies but the king only has 12 golden plates so he does not invite one
- The thirteenth fairy curses the princess to prick herself with a spindle and die
- The twelfth fairy changes the curse to a sleep of 100 years
- When she pricks her finger, the whole castle falls magically asleep
- A thorn hedge grows up around the castle
- Many princes try and fight through the thorns but fail – then the right prince comes along and the thorns turn into flowers
- When he finds the sleeping princess, he kisses her
- The princes wakes up and so does the whole castle
- The story ends with their marriage
Jacob & Wilhelm argued about including this tale because of its French origins (they were collecting tales with German origins), but Wilhelm argued for its inclusion because of 1) its beauty and romance 2) it had linked to the Norse myth Sigur and Brynhild – she was a Valkyrie who disobeyed Odin and was cursed to marry a mortal. She feared being wed to a coward, so was allowed to sleep on a mountaintop surrounded by a ring of fire until there was a man brave enough to ride through it and wake her. She had fallen asleep after pricking her hand on a thorn from the ‘sleep tree’.
[image error]
Motifs & Meaning Of Tales
Bruno Bettelheim , the Freudian psychoanalyst, wrote in his seminal work ‘The Uses of Enchantment’ that Beauty’s sleep is the physical lethargy that occurs at puberty. He sees the pricking of her finger as a symbol of menstruation, and sees sexual imagery in the girl’s search for a secret room, the circular stair, and the key in the lock. Therefore her awakening is a sexual awakening
Maria Tatar has written: “The story of Briar Rose has been thought to map a female sexual maturation, with the touching of the spindle representing the onset of puberty, a kind of sexual awakening that leads to passive, introspective period of latency”.
Joseph Campbell notes that fairy tales are often about girls who resist growing up. At the crisis of the threshold crossing, she baulks. So she goes to sleep until the prince comes through all the barriers.
Contrary to most feminist readings of the tale as being a bout a passive princess, some scholars have seen the Sleeping Beauty tale as containing remnants of matriarchal myth.
In ‘The Feminine in Fairy Tales’, Marie-Therese von Franz says: ‘ the mother of the Sun and the Moon is not an ordinary human being, so you could say it is a symbol. But if the children were Sun and Moon, or Day and Dawn, as in other versions, you are [. . .] in the realm of what we normally call the world of the gods.’ (ie Sleeping Beauty is representative of the Great Goddess)
This interpretation is borne up by some fo the symbols in the story, such as the spinning wheel, a feminine tool and an instrument of the Fates. It symbolizes death—i.e. the cutting of the thread. The hundred-year sleep of the princess is evocative of winter and Persephone’s ordeal, and her awakening to love is therefore the awakening of spring.
In ‘Once Upon a Time’, Max Luthi builds on this mythological interpretation, saying Sleeping Beauty ‘tells of death and resurrection. The flowering of the hedge of roses and the awakening of the sleeping maiden suggest the earth in lifeless repose which, touched by spring, begins to live anew and blossom as young and beautiful as ever. It suggests also the awakening of sleeping nature at the first glimmering of a new day.’(Aurora)
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Modern Retellings
'Sleeping Beauty' was a 1959 Disney animated musical fantasy film, the 16th in the Animated Classics series, it was released to theaters on January 29, 1959, by Buena Vista Distribution. This was the last Disney adaptation of a fairy tale for some years because of its initial disappointing box office gross and mixed critical reception. The studio did not return to the genre until years later, after Walt Disney died, with the release of The Little Mermaid (1989).
The film's musical score and songs, featuring the work of the Berlin Symphony Orchestra, are arrangements or adaptations of numbers from the 1890 Sleeping Beauty ballet by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky.
The heroine has only 18 lines of dialogue throughout the entire film & appears in the film for 18 minutes. Her first line is spoken 19 minutes into the film, and her last is delivered 39 minutes into the film. However, she does sing two songs during this time frame.
The seven fairies were changed to three so that it was not too much like Snow White & the Seven Dwarves.
Sleeping Beauty is also the name of a 2011 Australian film written and directed by Julia Leigh. It stars Emily Browning as a young university student who begins doing erotic freelance work in which she is required to sleep in bed alongside paying customers. The film is based in part on the novel The House of the Sleeping Beauties by Nobel laureate Yasunari Kawabata.
In Matthew Bourne’s 2013 version of Tchaikovsky's ballet Sleeping Beauty, the action starts in 1890, the year the ballet first premiered in St. Petersburg. Baby Aurora is humorously portrayed by a puppet and the fairies are both male & female. Instead of beauty, grace and modesty, they bestow passion, plenty, spirit, temperament and presciently, rebirth. The wicked fairy Carabosse is danced by a man.
[image error]
The Disney movie Maleficent has recently been released, starring Angelina Jolie.
Maleficent is a fictional character from Walt Disney Pictures's 1959 animated film Sleeping Beauty. Here is the blurb:
Maleficent is the untold story of Disney's most iconic villain, from the 1959 classic Sleeping Beauty. A beautiful, pure-hearted young woman, Maleficent has an idyllic life growing up in a peaceable forest kingdom, until one day when an invading army threatens the harmony of the land. Maleficent rises to be the land's fiercest protector, but she ultimately suffers a ruthless betrayal – an act that begins to turn her pure heart to stone. Bent on revenge, Maleficent faces an epic battle with the invading king's successor and, as a result, places a curse upon his newborn infant Aurora. As the child grows, Maleficent realises that Aurora holds the key to peace in the kingdom – and perhaps to Maleficent's true happiness as well.
I find this new take on the story particularly interesting, with the story being told from the point of view of the villainness allowing a new complexity of character and new moral ambiguity.
My Favourite Retellings of 'Sleeping Beauty'
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Sophie Masson. Clementine. Lady Aurora, daughter of the Count and Countess of Joli-Bois, and Clementine, the local woodcutter's child, have been firm friends for all of their sixteen years. Until, that is, the day they stumble upon a castle they never knew existed … A century later, Lord Arthur, a young amateur scientist, is determined to find out. But he discovers that science is no match for a magic that has been lying untouched for over one hundred years...
Adela Geras. Watching the Roses. Raped on the night of her eighteenth birthday by the despicable Angus, Alice remains in her room, in a near-catatonic state, communicating only with her diary, in a modern version of Sleeping Beauty in which the princess must ultimately save herself.
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Helen Lowe. Thornspell. - reimagines the Sleeping Beauty story from the point of view of the prince. Read my review and an interview with Helen Lowe here
Robin McKinley. Spindle's End. Katriona, an apprentice fairy sees the wicked fairy, Pernicia, delivers the curse: one day before her 21st birthday, the princess will prick her finger on a spindle, fall into a poisoned sleep, and die. Katriona flees with the infant princess in order to save her.
