Sharon Kay Penman's Blog, page 82

INTERVIEW WITH JUDITH STARKSTON

I ended my book tour for A King’s Ransom at the Tucson Festival of Books, which was a delightful experience and one I recommend highly to all my fellow book-lovers.  While in Tucson, I met and became friends with a gifted writer who shares my passion for the past, Judith Starkston.  When I learned that she was completing Hand of Fire, a novel about the Trojan princess Briseis, famously captured by Achilles during the siege of Troy, I was fascinated; I’ve always been intrigued by the story of Troy.   Judith kindly sent me an ARC to read, but neither of us expected that I’d suddenly find myself needing to have my cataract surgery performed sooner rather than later.  I was delighted with the results of the surgery; I would not go so far as to say I was viewing the world in black and white and it suddenly flamed into vivid technicolor, but there is no doubt that everything is brighter and sharper now.  But the surgery wreaked havoc on my schedule and I have had to postpone reading Hand of Fire.   Fortunately, I can still introduce Judith and her story of Briseis and Achilles to my readers.

What inspired you to write this book?

It may sound strange, but I began to write in order to answer a question that had bothered me for a long time. For years I’d taught the Iliad, Homer’s epic poem of the Trojan War, and kept wondering with my students how Briseis, the captive woman who sparked the bitter conflict between Achilles and Agamemnon, could possibly have loved Achilles.

The Greek had killed her husband and brothers, destroyed her city and turned her from princess to slave—hardly a heartwarming courtship. She is central to the plot and yet she gets only a handful of lines. In those few words, the one clear notion expressed is her sorrow when she is forced to leave Achilles.

I should say I always liked Achilles, the existential hero who calls the whole war into question—which shows he’s no brainwasher—so the answer wasn’t some ancient version of Stockholm Syndrome.

What drew you to historical fiction?

I loved ancient history and literature as a student while I earned my Classics degrees. That is the base that trained me.

Many years ago, I walked through the British Museum with my toddler son on my shoulders. I was retelling the myths painted on the Greek vases in front of us. We were happily lost in our imaginative world. I turned to go to another display case and discovered a crowd behind me listening in. So I think I’ve been “writing” historical tales for a long time.

Tell us about Hand of Fire.

Hand of Fire is partly a romance—Briseis and Achilles fall in love but in an unconventional manner that includes a mystical element. Achilles is half-immortal and I made full use of that half of his conflicted personality.

In addition to the romantic element, Hand of Fire explores why some people, women especially, can survive great tragedy and violence against them, even managing to take delight in what life still has to offer.

It is a coming of age tale featuring a smart, strong-willed teenage woman in an ancient culture that, counter to our modern stereotypes of the past, expects Briseis to be powerful, literate and a leader. Briseis succeeds in rising to those expectations despite the circumstances arrayed against her—and she’s strong enough to take on the mightiest of the Greek heroes.

Can you tell us a little about your main character?

Briseis is essential to the plot of the Iliad, and yet we only know that she was a princess captured by Achilles. To develop who she was I needed both an understanding of what she could plausibly have done in the course her life and her inner psychology.

Intriguingly, the world Briseis lived in—the details of its everyday life, religious beliefs, language, etc. have only come to light recently—dug from the earth by contemporary archaeologists. The cuneiform libraries of ancient Anatolia (modern Turkey) and the Hittite Empire, where Troy and Briseis’s city of Lyrnessos were situated, have begun to be translated and provided the material I needed. I discovered in the evidence a powerful role for Briseis, that of a healing priestess, called in Hittite a hasawa.

That role made perfect sense for a woman who fell in love with Achilles, the warrior who is also a healer and a bard. The stories—one taken from clay-recorded history and one from mythology—meshed and a strong-willed redhead began to form in my imagination.

Would you classify your writing more as plot driven or character driven?

Hand of Fire is very much character driven. I wanted to figure out who Briseis could have been—after a while she became very real to me and when I found myself struggling with a scene it usually meant I was trying to make Briseis do something that simply wasn’t in her nature. Characters are a very bossy lot once you let them get into your imagination.

Achilles stumped me for the longest time. He’s larger than life, half-immortal and deeply conflicted. In an early version I had him as one of the point-of-view characters, but it didn’t work. I couldn’t hear his voice. I finally wrote his part of the story as epic poetry in iambic pentameter, which is the closest I could get in English to the hexameter verse of Homer. Once I used a medium that was mythological and writ large, he gradually revealed himself. Later I used that understanding to remove the poetry and slide in his character in the more standard format of scenes.

