Word Wenches

Rites of Passage, or Stops on the Schoolbus of Life

by Susan Scott

Labor Day’s done, and now comes the annual ritual at the school bus stop across from my driveway: tiny children with Elmo backpacks, brand-new sneakers, and too-short haircuts, hopping up and down with excitement as their moms try not to weep and their dads record it all with the family video-cam.  Yes, it’s the first day of kindergarten, an American rite of passage if ever there was one, the first bona-fide step away from home and towards adulthood, or at least as much adulthood (i.e., solo trips to the restroom) as can be credited in five-year-olds.

Farther up the street, at the bus stop for the middle schoolers, it’s a slightly different story.  They’re righteous and rammy and slugging one another with abandon.  They’re almost-big-kids, with their parents relegated to the next driveway, holding coffee cups instead of cameras. 

At the top of the hill is the stop for the high school bus, and there’s nary a parent in sight – except, perhaps, that anxious mom with a freshman daughter, slumped down in the parked minivan where she hopes no one will see her.  These kids are barely awake, languidly texting as they wait, while one couple elevates their morning pulse with a tangled kiss or two. There’s a jaded, been-there-done-all-that air to this bus-stop, which is of course blown away by the speeding (waaaaaay over the limit), honking cars driven by lucky juniors and seniors, freed forever from bus-purgatory by drivers’ licenses. 

But there are other rites still ahead for those seniors: SAT’s, prom, college applications, and graduation.  Looming ahead are college and jobs, first houses and mortgages, marriages and babies, and the whole cycle begins again.

Such are the milestones for modern American kids: first day of school, first boyfriend/girlfriend, first cell-phone and driver’s license.  There are zillions of others, of course, from first solo in the ballet recital to first home run in Little League, the first sip of forbidden beer to a whole lot of other forbidden things that parents would rather not think about.  While three years separates my own son (21) and daughter (18), they’re both excited about an upcoming first that they’ll share at the same time: voting in a presidential election.

All of which made me think of the big events that marked transition in the lives of young people in the past, say, two or three hundred years ago.  School was seldom in the picture, especially school beyond the barest basics.  If your father was a farmer, that first step towards maturity could be the first day you were deemed old enough to go out in the fields to work for the day, instead of being kept at home to help with your mother’s chores, or, if you were a girl, the first time you were considered responsible enough to oversee the kitchen fire and midday meal.

In my three historical novels, the 17th century women who became my heroines were considered self-sufficient at ages that would astonish modern mothers.  Sarah Jennings (Duchess) was a maid of honor in Charles II’s court soon after her thirteenth birthday.  By the time she was nineteen, Barbara Palmer (demurely painted as a teen-aged bride, left) (Royal Harlot) had already left behind her country upbringing, conducted passionate affairs with several different gentlemen, married, and become the mistress of the king of England.  Youngest of all was Nell Gwyn (King’s Favorite), who had found her first “protector” at twelve, and four years had become the most popular comic actress of her time.

If you were a boy of a higher rank, perhaps the most important first step would be your “breeching”, the shift from wearing a babyish gown to breeches like the men, or perhaps it would be the first time you were permitted to ride a proper horse instead of a pony.  If you were a girl, it could be the first time you were allowed to wear your hair up, or to attend a party with dancing at a neighboring inn.

Depending on your family’s circumstances, your father could sign apprenticeship papers that would take you away for years to learn a trade.  He could send you into service in a rich man’s house, or give you over to the enlistment officer for a career in the military, or marry you off to a suitable mate.

If you lived near one of the new mills or factories, your father could find you a job working dawn to dusk, even if you were only seven years old, and contribute your earnings to supporting the entire family. If you were more enterprising, you could bid farewell to your family forever and emigrate to a foreign land –– America, Australia, India –– where fortunes could be made and land was free for the taking.

For wealthy, titled offspring, the landmarks were grander.  Young gentlemen would leave behind the family schoolroom for public school, and a grand tour of the Continent afterwards, to be followed, perhaps, by a maiden speech in the House or overseeing an estate, or a younger son’s honorable career as an officer or clergyman.  For young ladies, a Season in London would be crowned with a match, and a marriage, and the serious career of being a wife, mother, and mistress of the household.