Jane Yolen. Briar Rose. Written by one of the true greats in the field of folk and fairy tales, this novel explores the Holocaust with a storyline borrowed from Sleeping Beauty – brilliant!
[image error]
History of the Tale
The earliest ‘Sleeping Beauty’ tale appears in oral tradition around 1300, in the tale 'Troylus and Zellandine'. In this tale, a disgruntled deity places a curse on the young Princess Zellandine that causes her to go into a deep slumber. Many years later, Prince Troylus happens upon the princess and rapes her in her sleep. As a result, she has a child. In 1528, the same story appears in print for the first time, in Paris, in a book of romances called Perceforest.
[image error]
The tale ‘Sun, Moon & Talia’ was written by Neapolitan writer and courtier Giambattista Basile in the early 1600s, and published posthumously in 1634 in a collection of stories called The Tale of Tales. This also included the earliest known versions of Cinderella and Rapunzel.
Basile's story is not as pretty as the tale we know. It features the rape of the sleeping beauty, attempted infanticide, forced cannibalism and the threat of being burned alive.
Here is a brief outline of Basile's tale:
It is prophesied at Talia’s birth that she will one day face great danger from a chip of flax. Her father orders that all flax be removed from the kingdom. When she is grown, Talia manages to find the only piece of flax in the entire kingdom, gets a splinter of it stuck beneath her fingernail, and falls into a deathlike sleep.
Her father, beside himself with grief, orders the palace and surrounding countryside be abandoned so he can put the event out of his mind.
Eventually, another king stumbles upon the abandoned kingdom, and finds Talia sleeping alone. Unable to wake her, he decides to have ex with her while she sleeps. Talia falls pregnant and, without waking, eventually gives birth to twins. While the babies try to suckle, one sucks on her finger and the flax splinter is loosened. Talia wakes up, and is overjoyed to find herself the mother of twins, which she names Sun and Moon.
The king returns and finds Talia awake and his twin childrenborn. A relationship develops between them.
The king’s wife learns of the affair and, pretending to be the king, sends for Sun and Moon. She gives them to the cook, and tells him to slaughter and roast them and serve them to the king. The cook, unable to kill the babies, hides the twins and serves up two baby lambs instead. The queen watches gleefully as the king devours the meal.
She then sends for Talia, and demands she be burned alive. The King hears Talia screaming, and rescues her just in time. The awful queen is thrown in the fire instead, and roasts to death. The cook then produces the twins, alive and well, and they all live happily ever after.
In one 14th century version of the tale, the sleeping princess tells off the king and points out her lack of consent before deciding to give him another chance.
[image error]
‘La belle au bois dormant’ was written by French author Charles Perrault in 1697, most probably drawing upon Basile’s stories which may have been brought to the French court in mid-1690s by an Italian publisher. Perrault's Mother Goose tales also included such well-known stories as Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Bluebeard, and Puss in Boots.
In Perrault's tale, a king invites seven fairies to bless his newborn daughter, and prepares golden plates and cutlery for them. One fairy was not invited because she was so old and no-one had seen her for so long. However, she comes anyway and then is angry because there is no golden plate for her. She curses the baby princess to prick her on a spindle finger & die. One of the other fairies saves her by changing the curse of death to the curse of sleeping for 100 years.
At the age of 15 or 16, the princess pricks her finger on a spindle and falls into an enchanted sleep. The fairy puts the whole castle to sleep as well. A prince hears the story of the sleeping princess and goes to find her – the wood that hides the castle shows him the path. He finds the princess and kneels before her. The princess wakes up (NB: there is no kiss in Perrault's story) and they are married.
Perrault's story does not end here. The prince keeps Sleeping Beauty hidden for a few years and they have two children called Morning & Day. At last he becomes king & takes his wife and children to his home. The prince’s mother is an ogress – she conspires to eat the children and the princess but is outwitted by the cook, in a similar fashion to Basile's story. The Ogress queen dies in a tub of toads and snakes.
The uninvited fairy motif goes back to Greek mythology when he goddess Eris is not invited to a wedding, but arrives anyway, and throws the Golden Apple of Discord amongst the other goddesses with the inscription ‘For the Fairest’ which causes an argument over whom should claim it, and leads to the Trojan War.
[image error]
'Dörnroschen' (Little Brier Rose) – Grimm Brothers
The story was told to Wilhelm Grimm by a young woman, Marie Hassenpflug, who had French ancestors and was included in the first 1812 edition.
The tale is different to Perrault's in the following ways:
Differences
- it has a much simpler style, closer to ‘oral’ traditions
- the Queen is told of her pregnancy by a crab (in later versions a frog)
- There are 13 fairies but the king only has 12 golden plates so he does not invite one
- The thirteenth fairy curses the princess to prick herself with a spindle and die
- The twelfth fairy changes the curse to a sleep of 100 years
- When she pricks her finger, the whole castle falls magically asleep
- A thorn hedge grows up around the castle
- Many princes try and fight through the thorns but fail – then the right prince comes along and the thorns turn into flowers
- When he finds the sleeping princess, he kisses her
- The princes wakes up and so does the whole castle
- The story ends with their marriage
Jacob & Wilhelm argued about including this tale because of its French origins (they were collecting tales with German origins), but Wilhelm argued for its inclusion because of 1) its beauty and romance 2) it had linked to the Norse myth Sigur and Brynhild – she was a Valkyrie who disobeyed Odin and was cursed to marry a mortal. She feared being wed to a coward, so was allowed to sleep on a mountaintop surrounded by a ring of fire until there was a man brave enough to ride through it and wake her. She had fallen asleep after pricking her hand on a thorn from the ‘sleep tree’.
[image error]
Motifs & Meaning Of Tales
Bruno Bettelheim , the Freudian psychoanalyst, wrote in his seminal work ‘The Uses of Enchantment’ that Beauty’s sleep is the physical lethargy that occurs at puberty. He sees the pricking of her finger as a symbol of menstruation, and sees sexual imagery in the girl’s search for a secret room, the circular stair, and the key in the lock. Therefore her awakening is a sexual awakening
Maria Tatar has written: “The story of Briar Rose has been thought to map a female sexual maturation, with the touching of the spindle representing the onset of puberty, a kind of sexual awakening that leads to passive, introspective period of latency”.
Joseph Campbell notes that fairy tales are often about girls who resist growing up. At the crisis of the threshold crossing, she baulks. So she goes to sleep until the prince comes through all the barriers.
Contrary to most feminist readings of the tale as being a bout a passive princess, some scholars have seen the Sleeping Beauty tale as containing remnants of matriarchal myth.