Which is more important in “historical fiction”: the historical or the fiction? How important is it to get the history right?

I think you have to tell a compelling story first, but also get the history right. I feel a special obligation to do that with Hand of Fire because Bronze Age Turkey is still a new field.

Until recently, various prejudices and giant blanks in our knowledge led scholars to assume the Trojans were culturally Greeks, but now we know Troy and all the area now called Turkey, which in the Bronze Age was made up of various kingdoms but dominated by the Hittites, had its own language, cultural traditions and style, quite distinct from the Greeks.  Older novels set in the Trojan War focus only on myth or follow the belief the Trojans were Greek.

In addition to my research via books, academic journals and archaeological site reports, I have travelled in Turkey, spent hours studying museum collections, talked with archaeologists, and experienced firsthand the geography of the settings of my book.

However, none of that desire to get the history right is worth anything if you don’t tell a story that your reader can’t put down.

What do you hope readers take away from your book?

Despite being a book about war with a lot of death and violence, the fundamental theme of Hand of Fire is one of hope. I think people will come away with a renewed sense of the resiliency of humanity and of women in particular.

Also, my aim was to build the Bronze Age world of these Greeks and Trojans vividly enough that readers feel like they’ve lived there. For most people, that’s a new and exotic world and yet it will feel surprisingly familiar in some ways. I guess you could call Hand of Fire historical escapism with a positive message.

Can you tell us about your future projects?

I’m in the middle of a historical mystery featuring the Hittite Queen Puduhepa as “sleuth.” She would be as famous as Cleopatra if she hadn’t been buried by the sands of time. Her seal is on the first extant peace treaty in history next to her foe, Pharaoh Ramses II. Now that she’s been dug out, I’ve taken her remarkable personality, which seems perfectly suited for solving mysteries, and I am writing a series. She ruled from her teens until she was at least eighty, so I think this series may outlast me.

Hand of Fire will be followed by at least one sequel and possibly a prequel of sorts focusing on Iphigenia and Achilles. This spring I made a research trip to Cyprus because the sequel to Hand of Fire will end up there—but it’d be a spoiler if I revealed how or why. (Also I’d have to know the answer to both of those and I’m not entirely sure yet…) Suffice to say Cyprus is a beautiful and dramatic island with a density of Bronze Age archaeological sites that is almost alarming. My husband and I had a delightful trip and maybe that’s reason enough.

Thank you, Judith, for a very illuminating interview.  My readers love it when writers lift the veil, allowing them to glimpse how a novel takes form and offering a view into the author’s inner world.  Hand of Fire is sure to appeal to anyone interested in history in general and the ancient world in particular.  I am looking forward to reading it.   Here is the link to Judith’s website.

http://www.judithstarkston.com/

This may be my last blog for a while, as I am soon to leave on a research trip to Israel.  I felt very cheated that I was unable to follow in the Lionheart’s footsteps when I was writing my account of his crusade.  So I am very excited that I will be able to track the shadows of Balian d’Ibelin, his Greek queen, and the tragic young king, Baldwin IV, through the streets of Jerusalem, Jaffa, and Acre.

September 25, 2014

The Last Saxon King

I would like to wish a happy Rosh Hashanah to my Jewish friends and readers.
And September 25, 1066 was the date of the battle of Stamford Bridge in which the Saxon king, Harold Godwinson, defeated an invading Norwegian army. Just three weeks later, Harold would be defeated himself and slain during the battle of Hastings. For those interested in finding out more about the last Saxon king, I recommend the novel by Helen Hollick. It was published in the UK as Harold the King and in the US as I am the Chosen King, which is always a bad idea, for the potential for confusion is obvious, but writers are rarely consulted about such decisions. My British publisher at the time wanted to change the title for Here Be Dragons but I held firm and won the battle only by agreeing to change my name—no, I am not making that up. I had to drop my middle name in order to keep the title, which is why I am published in the US as Sharon Kay Penman and in the UK as Sharon Penman.

And the winner is....?