But on the whole, people haven’t changed much.  Whether 1808 or 2008, rich or poor or in between, the goal for parents remains generally the same: to see their child become a contributing, useful member of society, to find both security and happiness. It’s only the paths and the stops that mark the way that have changed with time, and with each individual, too. 

So what was a favorite “rite of passage” for you –– an event or moment that you were sure changed your life?  Was it something that seems charmingly insubstantial now (getting your ears pierced, or taking the subway without an adult), or one of life's perennial biggies, like marriage or the birth of your first child?  What was it that signified that you were at last on your way to being a “grown-up”? 

Historically Hot: Part Two

From Susan Scott:

As the summer winds down, I’m keeping my promise to post another selection of portraits of historical gentlemen that might deserve a heroic place on some future cover. 

Many writers (and probably more than a few readers as well) keep pictures of actors, musicians, athletes, and other assorted handsome fellows to serve as inspiration as they create their male characters. Personally, I’ve never been able to link to Hollywood or BBC faces –– no matter how gorgeous they may be, or skilled as actors, they always strike me somehow as too “modern”, too much a part of our time and not the past.

I remember seeing an interview with the director of the Master and Commander, (the movie based on the glorious Patrick O’Brian novels), and how he sent his casting director all over the world to find the right faces to fill Jack Aubrey’s crew of sailors.  He believed that most modern Americans and English have an acquired sense of how to present themselves to a camera, including that infamous fixed smile that we all learn from infancy onward.  He wanted men who’d never learned that kind of awareness, men with the same kind of media-innocence that an early 19th century English sailor would have had, and to find it, he’d proudly drawn most of his extras from remote villages in central Europe.  Of course I wondered what happened once he put his untutored innocents on a movie set with Russell Crowe as their captain, but hey, I appreciate what he was trying to do.

For me, paintings from the era of my story can set all kinds of cogs and wheels spinning in my imagination.  Portraits in particular can inspire me: truly, as the old saying goes, one pictures can be worth a thousand words.

So here’s the second half of my summer “gallery” –– plus a special bonus at the end.

Vice-Admiral the Honorable Sir Charles Paget (1778-1839, painted by Sir Thomas Lawrence), left

Charles Paget was one of those famous younger sons of an earl who “made good”, beginning a career in the Royal Navy at twelve, making captain of a sloop-of-war before his twentieth birthday, and after a celebrated career, finally becoming a vice-admiral and serving as a member of Parliament.  He also seems to have worn those golden epaulets with stylish aplomb.


Lords John Stuart (1621-1644) and his brother Lord Bernard Stuart (1622-1645), painted about 1638 by Anthony Van Dyck, right

Reader Virginia mentioned this double-portrait in response to my last blog, and my lament about how few blonde men were to be found in portraits of the past.  I’d already planned to use this one, but Virginia, you get credit, too! J  Blonde these two brothers certainly were, and obviously proud of their flowing golden locks.  Younger sons of the Duke of Lennox, they sat for this picture shortly before going to Europe for a three-year finish to their education as young gentlemen.  They seem destined for long lives of happy privilege, but alas, Oliver Cromwell and the English Civil Wars had other plans.  Both brothers served in Charles I’s royalist army, and both were killed in action in their early twenties.


Self-portrait of Albrecht Durer (1471-1528), painted in 1498, left

Wench Susan King (far more knowledgable in Northern European art history than I!) suggested this self-portrait of the German artist as another example of a fair-haired man.  Durer had just returned from his first, dazzling trip to Italy, and the influence of the gaudy south is clear not only in the pose he chose for himself, but in his elegant, stylish dress –– and check out the jaunty black-and-white cap!  I know his side-long glance resulted from studying his own reflection, but I still like the way it gives his expression a certain cynical watchfulness.  Legend has it that this portrait was considered such an excellent likeness that Durer’s dog barked in recognition when he saw it.  Whether that’s true or not, it’s a striking picture of a striking man.