In ‘The Feminine in Fairy Tales’, Marie-Therese von Franz says: ‘ the mother of the Sun and the Moon is not an ordinary human being, so you could say it is a symbol. But if the children were Sun and Moon, or Day and Dawn, as in other versions, you are [. . .] in the realm of what we normally call the world of the gods.’ (ie Sleeping Beauty is representative of the Great Goddess)
This interpretation is borne up by some fo the symbols in the story, such as the spinning wheel, a feminine tool and an instrument of the Fates. It symbolizes death—i.e. the cutting of the thread. The hundred-year sleep of the princess is evocative of winter and Persephone’s ordeal, and her awakening to love is therefore the awakening of spring.
In ‘Once Upon a Time’, Max Luthi builds on this mythological interpretation, saying Sleeping Beauty ‘tells of death and resurrection. The flowering of the hedge of roses and the awakening of the sleeping maiden suggest the earth in lifeless repose which, touched by spring, begins to live anew and blossom as young and beautiful as ever. It suggests also the awakening of sleeping nature at the first glimmering of a new day.’(Aurora)
[image error]
Modern Retellings
'Sleeping Beauty' was a 1959 Disney animated musical fantasy film, the 16th in the Animated Classics series, it was released to theaters on January 29, 1959, by Buena Vista Distribution. This was the last Disney adaptation of a fairy tale for some years because of its initial disappointing box office gross and mixed critical reception. The studio did not return to the genre until years later, after Walt Disney died, with the release of The Little Mermaid (1989).
The film's musical score and songs, featuring the work of the Berlin Symphony Orchestra, are arrangements or adaptations of numbers from the 1890 Sleeping Beauty ballet by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky.
The heroine has only 18 lines of dialogue throughout the entire film & appears in the film for 18 minutes. Her first line is spoken 19 minutes into the film, and her last is delivered 39 minutes into the film. However, she does sing two songs during this time frame.
The seven fairies were changed to three so that it was not too much like Snow White & the Seven Dwarves.
Sleeping Beauty is also the name of a 2011 Australian film written and directed by Julia Leigh. It stars Emily Browning as a young university student who begins doing erotic freelance work in which she is required to sleep in bed alongside paying customers. The film is based in part on the novel The House of the Sleeping Beauties by Nobel laureate Yasunari Kawabata.
In Matthew Bourne’s 2013 version of Tchaikovsky's ballet Sleeping Beauty, the action starts in 1890, the year the ballet first premiered in St. Petersburg. Baby Aurora is humorously portrayed by a puppet and the fairies are both male & female. Instead of beauty, grace and modesty, they bestow passion, plenty, spirit, temperament and presciently, rebirth. The wicked fairy Carabosse is danced by a man.
[image error]
The Disney movie Maleficent has recently been released, starring Angelina Jolie.
Maleficent is a fictional character from Walt Disney Pictures's 1959 animated film Sleeping Beauty. Here is the blurb:
Maleficent is the untold story of Disney's most iconic villain, from the 1959 classic Sleeping Beauty. A beautiful, pure-hearted young woman, Maleficent has an idyllic life growing up in a peaceable forest kingdom, until one day when an invading army threatens the harmony of the land. Maleficent rises to be the land's fiercest protector, but she ultimately suffers a ruthless betrayal – an act that begins to turn her pure heart to stone. Bent on revenge, Maleficent faces an epic battle with the invading king's successor and, as a result, places a curse upon his newborn infant Aurora. As the child grows, Maleficent realises that Aurora holds the key to peace in the kingdom – and perhaps to Maleficent's true happiness as well.
I find this new take on the story particularly interesting, with the story being told from the point of view of the villainness allowing a new complexity of character and new moral ambiguity.
My Favourite Retellings of 'Sleeping Beauty'
[image error]
Sophie Masson. Clementine. Lady Aurora, daughter of the Count and Countess of Joli-Bois, and Clementine, the local woodcutter's child, have been firm friends for all of their sixteen years. Until, that is, the day they stumble upon a castle they never knew existed … A century later, Lord Arthur, a young amateur scientist, is determined to find out. But he discovers that science is no match for a magic that has been lying untouched for over one hundred years...
Adela Geras. Watching the Roses. Raped on the night of her eighteenth birthday by the despicable Angus, Alice remains in her room, in a near-catatonic state, communicating only with her diary, in a modern version of Sleeping Beauty in which the princess must ultimately save herself.
[image error]
Helen Lowe. Thornspell. - reimagines the Sleeping Beauty story from the point of view of the prince. Read my review and an interview with Helen Lowe here
Robin McKinley. Spindle's End. Katriona, an apprentice fairy sees the wicked fairy, Pernicia, delivers the curse: one day before her 21st birthday, the princess will prick her finger on a spindle, fall into a poisoned sleep, and die. Katriona flees with the infant princess in order to save her.
Jane Yolen. Briar Rose. Written by one of the true greats in the field of folk and fairy tales, this novel explores the Holocaust with a storyline borrowed from Sleeping Beauty – brilliant!
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June 5, 2014
INTERVIEW: Melanie Benjamin author of 'The Aviator's Wife
Please welcome Melanie Benjamin to the blog, answering five quick questions about her new book The Aviator's Wife.
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What is 'The Aviator's Wife' all about?
The Aviator’s Wife is a historical novel concentrating on the epic marriage between Anne Morrow and Charles Lindbergh
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How did you get the first idea for it?
I thought the early days of aviation would be interesting and romantic, even, to write about. And the name “Lindbergh” certainly looms over all of those days. So that was what drew me to further research the lives of Charles and Anne, and hope that they would yield an interesting novel – I think they did!
What do you love most about writing?
I love playing with the language, rearranging the words on the page, primarily. I also love learning through the research process.
What are the best 5 books you've read recently?
IN COLD BLOOD, DURING THE REIGN OF THE QUEEN OF PERSIA, THE GIRLS OF ATOMIC CITY, THE ENTERTAINER (MOVIES, MAGIC AND MY FATHER’S TWENTIETH CENTURY), LONGBOURN,
What lies ahead of you in the next year?
I hope to finish up my next historical novel.
Melanie Benjamin
[image error]
What is 'The Aviator's Wife' all about?
The Aviator’s Wife is a historical novel concentrating on the epic marriage between Anne Morrow and Charles Lindbergh
[image error]
How did you get the first idea for it?
I thought the early days of aviation would be interesting and romantic, even, to write about. And the name “Lindbergh” certainly looms over all of those days. So that was what drew me to further research the lives of Charles and Anne, and hope that they would yield an interesting novel – I think they did!
What do you love most about writing?