Not much to report on today in terms of medieval history, so I’ll pass along some Game of Thrones news for the upcoming season scheduled to return in four years or so No Bran at all in this season, and no Hodor either. His storyline won’t figure in the plot. As long as Tyrion is front and center, I won’t complain; I was a very unhappy camper when he disappeared altogether from the fourth book.
And here is an article about what are supposed to be the 50 best American cities in which to live. I can’t say I agree with all of the choices, but it makes interesting reading. If I had a ton of money, I’d chose my favorite city, San Francisco, with a vacation home in Honolulu, another city I really like. With frequent visits to New Orleans, for although I would not want to live there again (a climate so humid it feels like downtown Atlantis, and flying cockroaches) it remains one of the most intriguing and exotic cities on the planet, at least IMHO.
http://time.com/money/3318962/best-bi...

The most interesting of the Angevins

September 23rd, 1158 was the birthdate of the most intriguing and enigmatic of the Devil’s Brood, Geoffrey, Duke of Brittany. I confess he has always been a favorite of mine, his brief rule in Brittany and his premature death raising all sorts of interesting What If questions. There is no doubt that if he’d not died of the injuries suffered in that French tournament, English history would have been changed. But how? I think Geoffrey would have been a successful king, certainly more so than John, for he’d proved his capabilities by winning over the turbulent, contentious Breton barons, and he did not share John’s emotional insecurities. Would Richard have dared to go on crusade had Geoffrey been alive in 1189? Or would they have come to a pragmatic understanding based upon Geoffrey’s likely assumption that his reckless older brother would never die peacefully in bed? After Richard’s death at Chalus, would John have challenged Geoffrey for the throne? Would England have had a King Arthur? Of course these speculations are unanswerable, probably one reason why we find them so fascinating.
I miss writing about Geoffrey, so here is a brief scene from Lionheart in which I managed to infiltrate him into the story line despite being dead for six years. In this scene, Richard is very ill with malaria and running such a high fever that he’s begun to hallucinate.
Lionheart, pages 559-560
* * *
Is this what you want, Richard? A familiar figure emerged from the darkness, holding out Joyeuse, the sword Maman had given him on his fifteenth birthday, when he’d been invested as Duke of Aquitaine. (omission) He reached for it, but his brother pulled it away before his fingers could touch the enameled pommel. What good will a sword do you when you are as weak as a mewling kitten? Geoffrey sat on a nearby coffer, tossing the sword aside. You were so pleased when you heard I’d been trampled in that tournament. Very short-sighted of you, Richard. You’d have been better off with me as your heir, much better off.
As if you’d not have connived for my crown, too! You’d never have been satisfied with a duchy if a kingdom was in the offing
He had no energy for speech, but he did not need it, for Geoffrey seemed to pluck his words from the air, saying with a sardonic smile, Yes, but I would have been willing to wait. Face it, Richard, you’ll never make old bones. Other men lust after women. You lust after Death, always have. You’ve been chasing after her like a lovesick lad and sooner or later she’ll take pity and let you catch her. So I could afford to wait. But Johnny had to entangle himself in Philippe’s web, the damned fool.
You entangled yourself in Philippe’s web, too, Richard reminded him. If you had not been plotting with the French, you’d not have been at Lagny when that tournament was held.
You know why I turned to Philippe. I got tired of Papa treating us like his puppet princes, tired of him dangling that accursed crown before us like a hunter’s lure. So did you, remember? You did me one better, too, doing public homage to Philippe for all your fiefs “on this side of the sea” whilst Papa looked on, dumbfounded. But you could safely make use of Philippe, for you knew you could outwit him and outfight him. So could I. Johnny cannot, as he’ll soon learn to his cost. Ah, well, you’ll be dead by then, so mayhap it will not matter so much
Christ Jesus, Geoffrey, of course it matters! Furious, Richard thrashed about, trying to free himself from his sheets. If you’ve come only to mock me, go back to Hell where you belong!
Purgatory, not Hell, Geoffrey said and laughed before fading back into the blackness. Richard called out to him, but he got no answer. He was alone.
* * *
Henry and Eleanor made some major mistakes as parents, but perhaps their greatest blunder was that they utterly failed to engender a sense of solidarity among their sons. Imagine how different their history would have been if Hal, Richard, Geoffrey, and John had been allies, not enemies?

Happy Birthday, Anne

September 22nd, 1515, is the birthdate of the luckiest of Henry VIII’s wives, Anne of Cleaves. I think she was also very clever, for she played her cards perfectly, salvaging Henry’s massive ego while escaping from a marriage that was probably as distasteful as it was dangerous. I think the best film treatment of Henry’s marital circus is the BBC’s The Six Wives of Henry VIII, with an episode for each wife. Anne’s episode is great fun and I highly recommend it, for the series has stood the test of time admirably.
Back in real life, my Eagles are flying high, but Eagles fans are aging fast. Way too much suspense and high drama, which I prefer to confine to my novels.