William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne (1779-1848) painted in 1805 by Sir Thomas Lawrence, right

Later in his life, William Lamb would rise to become Prime Minister, but in this portrait he’s shown as romantically windswept. There’s a certain fashionable, haunted  melancholy in his eyes, and he has good reason for it, too: around the time Lamb sat for Lawrence, he wed the famously unstable poet Lady Caroline Lamb, marking one of the most doomed marriages in English history.  The main reason for this marital disaster, of course, is the gentleman below, Lord Byron, Lady Caroline’s notorious lover.

George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (1788-1824) painted in 1813 by Richard Westall, left

Ahh, who doesn’t know Lord Byron. the quintessential romantic bad-boy hero, so perfectly described by Lady Caroline Lamb as  being “mad, bad, and dangerous to know”? He was always on my list, but thanks to both Tal and Wench Loretta for suggesting him as well.  Byron was a celebrity before there were celebrities, as famous for his wild living, extravagant debts, international exploits, and love affairs as he was for his writing. No wonder he was nearly irresistible to women and men alike: that profiles says it all.

Michael Phelps (b. 1985), right

Okay, so this isn’t exactly fine art, but surely Michael Phelps deserves a place in this list for making history as well as living it?  Beyond all those record-setting Olympic gold medals, he’s already demonstrated a fierce determination to strive for his personal best coupled with a humble charm in the middle of the media circus.  He’s devoted to his mom, his sisters, and his bulldog, and he’s not afraid to cry during the National Anthem.  Not bad for only twenty-three!

So do any of these gentlemen inspire you?  Or do you “see” a more contemporary face (Clark Gable, Johnny Depp, James McAvoy, Javier Bardem) while you read or write?

And ‘fess up, along with me: did you put aside books this week in favor of watching the Olympics?

Historically Hot: Part One

From Susan Scott:

Yes, it’s officially hot now, the first day of August and the true dog days of summer.  Too hot for a serious blog, one with heavy history, thoughtful commentary, or even a random rant.  No more shameless self-promotion for The King's Favorite, either (except to say that it's still available, and to thank all of you who've told me how much you've enjoyed it.) Nope, at this time of year, it’s better to go straight to pictures. 

Specifically, pictures of hot historical (or should that be historically hot?) men.

I can’t be the only one who often finds the heroes on the covers of historical romances somewhat . . . lacking.  They’re supposed to be men from the past, yet with their gym-honed abs, waxed chests and brows, and blown-dry hair, most of the time they look far more at home in a club in South Beach than an English country house. 

So for my August blogs, I’m once again dusting off my under-used art history education to offer a selection of gentlemen whose handsome, confident (and more accurate) faces could be substituted for those callow cover-models: six this week, and six more at the end of the month. 

It's interesting how, in light of Wench Edith's recent blog, how few blonde men appear in portraits, and even fewer handsome ones.  True, by nature they are more rare, and, as Wench Susan/Sarah pointed out, the varnishes and oils used in paintings have often darkened over time, and the subjects' hair with it.  Fashion has always played its part as well. When the reigning monarch (whether Charles II or Victoria) was brunette, then dark hair also ruled. For whatever reason, even men whose contemporaries refer to as fair-haired are often shown in portraits as brunettes.  Apparently our much-loved golden boys belong more to our modern Clairol times than the past.

My choices below are entirely personal too; please feel free to disagree with me, or suggest others.  This isn't a contest or a puzzle, and there aren't any right or wrong answers.  As the tabloids say, it's just an excuse to show the eye-candy. *G*

Charles-Joseph-Laurent Cordier (1777-1870, painted in 1810 by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres)  left
With a face as knowing and world-weary as this, it can’t be mere coincidence that the gentleman (a high-ranking French official stationed in Rome) shares the surname of Loretta’s hero in Your Scandalous Ways. And have you ever seen another bureaucrat with such impeccably snowy linen?

Charles Lennox, 3rd Duke of Richmond (1734-1806, painted in 1758 by Sir Joshua Reynolds) right
Aside from bearing a striking resemblance to Keanu Reeves, His Grace had more than a few heroic qualities of his own as a soldier, politician, reformer, art collector, and avid dog-lover.  Most notably, he championed the cause of the colonists during the American revolution in the House of Lords.  (He’s also the great grandson of Charles II and Louise de Keroualle, the heroine of my next book, The French Mistress.)