I love playing with the language, rearranging the words on the page, primarily. I also love learning through the research process.
What are the best 5 books you've read recently?
IN COLD BLOOD, DURING THE REIGN OF THE QUEEN OF PERSIA, THE GIRLS OF ATOMIC CITY, THE ENTERTAINER (MOVIES, MAGIC AND MY FATHER’S TWENTIETH CENTURY), LONGBOURN,
What lies ahead of you in the next year?
I hope to finish up my next historical novel.
Melanie Benjamin
Author of THE AVIATOR'S WIFE, a novel of Anne Morrow Lindbergh; ALICE I HAVE BEEN; and THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MRS. TOM THUMB
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June 3, 2014
SPOTLIGHT: Anne Morrow Lindbergh author of Gifts From the Sea
Last month I read The Aviator's Wife by Melanie Benjamin which is a historical novel inspired by the life of Anne Morrow Lindbergh. Until then, I had not realised that the author of the inspirational book Gift from the Sea was the mother of the kidnapped and murdered Lindbergh baby.
Anne Morrow Lindbergh was born June 22, 1906 and was a pioneering aviator and the wife of fellow aviator Charles Lindbergh. She wrote many books, spanning from poetry to memoir to non-fiction. On march 1, 1932, their 18 month old baby was kidnapped from their home and sparked a massive investigation that ruined many lives. His body was found the following May, dumped only 6 km away from their house. Its probably one of the most famous -and most tragic - kidnappings in the world.
Gift from the Sea celebrates the need for simplicity, solitude and caring for the soul, and has sold over 3 million copies in 45 languages. It was also the number one non-fiction bestseller in the United States for 1955.
I had long ago given away my copy of 'Gift from the Sea' so I ordered a new copy and read it again. It's a very simple book, yet beautifully written, and contains, I think, a lot of quiet wisdom that really spoke to me in the midst of my frantic writing life. Here are a few of my favourite quotes:
“I do not believe that sheer suffering teaches. If suffering alone taught, all the world would be wise, since everyone suffers. To suffering must be added mourning, understanding, patience, love, openness, and the willingness to remain vulnerable.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea
“The most exhausting thing in life, I have discovered, is being insincere.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh
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“Only love can be divided endlessly and still not diminish.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh
“Women need solitude in order to find again the true essence of themselves.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea
“...I want first of all - in fact, as an end to these other desires - to be at peace with myself. I want a singleness of eye, a purity of intention, a central core to my life that will enable me to carry out these obligations and activities as well as I can. I want, in fact - to borrow from the language of the saints -to live 'in grace' as much of the time as possible. I am not using this term in a strictly theological sense. By grace I mean an inner harmony, essentially spiritual, which can be translated into outward harmony...”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh
“With a new awareness, both painful and humorous, I begin to understand why the saints were rarely married women. I am convinced it has nothing inherently to do, as I once supposed, with chastity or children. It has to do primarily with distractions. The bearing, rearing, feeding and educating of children; the running of a house with its thousand details; human relationships with their myriad pulls--woman's normal occupations in general run counter to creative life, or contemplative life, or saintly life. The problem is not merely one of Woman and Career, Woman and the Home, Woman and Independence. It is more basically: how to remain whole in the midst of the distractions of life; how to remain balanced, no matter what centrifugal forces tend to pull one off center; how to remain strong, no matter what shocks come in at the periphery and tend to crack the hub of the wheel.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea
“When you love someone you do not love them, all the time, in the exact same way, from moment to moment. It is an impossibility. It is a lie to pretend to. And yet this is exactly what most of us demand. We have so little faith in the ebb and flow of life, of love, of relationships.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea
“One writes not to be read but to breathe...one writes to think, to pray, to analyze. One writes to clear one's mind, to dissipate one's fears, to face one's doubts, to look at one's mistakes--in order to retrieve them. One writes to capture and crystallize one's joy, but also to disperse one's gloom. Like prayer--you go to it in sorrow more than joy, for help, a road back to 'grace'.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, War Within & Without: Diaries and Letters of Anne Morrow Lindbergh, 1939-1944
Want to know more about her? Read The Aviator's Wife by Melanie Benjamin.
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Anne Morrow Lindbergh was born June 22, 1906 and was a pioneering aviator and the wife of fellow aviator Charles Lindbergh. She wrote many books, spanning from poetry to memoir to non-fiction. On march 1, 1932, their 18 month old baby was kidnapped from their home and sparked a massive investigation that ruined many lives. His body was found the following May, dumped only 6 km away from their house. Its probably one of the most famous -and most tragic - kidnappings in the world.
Gift from the Sea celebrates the need for simplicity, solitude and caring for the soul, and has sold over 3 million copies in 45 languages. It was also the number one non-fiction bestseller in the United States for 1955.
I had long ago given away my copy of 'Gift from the Sea' so I ordered a new copy and read it again. It's a very simple book, yet beautifully written, and contains, I think, a lot of quiet wisdom that really spoke to me in the midst of my frantic writing life. Here are a few of my favourite quotes:
“I do not believe that sheer suffering teaches. If suffering alone taught, all the world would be wise, since everyone suffers. To suffering must be added mourning, understanding, patience, love, openness, and the willingness to remain vulnerable.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea
“The most exhausting thing in life, I have discovered, is being insincere.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea
“it takes as much courage to have tried and failed as it does to have tried and succeeded.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh
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“Only love can be divided endlessly and still not diminish.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh
“Women need solitude in order to find again the true essence of themselves.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea
“...I want first of all - in fact, as an end to these other desires - to be at peace with myself. I want a singleness of eye, a purity of intention, a central core to my life that will enable me to carry out these obligations and activities as well as I can. I want, in fact - to borrow from the language of the saints -to live 'in grace' as much of the time as possible. I am not using this term in a strictly theological sense. By grace I mean an inner harmony, essentially spiritual, which can be translated into outward harmony...”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh
“With a new awareness, both painful and humorous, I begin to understand why the saints were rarely married women. I am convinced it has nothing inherently to do, as I once supposed, with chastity or children. It has to do primarily with distractions. The bearing, rearing, feeding and educating of children; the running of a house with its thousand details; human relationships with their myriad pulls--woman's normal occupations in general run counter to creative life, or contemplative life, or saintly life. The problem is not merely one of Woman and Career, Woman and the Home, Woman and Independence. It is more basically: how to remain whole in the midst of the distractions of life; how to remain balanced, no matter what centrifugal forces tend to pull one off center; how to remain strong, no matter what shocks come in at the periphery and tend to crack the hub of the wheel.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea
“When you love someone you do not love them, all the time, in the exact same way, from moment to moment. It is an impossibility. It is a lie to pretend to. And yet this is exactly what most of us demand. We have so little faith in the ebb and flow of life, of love, of relationships.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea
And, finally, a quote from Anne Morrow Lindbergh's private diaries:
“One writes not to be read but to breathe...one writes to think, to pray, to analyze. One writes to clear one's mind, to dissipate one's fears, to face one's doubts, to look at one's mistakes--in order to retrieve them. One writes to capture and crystallize one's joy, but also to disperse one's gloom. Like prayer--you go to it in sorrow more than joy, for help, a road back to 'grace'.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, War Within & Without: Diaries and Letters of Anne Morrow Lindbergh, 1939-1944
Want to know more about her? Read The Aviator's Wife by Melanie Benjamin.