Two men of honor at a time when there was a great need for honor

On September 20th, 1187, Saladin began the siege of Jerusalem, which figures in Ridley Scott’s epic, Kingdom of Heaven. Most of you know I am something of a purist when it comes to historical films or novels, so you won’t be surprised by my verdict on this film. It is visually stunning, but historical fantasy. They got only two facts right about the real Balian d’Ibelin—his name and that he was the savior of the Holy City.

Balian was one of the few lords to escape the debacle at Hattin, and he asked Saladin for a safe-conduct so he could go to Jerusalem and bring his wife and children to safety. Saladin agreed, on condition he remain in the city for only 24 hours. But upon his arrival, Balian discovered the city in an understandable state of panic, for Saladin intended to take Jerusalem by storm, which always meant a bloodbath when a medieval city was not able to surrender, an orgy of killing, rape, and looting. The capture of Jerusalem during the First Crusade had led to a massacre of the Muslims and Jews in the city, with crusader chroniclers boasting that blood ran in the streets up to the ankles of knights’ horses. It was to avenge this notorious slaughter that Saladin had vowed to take Jerusalem by force, slaying or enslaving all of those sheltering within the city.

There was no one to organize a defense of Jerusalem and Balian was torn between his promise to the sultan and the pleading of the citizens, who begged him to stay. He finally sent word to Saladin, explaining his plight and asking to be released from his promise. Yes, there were men in the MA who took honor seriously. Saladin not only agreed, he permitted Balian’s wife and children to leave the city and provided an escort to see them to safety. Balian then tried to rally the city’s defense, which included knighting the sons of townspeople since they had so few fighting men. They managed to stave off the Saracen army for a time, but they knew they were doomed and Balian made a desperate gamble. He told Saladin that if the city were not allowed to surrender and the citizens ransomed, they would kill all the Muslim prisoners in the city, destroy all of the Muslim holy sites, and fight to the death since they had nothing to lose.

He must have been convincing for Saladin agreed to a surrender. Ransoms were set—10 dinars for a man, 5 for a woman, and 1 for a child. When Balian said there were about 20,000 poor in the city who could not raise these ransoms, Saladin agreed to release 7,000 of them for a lump sum payment of 30,000 dinars. Henry II had been providing money for the support of the kingdom for a number of years and Balian used what was left of this money now to buy the freedom for as many of the poor as he could. Those who could not raise the ransom were destined for the slave markets in Damascus and Cairo, but there were individual acts of mercy. Although the Patriarch of Jerusalem had departed the city with as much of the Church’s wealth as he could carry away, which shocked the Saracen chroniclers, Saladin’s brother, al-Adil, asked the sultan for the gift of 1,000 of these slaves. When Saladin agreed, al-Adil freed them all. Although the patriarch was not willing to use the Church plate and relics to save these poor souls, he did ask Saladin for 700 as a personal favor and again the sultan agreed. Saladin also granted Balian’s request for 500 of them and then ordered the release of the elderly. He gave widows and orphans money to tide them over on their journey to safety and made sure that none of his army plundered the city or harmed the captive Christians. It has been estimated that as many as 11,000 were taken off into slavery, but thousands of others were spared thanks to Balian’s efforts, Saladin’s mercy, and Henry II’s money.

So Balian definitely deserves a film of his own for the role he played in the salvation of Jerusalem, just not the one he got. He was a member of the powerful d’Ibelin family, Lord of Nablus by his marriage to Maria Comnena, former Queen of Jerusalem, stepfather to the future queen, Isabella, who would wed one of my favorites, Henri of Champagne, so I envisioned Balian spinning in his grave like the proverbial top after he was transformed into an illegitimate French blacksmith who learned knightly skills on his two month journey to the Holy Land and ran off with Queen Sybilla (who was never his lover and had been dead for 3 years) at film’s end.