Juan de Pareja (1610-1670, painted in 1650 by Diego Velazquez) left
Born into slavery in Seville, Juan de Pareja was bought by Velazquez, who promptly gave him his freedom, and a place in his studio and household as well.  The two men were not only life-long friends, but associates: Pareja was also a talented painter, learning his craft as Velazquez’s assistant, and traveling with him to study throughout Italy.  There Velazquez painted this portrait of Juan, as a "warm-up" to a commissioned portrait of the Pope.

Portrait of a Young Man (Sixteenth century Florence, painted in the 1530s by Agnolo Bronzino) right
While this Renaissance gentleman’s name may have been lost over time, his sensuous appeal certainly hasn’t.  Historians guess from the book in his hand that he may have been a poet, or at least a member of the Florentine literary circle, and affluent (and self-assured) enough to sit for his portrait.

Captain John Howland (1802-1846, painted by an anonymous Massachusetts painter c.1830)  left

This whaling captain from New Bedford, MA is a genuine rarity in portraits: a red-haired, blue-eyed man! A descendant of one of the first Mayflower pilgrims, Yankee John Howland went to sea as a twelve-year-old cabin boy and was a captain by the time he was twenty, sailing on three-year whaling voyages to the Pacific Ocean.  While he may  be the only American in today's gallery, he can certainly hold his own among the European gentlemen.

Bindo Altoviti (1491-1556, painted by Raphael about 1515) right

While Wench Edith longed for blonde heroes on her covers in her last blog, they're also few and far between in Western male portraits.  But this wealthy young Florentine, a prominent Renaissance banker (!) and art patron, certainly makes a case for fair-haired gentlemen.  In fact, the story behind this painting is so shamelessly romantic, that I'm quoting at length the notes about it on the National Gallery of Art's web page:

[In the portrait, Bindo]"turns in a dramatic, almost theatrical, way to fix the eye of the viewer. Perhaps one viewer in particular was meant to receive his captivating look: Bindo's wife Fiammetta Soderini. Renaissance poets and courtiers were unanimous in believing that a person first fell in love through the eyes. They were called the guides of love, which could reveal the passion within more effectively than the tongue itself, or letter, or messengers. Bindo's flushed cheeks contribute to the impression of passion, and a ring is prominent on the hand he holds above his heart. The robe slipping from his shoulder reveals a bare nape caressed by soft curls. Their golden color would have underscored the nobility and purity of his love.

"Bindo and Fiammetta, daughter of a prominent Florentine family, were married in 1511, when Bindo would have been about twenty. The couple had six children, but Fiammetta continued to live in Florence while Bindo's business with the papal court required his presence in Rome. This portrait, which apparently hung in the couple's home in Florence, would have provided Fiammetta with a vivid reminder of her absent husband."

Ahhhhhh....

Do you wish the cover-models for romantic heroes were a bit more accurate, or do you like them just fine as they are?  And who's your favorite among these gentlemen?

And be sure to look for Part Two later this month!

We Have a Winner!

Sherrie here, announcing yet another book winner!

LuluB, you have won an autographed copy of Susan Holloway Scott's The King's Favorite.  Are you ever in for a treat!  Please send your mailing address to Sherrie so that we can get that book in the mail to you.

By the way, if you've checked out our Announcements sidebar on the right, you'll see that Susan S. will be a guest over at the History Hoydens on July 24 and 25, where she'll be talking about The King's Favorite and Nell Gwyn.  Please feel free to drop by and give her a wave.

In fact, if you'll check out the Announcements sidebar, you'll see that several of the Wenches will be busy in this month.

Cover Girl Nell Gwyn

by Susan Holloway Scott

Once upon a time, before every last second of every other person’s life was documented by way of a digital camera or cell-phone (at least every other person beneath a Certain Age), images were special.  Before photography and daguerreotypes became widespread in the early 19th century, the overwhelming majority of people lived their entire lives without any sort of visual documentation.  No photo-smiles, retouching, good sides or bad.  One’s image was based entirely on the here and now, or memory.