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June 1, 2014
BOOK REVIEW: The Aviator's Wife by Melanie Benjamin
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Title: The Aviator’s Wife
Author: - Melanie Benjamin
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Age Group & Genre: Historical Fiction for Adults
Reviewer: Kate Forsyth
Source of Book: I bought it
The Blurb:
For much of her life, Anne Morrow, the shy daughter of the U.S. ambassador to Mexico, has stood in the shadows of those around her, including her millionaire father and vibrant older sister, who often steals the spotlight. Then Anne, a college senior with hidden literary aspirations, travels to Mexico City to spend Christmas with her family. There she meets Colonel Charles Lindbergh, fresh off his celebrated 1927 solo flight across the Atlantic. Enthralled by Charles’s assurance and fame, Anne is certain the celebrated aviator has scarcely noticed her. But she is wrong.
Charles sees in Anne a kindred spirit, a fellow adventurer, and her world will be changed forever. The two marry in a headline-making wedding. Hounded by adoring crowds and hunted by an insatiable press, Charles shields himself and his new bride from prying eyes, leaving Anne to feel her life falling back into the shadows. In the years that follow, despite her own major achievements—she becomes the first licensed female glider pilot in the United States—Anne is viewed merely as the aviator’s wife. The fairy-tale life she once longed for will bring heartbreak and hardships, ultimately pushing her to reconcile her need for love and her desire for independence, and to embrace, at last, life’s infinite possibilities for change and happiness.
Drawing on the rich history of the twentieth century—from the late twenties to the mid-sixties—and featuring cameos from such notable characters as Joseph Kennedy and Amelia Earhart, The Aviator’s Wife is a vividly imagined novel of a complicated marriage—revealing both its dizzying highs and its devastating lows. With stunning power and grace, Melanie Benjamin provides new insight into what made this remarkable relationship endure.
What I Thought:
The Lindberghs were incredibly famous in their day, both for their feats of flying, and for the kidnap and murder of their first child. This beautifully written novel reimagines the life of Anne Morrow Lindbergh from the time of her first encounter with the handsome but controlling aviator Charles Lindbergh to his death. It deals with his infatuation with the Nazis, the terrible months following their boy’s kidnap, and the writing of Anne’s own book, ‘Gift from the Sea’, which I remember reading as a teenager.
Not being American, I did not know much about the Lindbergs except their name and the fact their first child was kidnapped and murdered. I found this novel really fascinating as it draws in so much about the period. I came to realise just how extraordinary their feats of flying were, and how extraordinary it was for Anne to write ‘Gifts from the Sea’, a book of such beauty and grace, after suffering such a horrible tragedy.
The book is deftly written and a real page-turner – I devoured it in several sittings. It reminded me of Nancy Horan’s books Loving Frank and Under A Wide, Starry Sky in that it is a book about a woman who has lived her life in the shadow of a man but whose own story is just as compelling
The Aviator’s Wife is a really moving and powerful novel about one woman’s extraordinary life – I strongly recommend it.
Writer’s website
PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT – I LOVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK
May 26, 2014
BOOK LIST: Books I Read in April 2014
One of the fascinating things about keeping a record of what I’ve been reading is seeing the patterns which emerge. This month nearly every single novel I read had a historical setting, and half of them were murder mysteries. I’ve always loved a good murder mystery, particularly if it is set in the past. I do not, however, usually read three of them back to back!
Here’s what I’ve read this month:
Astor Place Vintage – Stephanie Lehmann
This is a really charming, funny book that moves deftly from modern-day New York to the same city streets in 1907.
Amanda loves old things – especially shoes and clothes – which she hunts down for herself and for her vintage clothes store, Astor Place Vintage. One day she discovers a diary from 1907, sewn into an ancient fur muff. Reading the diary, she finds herself drawn into the life of Olive Westcott, a young lady who lived in New York City one hundred years ago.
Both narrative threads are really interesting and engaging, and the lives of the two women touch in interesting and unexpected ways. Both are young woman trying to forge their own way, and both have various romantic intrigues that add an extra sparkle to the novel.
Death Comes as Epiphany – Sharan Newman
I’ve always had a soft spot for a medieval murder mystery, thanks no doubt to all the Cadfael books I read as a teenager. Sharan Newman is a new author for me (always a risk), but I enjoyed this very much and am planning to get the next in the series.
The story revolves around Catherine LeVendeur, a headstrong and clever young woman who has been sent to the Convent of the Paraclete, famous for its abbess, the fabled Heloise. When a manuscript created by the convent disappears, Heloise asks Catherien for help in searching it out. For Heloise is afraid that the manuscript will be used to harm her one-time lover, Peter Abelard.
The story rolls along swiftly, with lots of interesting historical details, and a really lovely understated romance. Sharan Newman is a medieval scholar, but her knowledge of the period is never allowed to slow down the plot.
Death on Blackheath – Anne Perry
I always enjoy the work of Anne Perry, who writes atmospheric and psychologically acute murder mysteries set in Victorian Britain. This is No 29 in her Thomas and Charlotte Pitt mystery series – an impressive number! I’ve not read them all, but one day I will sit down and read them all again, back to back, in order, because the growth and change in her major characters is so much an important part of the overarching series narrative.
This one involves a missing housemaid, the corpses of horribly mutilated women appearing on the heath, and espionage. A brilliant historical murder mystery (but if you haven’t read any other of these, start with Book 1, The Cater Street Hangman.
.
Elegy for Eddie – Jacqueline Winspear
Elegy for Eddie is the latest in Jacqueline Winspear’s elegant series of murder mysteries set in 1930s Britain. The books are serious and rather dark in tone, and a great deal of time is spent on the ruminations of the central character, Maisie Dobbs, a lower-class girl who has dragged herself up through the efforts of her own intelligence. At times I wish Jacqueline Winspear would give us more romance, more action, more humour, more sparkle! However, the books are very readable, nonetheless, and the London setting is most atmospheric.