The battle of Poitiers and the celebration of the Scots

September 19, 1356 was the date of one of the MA’s more important battles, at Poitiers. It was a bad day for the French. Not only were they defeated by the Black Prince, their king, Jean Valois, was captured and would spend four years in very comfortable confinement. He was finally freed in 1360 after payment of part of a vast ransom and the surrender of highborn hostages, including one of his sons. When that son escaped in 1363, the French king voluntarily returned to his gilded captivity in England. Naturally the best account of the battle at Poitiers is to be found in Bernard Cornwell’s Grail Quest series, titled 1356. He dramatizes battles so well that it is enough to make us believe he has found a way to time travel.
Yesterday was the historic vote on Scotland’s independence. Sadly, no matter the outcome, there were bound to be many very disappointed people. It seemed appropriate today to mention some of the important contributions that the Scots have made over the centuries. Most Americans probably don’t know that our Declaration of Independence was influenced by the Declaration of Arbroath, asserting Scottish independence in 1320. Famous Scots include James Watt, who developed the practical steam engine, Sir Alexander Fleming, who discovered penicillin, Alexander Graham Bell, who invented the telephone, the economist Adam Smith, the philosopher, David Hume, historical figures Robert the Bruce, William Wallace, and Mary, Queen of Scots, and actor Sean Connery. Their literary stars include Robert Louis Stevenson, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Sir Walter Scott, Robert Burns, and J.K. Rowling. (I did not include politicians since they tend to be controversial.) It is often said that Ireland has had an influence upon the world disproportionate to its size and population. I think the same can definitely be said of Scotland, too.

Eleanor's ex-husband

On September 18, 1180, Louis VII of France died at age sixty. He’d suffered from ill health for months after suffering a stroke, ignored as the royal court turned from the sunset to the dawning sun, his sole son and heir, Philippe Auguste, then fifteen. Louis was not a successful king, being overmatched by his brilliant Angevin rival, Henry II, and today he is probably better known outside France as the ex-husband of Eleanor of Aquitaine rather than for anything he did as king. He’d been raised in a monastery, meant for the Church, but a stray pig changed his fate when it spooked the horse of Louis’s elder brother, who was thrown and fatally injured. Eleanor is famously reported to have said that she thought to have married a king, but found she’d married a monk, and there is no doubt that his early upbringing influenced Louis throughout his life. He was certainly more pious than the Angevins; no one would ever have said of Louis that he’d come from the Devil and to the Devil he’d go, the dramatic charge that St Bernard of Clairvaux leveled against the Angevins. His son—coldly intelligent, ruthless, and fiercely ambitious--was so unlike his sire that it is almost enough to make us believe in foundlings. Philippe was a better king, but I think Louis was the better man. He deserves credit for protecting the Jews in his realm, showing a diligence that was quite unusual for medieval kings, in sharp contrast to his son, who made life utterly miserable for the Jews during his reign. And I find it touching that when Louis feared for Philippe’s life after the boy had become gravely ill, he begged Henry for permission to make a pilgrimage to Canterbury to entreat that prickly saint to spare his son. In light of the fact that Louis had done his best to alienate Henry and his rebellious sons, it is very much to Henry’s credit that he not only agreed, he personally escorted the frantic French king to Canterbury.

The remarkable Hildegard of Bingen and a wonderful novel about her

On September 17, 1179, one of the most extraordinary women of the MA, Hildegard van Bingen, died at age 79. She was an abbess, a mystic, a poet, a composer, an herbalist, a writer, a visionary, a polymath, and eventually a saint, if not “officially.” She even invented an alternative alphabet. If you’d like to know more about Hildegard, here is a link to a website dedicated to her accomplishments. She is also the subject of a wonderful novel, Illuminations, by Mary Sharratt, which I highly recommend. It drew me in from the very first page, historical writing at its finest. Mary is also the author of a heartbreaking novel about a 17th century tragic trial of several Englishwomen accused of witchcraft, The Daughters of Witching Hill. http://www.amazon.com/Illuminations-N...
http://www.hildegard-society.org/p/me...

The Welsh princes

Medieval Wales was blessed with three great princes—Llywelyn ab Iorwerth, his grandson Llywelyn ap Gruffydd, and Owain Glyn Dwr. Llywelyn was dangerously persuasive; not only did he steal Here Be Dragons out from under John’s nose, he then convinced me I should do a trilogy about his family. I’ve not yet written about Owain Glyn Dwr, but he is as eloquent in his own way as Llywelyn and I promised that I would write his remarkable story, too, one day. Every now and then, he reminds me that my writing days are dwindling down, not very tactful but true, and I assure him his time is coming. Meanwhile, on September 16, 1404, Owain summoned his first parliament, at which time he was proclaimed Prince of Wales.
Oh, and fly, Eagles, fly!