Portraits belonged to the rich, the famous, and the infamous.  Portraits were expensive, and the formal ones could take months, even years, to complete.  Portraits celebrated beauty, rank, wealth, achievement, nobility, or notoriety, and did so for all posterity.  Portraits could be viewed and venerated as stand-ins for the actual person, whether the king in a distant colonial outpost or a deceased dowager duchess respectfully added to the other ancestors in the family gallery.

Portraits also grace the covers of my historical novels.  I’ve been phenomenally fortunate in my covers, which have each featured an actual portrait of my heroine.  In the past, I’ve blogged about the portraits on the covers of Duchess and Royal Harlot, so it seems only fair that I write as well about the portrait of Nell Gwyn on the cover of my current novel, The King’s Favorite.

Those two earlier heroines –– Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, and Barbara, Duchess of Cleveland –– were both seventeenth century Ladies with a capital L, and as such they had their choice of the very best and most fashionable artists.  They were painted grandly, lushly, extravagantly, with the trappings of their titles and wealth around them. (That's Sarah with her family to the right, and even the younger son is looking flawlessly aristocratic.)

Nell Gwyn was different.  Nell was Common.  True, she was a celebrity in an era that was just beginning to realize the concept, an immensely popular actress before she became a royal mistress.  With her curly auburn hair, she wasn’t considered classically beautiful so much as charmingly pretty (what we’d now call “cute”), and her diminutive size (best modern guesses peg her at about 4’10”) made her an unlikely model for a goddess.  She was gleefully unapologetic of her humble beginnings, and only affected grand airs to twit her betters.

But like many people who rise from poverty, Nell was acutely aware of the symbols of success.  Although she could scarcely write her name, she made sure that all the silverware (and even many of the window panes) in her townhouse carried her monogram.  Nell understood the importance of portraits.  She wanted her beauty and success to be honored and preserved for future generations, but more importantly she wanted the notoriously unfaithful Charles to remember her now.

Nell sat for her portrait numerous times during her short life.  She didn’t always have the most skilled painters (see the awkward effort to the right by Simon Verelst), and because of her background, she was often shown with one or both breasts bared.  Her tiny stature makes her near-nude pose as Venus for Sir Peter Lely seem a little odd to modern eyes (and that's not to mention that weird vertical-futon-thingee she's lounging against), but Charles loved the picture so well that Nell had a copy of it painted for him to hang in his private quarters in the palace.  The artists loved painting her as well; because of her great popularity, they could count on selling prints engraved after the original portrait.

The portrait of Nell by Sir Peter Lely on the cover of The King’s Favorite was painted and copied several times, too, and it’s unlikely that this version was the original.   My cover is even further removed.  For design purposes, my publisher asked for permission from the owners to reverse the painting, and to change the color of the gown from yellow to a more eye-catching red. 

There’s another reason for the color change, too, the kind of weird coincidence that delights art historians.  If you look back at the cover of Royal Harlot, you’ll see that Barbara is wearing the same yellow gown/blue cloak combination.  And I mean the SAME gown and cloak.  Because 17th century artists kept “costumes” (long swaths of rich fabric that could be pinned and clasped into a variety of vaguely classical styles) for posing in their studios, it’s very likely that both women are wearing the exact same length of yellow cloth pulled from Sir Peter’s wardrobe –– and I also imagine that Nell might have done so intentionally to irritate Barbara.

But in this painting meant as a gift for Charles, only Nell would have chosen to be painted in such a rural setting.  She was Charles’s country mistress, his favorite companion on escapes from the London Court to Windsor Castle.  She taught him to fish, and he tried to teach her to ride, and together they swam in the river and strolled through the fields and forests, and it’s likely she wished to remind the king of these balmy, happy days in her company. Her throat and ears bare of jewels and her hair carelessly tousled,  she drapes a wreath of wildflowers around the neck of an adoring lamb who may (or may not) represent a besotted, tamed Charles himself. 

What did Charles think?  Ahh, for that you’ll just have to read The King’s Favorite, and find out for yourself.

If you were sitting for your portrait, how would you wish to be portrayed: as a Greek goddess, a Regency lady, or a movie star at Cannes, a prowling tigress, a star-spangled alien, or something else altogether? Or do you have another question or comment about Nell herself? I’ll give away a signed copy of The King’s Favorite on Sunday night to a reader who posts before then. 