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The Aviator’s Wife - Melanie Benjamin
The Lindberghs were incredibly famous in their day, both for their feats of flying, and for the kidnap and murder of their first child. This beautifully written novel reimagines the life of Anne Morrow Lindbergh from the time of her first encounter with the handsome but controlling aviator Charles Lindbergh to his death. It deals with his infatuation with the Nazis, the terrible months following their boy’s kidnap, and the writing of Anne’s own book, ‘Gift from the Sea’, which I remember reading as a teenager. The Aviator’s Wife is a really moving and powerful novel about one woman’s extraordinary life – I strongly recommend it.
Meanwhile, much of my reading time continues to be taken up with research on Hitler and Nazi Germany, for the new novel I hope to start writing soon. In fear of boring you, I won’t list every book I’ve read … only the best and most interesting.
Road to the Wolf’s Lair: German Resistance to Hitler - Theodore S Hamerow
This book is an in-depth examination of the men behind the ill-fated Valkyrie plot to assassinate Hitler, and the events which drove them to take such a drastic and dangerous path. It does assume the reader is well acquainted with the story, so should perhaps be read in conjunction with the famous classic account by Allen Welsh Dulles, Germany’s Underground: The Anti-Nazi Resistance. Dulles was OSS chief in Bern, Switzerland, during World War II and was acquainted with many people in the German Resistance.
In the Garden of the Beasts: Love, Terror and an American Family in Hitler’s Berlin – Erik Larson
This is an utterly brilliant and beautifully written account of the life of the American Ambassador and his family in Germany in 1933. William E. Dodd was a mild-mannered history professor, with two Bright Young Things as children. On his appointment and subsequent arrival in Berlin, the Dodd family was at first entranced by the new Germany – everything was so clean, so pretty, so efficient, so well-ordered – and Adolf Hitler and his followers were so full of energy and conviction. Gradually, though, their view of Germany darkened. Dodd became convinced that Hitler planned war, but nobody listened to him. In fact, they thought he was a fool. One of the really illuminating things about this book is the way it shows the slow, gradual, and ultimately horrifying realisation of the depths of Hitler’s depravity. Most people in the world really had no way of knowing what was going on … until it was too late.
I, Pierre Seal: Deported Homosexual – Pierre Seal
I’ve been reading a lot of memoirs from people who lived through the Second World War, but this is one of the most gut-wrenching I’ve encountered. Pierre was a normal teenage boy just discovering his own sexuality when the Germans invaded his homeland of Alsace-Lorraine. He and other young homosexuals were rounded up, tortured, raped, and sent to a concentration camp. The account of the murder of Pierre’s young lover is just horrifying, and the psychological damage it caused Pierre for the rest of his life moved me to tears. The atrocities committed against homosexuals in Hitler’s Third Reich are not widely known, though there has been a movement in recent years to give voice to those that were deported and killed. A chilling read.
Books Read in March
PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT - I LOVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK!
Here’s what I’ve read this month:
Astor Place Vintage – Stephanie Lehmann
This is a really charming, funny book that moves deftly from modern-day New York to the same city streets in 1907.
Amanda loves old things – especially shoes and clothes – which she hunts down for herself and for her vintage clothes store, Astor Place Vintage. One day she discovers a diary from 1907, sewn into an ancient fur muff. Reading the diary, she finds herself drawn into the life of Olive Westcott, a young lady who lived in New York City one hundred years ago.
Both narrative threads are really interesting and engaging, and the lives of the two women touch in interesting and unexpected ways. Both are young woman trying to forge their own way, and both have various romantic intrigues that add an extra sparkle to the novel.
Death Comes as Epiphany – Sharan Newman
I’ve always had a soft spot for a medieval murder mystery, thanks no doubt to all the Cadfael books I read as a teenager. Sharan Newman is a new author for me (always a risk), but I enjoyed this very much and am planning to get the next in the series.
The story revolves around Catherine LeVendeur, a headstrong and clever young woman who has been sent to the Convent of the Paraclete, famous for its abbess, the fabled Heloise. When a manuscript created by the convent disappears, Heloise asks Catherien for help in searching it out. For Heloise is afraid that the manuscript will be used to harm her one-time lover, Peter Abelard.
The story rolls along swiftly, with lots of interesting historical details, and a really lovely understated romance. Sharan Newman is a medieval scholar, but her knowledge of the period is never allowed to slow down the plot.
Death on Blackheath – Anne Perry
I always enjoy the work of Anne Perry, who writes atmospheric and psychologically acute murder mysteries set in Victorian Britain. This is No 29 in her Thomas and Charlotte Pitt mystery series – an impressive number! I’ve not read them all, but one day I will sit down and read them all again, back to back, in order, because the growth and change in her major characters is so much an important part of the overarching series narrative.
This one involves a missing housemaid, the corpses of horribly mutilated women appearing on the heath, and espionage. A brilliant historical murder mystery (but if you haven’t read any other of these, start with Book 1, The Cater Street Hangman.
.
Elegy for Eddie – Jacqueline Winspear
Elegy for Eddie is the latest in Jacqueline Winspear’s elegant series of murder mysteries set in 1930s Britain. The books are serious and rather dark in tone, and a great deal of time is spent on the ruminations of the central character, Maisie Dobbs, a lower-class girl who has dragged herself up through the efforts of her own intelligence. At times I wish Jacqueline Winspear would give us more romance, more action, more humour, more sparkle! However, the books are very readable, nonetheless, and the London setting is most atmospheric.
[image error]
The Aviator’s Wife - Melanie Benjamin
The Lindberghs were incredibly famous in their day, both for their feats of flying, and for the kidnap and murder of their first child. This beautifully written novel reimagines the life of Anne Morrow Lindbergh from the time of her first encounter with the handsome but controlling aviator Charles Lindbergh to his death. It deals with his infatuation with the Nazis, the terrible months following their boy’s kidnap, and the writing of Anne’s own book, ‘Gift from the Sea’, which I remember reading as a teenager. The Aviator’s Wife is a really moving and powerful novel about one woman’s extraordinary life – I strongly recommend it.
Meanwhile, much of my reading time continues to be taken up with research on Hitler and Nazi Germany, for the new novel I hope to start writing soon. In fear of boring you, I won’t list every book I’ve read … only the best and most interesting.
Road to the Wolf’s Lair: German Resistance to Hitler - Theodore S Hamerow
This book is an in-depth examination of the men behind the ill-fated Valkyrie plot to assassinate Hitler, and the events which drove them to take such a drastic and dangerous path. It does assume the reader is well acquainted with the story, so should perhaps be read in conjunction with the famous classic account by Allen Welsh Dulles, Germany’s Underground: The Anti-Nazi Resistance. Dulles was OSS chief in Bern, Switzerland, during World War II and was acquainted with many people in the German Resistance.