We Have a Winner!

Sherrie, here, announcing another winner.  KIMMY L, you have won a copy of THE KING'S FAVORITE from Susan Holloway Scott!  Please contact Sherrie with your mailing address so that we can send you your autographed book.  And congratulations!

By the way, a number of winners have never claimed their books.  Do make a note to stop by here on Sundays to check to see if your name is listed as a winner.  (We do announcements on Sundays.)  Because many of the winners are not newsletter subscribers, we can't look them up on the newsletter list, either.  So signing up for the monthly Wenches newsletter increases your chances of our having a way of contacting you if you win a book.  Because we do love to give away books.

The King’s Favorite: The Interview, Part Two

An Interview with Wench Susan Holloway Scott by Wench Loretta Chase

Welcome to Part Two of our interview with Susan Holloway Scott.  We’re celebrating the release of her new historical novel, THE KING'S FAVORITE --and I’m delighted to report that the book is already appearing in stores--great news for all who’ve been waiting not very patiently for Nell Gwyn’s story.

For a tantalizing taste, you can read an excerpt from The King’s Favorite at Susan’s web site.  And do visit Facebook, where not only does Susan have a brand-new page,
but so does Nell Gwyn herself.  Stop by and become a friend to both of them.

And don’t forget:  Susan will be giving away an autographed copy of The King’s Favorite to a reader who posts a comment or question to this interview.

Loretta: King Charles II plays, as a monarch ought to do, a major role in both Royal Harlot and The King’s Favorite. But we see a different Charles in this book.  Did you find him more or less sympathetic in the context of his relationship with Nell?

Susan: This has been one of the most fascinating parts of writing this series of books: the same hero, but viewed through the very different perspective of each heroine.  The Charles Stuart in Royal Harlot loved Barbara Villiers Palmer, Lady Castlemaine (another beautiful woman who relished the spotlight of celebrity, shown to the right) almost as an equal.  They were cousins, and she was undeniably a lady, and even at the rancorous end of their long relationship, he always treated her with the courtesy and generosity due her rank. 

But though Charles loved Nell, too, and regarded her as one of his dearest friends, he could not quite forget her humble origins.  While he gave her several houses and a handsome income, he never granted her the same titles or livings that he gave to his other long-term mistresses, and his casual disregard for her feelings is as troubling as Nell’s constant forgiveness of his slights towards her.  Theirs is undeniably a love story between friends, a fairy tale romance between king and commoner, but it’s also sadly a love story where the hero does not always behave as heroically as he should. 

Loretta: So while Nell’s name was the last on the dying king’s lips, he did not provide very well for her.  How do you account for this?

Susan: I wish I could!  Actually, there is documentation that Charles had planned finally to give Nell her long-deferred title as a birthday present, a plan thwarted by his own untimely death.   Always robustly healthy and athletic, he was stricken one night by a series of debilitating strokes, and thanks to the over-zealous bleeding,  purging, and other rigorous attentions of 17th century medicine, died soon after, with no chance to right any of his wrongs to Nell.  I think it was more his characteristic procrastination rather than any willful neglect. His dying words were in fact a plea to his brother James “not to let poor Nellie starve”, but James had other plans on his royal agenda beyond looking after his dead brother’s old mistresses.  (James was especially cruel in forbidding Nell from Charles’s deathbed, claiming that she’d no right to say farewell to the dying king because she had no title.) Nell didn’t starve, but as soon as Charles’s protection was gone and her income with it, creditors swooped down to claim most of her wealth.  When she died soon after Charles in 1687, she left considerable debts –– but also a generous legacy to the prisoners in Newgate.

Loretta: Did your research for Nell show you any aspects of the king’s character you might not have previously considered?

Susan: By the time Charles became seriously involved with Nell (another portrait of her is to the right) in 1668, the first glorious optimism of his early reign had faded.  He was faced with the genuine challenges of a difficult Parliament, lack of funds, a country ravaged by plague and a capital struggling to recover from the Great Fire, as well as the constant danger of war with France and the Dutch.  Despite being called “the Merrie Monarch”, Charles was often plagued with melancholy (what we’d now call depression.)  Nell’s high spirits and ability to amuse him were exactly what the darker side of his personality needed. 