In the Garden of the Beasts: Love, Terror and an American Family in Hitler’s Berlin – Erik Larson
This is an utterly brilliant and beautifully written account of the life of the American Ambassador and his family in Germany in 1933. William E. Dodd was a mild-mannered history professor, with two Bright Young Things as children. On his appointment and subsequent arrival in Berlin, the Dodd family was at first entranced by the new Germany – everything was so clean, so pretty, so efficient, so well-ordered – and Adolf Hitler and his followers were so full of energy and conviction. Gradually, though, their view of Germany darkened. Dodd became convinced that Hitler planned war, but nobody listened to him. In fact, they thought he was a fool. One of the really illuminating things about this book is the way it shows the slow, gradual, and ultimately horrifying realisation of the depths of Hitler’s depravity. Most people in the world really had no way of knowing what was going on … until it was too late.
I, Pierre Seal: Deported Homosexual – Pierre Seal
I’ve been reading a lot of memoirs from people who lived through the Second World War, but this is one of the most gut-wrenching I’ve encountered. Pierre was a normal teenage boy just discovering his own sexuality when the Germans invaded his homeland of Alsace-Lorraine. He and other young homosexuals were rounded up, tortured, raped, and sent to a concentration camp. The account of the murder of Pierre’s young lover is just horrifying, and the psychological damage it caused Pierre for the rest of his life moved me to tears. The atrocities committed against homosexuals in Hitler’s Third Reich are not widely known, though there has been a movement in recent years to give voice to those that were deported and killed. A chilling read.
Books Read in March
PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT - I LOVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK!
May 15, 2014
INTERVIEW: Helen Lowe author of Thornspell
Please welcome Helen Lowe, author of the magical Thornspell!
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Are you a daydreamer too?
I definitely was as a kid, less so since I entered the adult world with its imperative to stay "on task."
Have you always wanted to be a writer?
Yes, pretty much ever since I was able to read independently. I began writing very soon after that.
Tell me a little about yourself – where were you born, where do you live, what do you like to do?
I was born in Wellington, New Zealand (NZ) although my family did not live there long, and since then have lived in several different locales within NZ, as well as in Singapore and Sweden at different times. I currently live in Christchurch, in the South Island of NZ where I enjoy walking and hiking, and spending time with friends. And because I’m a foodie and interested in wine, making and sharing food is a big part of that spending time.
How did you get the first flash of inspiration for this book?
Thornspell is a retelling of Sleeping Beauty from the prince’s perspective and the first inspiration came when I was at the ballet of Sleeping Beauty, with its wonderful Tchaikovsky score. I remember sitting up in my seat when the prince first came leaping onto the stage and thinking: "What about the prince? What’s his story?” The novel developed very quickly from there, especially once I started thinking about the wicked fairy’s motivation and what she would do when her death spell was thwarted.
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How extensively do you plan your novels?
I think it would be fair to say that I am an evolver, rather than a planner, so much so that actively trying to plan can mitigate against my creative process. But I always have the arc in my head, including the main story elements and the beginning and end.
Do you ever use dreams as a source of inspiration?
Not directly know, although sometimes the emotion of a particularly “cinematic” dream will stay with me and I may draw on that when writing. And I have used the experience of dreams and the way they work to influence the magic of both Thornspell and The Heir of Night series.
Did you make any astonishing serendipitous discoveries while writing this book?
Not that I can recall, no.
Where do you write, and when?
I write from home and have an official ‘study’, but having a laptop means I usually write from whichever part of the house is pleasantest. In terms of ‘when’, the times I write depend on circumstance, so I can write from 9 am to 5 pm, but there are other times when it will be something like 6 pm to midnight. Usually though, I try to get started no later than 9.30 am and will finish any time from mid-afternoon to early evening.
What is your favourite part of writing?
You know, I really do love every stage of the creative process, even though they all have me gnashing my teeth and tearing my hair at different times. But I think there is also something special about the second draft of a story: when you have the essential arc “down” and can then shape and refine, adding greater nuance, texture and subtlety.
What do you do when you get blocked?
Sometimes even getting up and making a cup of coffee can be enough to ‘reboot’ the creative process. Going for a walk or doing something manual but still creative, like gardening or cooking, can help—although often I think it’s the least creative parts like weeding, or peeling and chopping vegetables, that are most therapeutic for the muse. When I’m really wrangling a gnarly part of a story I like to do regular longhand writing. A complete change of scene is also always beneficial for the muse.
How do you keep your well of inspiration full?
I think that’s usually via regular deployment of the methods immediately above.
Do you have any rituals that help you to write?
No specific rituals, but I do like to do the regular longhand pages when I’m working on a book as I find it an excellent way of wrangling everything from plot issues to character development.
Who are ten of your favourite writers?
Ah, restricted to ten… Also, I find that the prominence given to particular ‘favourites’ can shift around a fair bit in relation to my reading focus or simply what’s happening in my life.
But to approach the question in small bites, three books that I often cite as being “extremely influential” for me as both a reader and writer are (in alphabetical order by author surname):
• Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice.
• Aldous Huxley’s Eyeless In Gaza.
• JRR Tolkien’s The Lord Of The Rings.
Three very formative children’s authors (again in alphabetical order), because more than one novel proved a firm favourite, were—and are, since I still love them:
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• Alan Garner, particularly for Elidor, The Weirdstone of Brisingamen, and The Moon Of Gomrath.
• CS Lewis (of course!) for the Narnia series, although The Horse & His Boy is probably my most dog-eared edition.
• Joyce West, a NZ author, for the classic Drover’s Road trilogy and The Year Of The Shining Cuckoo.
Three very influential YA authors (again in alphabetical order) I regard as having shaped my reading awareness include:
• Melina Marchetta, for her wonderful contemporary realism novels. On the Jellicoe Road may be the best known outside Asutralia, but I have enjoyed them all from Looking For Alibrandi to the more recent The Piper's Son.
• Patricia McKillip for so very many wonderful books, although The Riddlemaster Of Hed trilogy, The Forgotten Beasts Of Eld and Ombria In Shadow are particular favourites.
• Robin McKinley for Beauty, the very first fairytale retelling I think I ever read and which “blew my mind.” I then went on to read The Blue Sword (and many others since), which I also loved.
I really deliberated over the tenth place, but decided to go with non-fiction and something that has always spoken to me as both a woman and a writer:
• Virginia Woolf's A Room Of One's Own.
Very well worth a read for those who have not done so already.
What do you consider to be good writing?
A 'big" question indeed! The first criteria will always be that the writing, whether fiction or non fiction, must snare my attention and refuse to let it go. And when I reach "the end" I must both feel satisfied and long for more at the same time. Within that, I really appreciate writing where the language and construction is both beautiful and elegant, and I will always respond most strongly to writing that delivers an emotional pay-off.
What is your advice for someone dreaming of being a writer too?
Stop dreaming and get writing!
What are you working on now?
I have just completed the manuscript for Daughter Of Blood, The Wall Of Night Book Three, which is currently with my US and UK editors, and having a much-needed holiday. When the edit is done, I'll commence work on the fourth and final book in the WALL series, which I've given the working title The Chaos Gate.
PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT - I LOVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK!
May 13, 2014
BOOK LIST: Helen Lowe's Favourite Fairy Tale Retellings
I recently read & loved Helen Lowe's gorgeous retelling of the Sleeping Beauty fairy tale, which is called 'Thornspell'. It's been added to my list of all-time favourite fairy tale retellings.
As I'm always on the hunt for new and beautiful books in this genre, I thought I'd ask Helen to list her favourites for me:
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A Few Of My Favourite Fairytale Retellings
by Helen Lowe
I have always loved fairytales, and it may come as no surprise – given that Thornspell is a retelling of Sleeping Beauty from the perspective of the prince – that Sleeping Beauty was always my 'favourite" when I was a kid.
Later, Hans Christian Andersen's The Little Mermaid probably ran it a close second as my 'favourite" fairytale, and I was always remarkably fond of Snow White and Cinderella.
When it comes to retellings, however, I was already an adult before I discovered Robin McKinley's Beauty ("Beauty and The Beast"), which has the distinction of being a "first" for fairytale retellings and therefore a firm favourite – although her Deerskin (adapting the traditional "Donekeyskin") is also a powerful and compelling read.
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Another longstanding favourite is Elizabeth Ann Scarborough's "Godmother" series: The Godmother, The Godmother's Apprentice, and The Godmother's Web. The first novel draws on an array of fairytales, including Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, and Hansel and Gretel, to name just a few, while the second and third books delve more specifically into Celtic and Amerindian tales. Wonderful reads: I thoroughly recommend them.
Another tale that draws on an array of fairytales is Juliet Marillier's Wildwood Dancing, and the primary tale is another longstanding favourite, "The Twelve Dancing Princesses."
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Other more recently enjoyed reads include Malinda Lo's Ash (Cinderella) and Grace Lin's Where The Mountains Meets The Moon, which draws on Chinese folklore in a Junior fiction retelling. Alan Garner's The Owl Service is an eerie retelling of the Celtic fairytale / myth of Blodeuwedd from the Mabinogion – but I suspect Maggie Stiefvater may be drawing on the same tale for part of her new The Raven Boys series, which I'm also very much enjoying. (Although it's yet to be completed so I may be proven completely wrong regarding Blodeuwedd!) I have also always loved Diana Wynne HJones'retelling of the story of Brunnhilde and Siegfried in Eight Days of Luke.
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Perhaps I am interpreting "fairytale" too broadly here since both the Mabinogion and the tale of Brunnhilde and Siegfired may be counted as myth – but if so it is the same blending that infuses Thornspell, where I have worked the Arthurian cycle into the fairytale retelling. In much the same way, I may add, as fairytale and history are blended in Bitter Greens.
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But stepping away from novels briefly, I very much enjoyed Juliet Marillier's short story By Bonelight (published last year in the collection Prickle Moon), a retelling of the Russian Baba Yaga fairytale that has recently won both the Aurealis and Sir Julius Vogel Awards. And when it comes to film, I can't go past Ever After – my "best ever" retelling of Cinderella.
Thanks, Helen! I love many of these too, and have added a few new titles to my must-read-soon list!
And I've just updated my list of FAVOURITE FAIRY TALE RETELLINGS - check them out!
As I'm always on the hunt for new and beautiful books in this genre, I thought I'd ask Helen to list her favourites for me:
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A Few Of My Favourite Fairytale Retellings
by Helen Lowe
I have always loved fairytales, and it may come as no surprise – given that Thornspell is a retelling of Sleeping Beauty from the perspective of the prince – that Sleeping Beauty was always my 'favourite" when I was a kid.
Later, Hans Christian Andersen's The Little Mermaid probably ran it a close second as my 'favourite" fairytale, and I was always remarkably fond of Snow White and Cinderella.
When it comes to retellings, however, I was already an adult before I discovered Robin McKinley's Beauty ("Beauty and The Beast"), which has the distinction of being a "first" for fairytale retellings and therefore a firm favourite – although her Deerskin (adapting the traditional "Donekeyskin") is also a powerful and compelling read.
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Another longstanding favourite is Elizabeth Ann Scarborough's "Godmother" series: The Godmother, The Godmother's Apprentice, and The Godmother's Web. The first novel draws on an array of fairytales, including Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, and Hansel and Gretel, to name just a few, while the second and third books delve more specifically into Celtic and Amerindian tales. Wonderful reads: I thoroughly recommend them.
Another tale that draws on an array of fairytales is Juliet Marillier's Wildwood Dancing, and the primary tale is another longstanding favourite, "The Twelve Dancing Princesses."
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Other more recently enjoyed reads include Malinda Lo's Ash (Cinderella) and Grace Lin's Where The Mountains Meets The Moon, which draws on Chinese folklore in a Junior fiction retelling. Alan Garner's The Owl Service is an eerie retelling of the Celtic fairytale / myth of Blodeuwedd from the Mabinogion – but I suspect Maggie Stiefvater may be drawing on the same tale for part of her new The Raven Boys series, which I'm also very much enjoying. (Although it's yet to be completed so I may be proven completely wrong regarding Blodeuwedd!) I have also always loved Diana Wynne HJones'retelling of the story of Brunnhilde and Siegfried in Eight Days of Luke.
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Perhaps I am interpreting "fairytale" too broadly here since both the Mabinogion and the tale of Brunnhilde and Siegfired may be counted as myth – but if so it is the same blending that infuses Thornspell, where I have worked the Arthurian cycle into the fairytale retelling. In much the same way, I may add, as fairytale and history are blended in Bitter Greens.
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But stepping away from novels briefly, I very much enjoyed Juliet Marillier's short story By Bonelight (published last year in the collection Prickle Moon), a retelling of the Russian Baba Yaga fairytale that has recently won both the Aurealis and Sir Julius Vogel Awards. And when it comes to film, I can't go past Ever After – my "best ever" retelling of Cinderella.
Thanks, Helen! I love many of these too, and have added a few new titles to my must-read-soon list!
And I've just updated my list of FAVOURITE FAIRY TALE RETELLINGS - check them out!