Loretta: You’ve mentioned on the blog and in our conversations the Victorians’ partiality for Nell.  What about her appealed to that straitlaced, hypocritical lot?

Susan: Every generation interprets the past to suit themselves.  The Victorians adored the 17th century, romanticizing Charles I’s doomed cavaliers and Charles II’s Court of wits and gallants and beautiful ladies in plumed hats as if they’d been created by Sir Walter Scott, and glossing over the harsher realities of the Restoration.  Scenes from this sentimentalized version of the Restoration were great favorites of Victorian painters as well, such as this one after Edward Matthew Ward, of Nell improbably directing the king in the rebuilding of London after the Great Fire  Nell’s doll-like beauty appealed to the Victorians, and they fashioned her into a classic fallen-woman-with-a-heart-of-gold, praising her loyalty to Charles and her generosity to the poor, and making her into such a plucky Magdalene that I suspect the real, more earthy Nell would scarcely recognize herself. By all reports, Nell enjoyed the material rewards of her position as much as any of the other royal mistresses, and was especially proud of her elaborate, over-sized bedstead, featuring portraits of her and Charles, their two sons as cupids, and even her rival mistresses allegorically receiving their just desserts –– and wrought entirely of shining sterling silver!  Unfortunately, the Victorian version of Nell, nobly giving away her oranges to the poor, is often the one that appears even today in contemporary histories.

Loretta: There were other men in Nell’s life beyond the king –– Charles Hart, the actor and an early lover; Lord Buckhurst, Lord Buckingham, Lord Rochester –– all fascinating men who played significant roles in Restoration London.  But for me, Rochester was the most intriguing, a lost soul, if ever I’ve met one.  Would you tell us something about this other player in Nell’s life?

Susan: There’s no better definition of a lost soul than John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester, shown here.  Yet another left fatherless by the Civil War, he was regarded as breathtakingly beautiful, funny, intelligent, intellectual, gifted both at writing poetry and the fast-paced banter of Charles II’s Court.  Unfortunately, he was also cursed by self-destructive alcoholism and a true libertine’s taste for sexual adventure and excess, and died badly of drink and syphilis at the age of 33.  The recent Johnny Depp movie (The Libertine) over-simplified his life, as film biographies often do.  He and Nell were fast friends, though apparently never lovers.  Like her, Rochester was much loved by the King for his ability to entertain, and he was fascinated by the make-believe world of the playhouse where Nell reigned as comic queen.  He was often her advisor in financial matters and her advocate with Charles, and she remained his loyal friend through his repeated disgraces and banishments from Court and his last, consuming illness.  I found it fascinating that the same man who wrote some of the most pornographic and bitter poetry about women to be found in English literature could also be so close to a woman like Nell, and their unusual friendship was an important stabilizer in both their lives.

Loretta: You’ve spent quite a bit of time in the Restoration era.  In researching Nell’s story, did you come across anything that surprised or intrigued you? 

Susan: I think I’ve probably had the same experience as most other writers do who love the past: the more you learn, the more you realize how little you still know.  The Restoration is a delicious time in English history, straddling as it does the end of the middle ages and the beginning of the age of enlightenment.  Traitors are still drawn and quartered, their heads stuck on spikes on London Bridge, yet Christopher Wren is rebuilding London into a modern city and Isaac Newton is making revolutionary scientific discoveries.  Much like the Regency era 150 years in the future, the Restoration is a time of tremendous social instability and change, with a mercantile middle class increasing its power while the aristocracy is feeling the first pinch of waning influence.  Add to this unforgettable people like King Charles, Nell Gwyn, and Lord Rochester, and it’s an irresistible setting for any historical novelist.

Loretta: The King’s Favorite offers us a number of glimpses of Louise de Keroualle, a detested rival of Nell’s whose story you’ll be telling in The French Mistress.  Would you give us a preview of this book? 
.
Susan:  Louise de Keroualle (in the painting to the left) was Charles’s last “official” mistress, a lovely French lady whose plump cheeks so delighted Charles that he fondly nicknamed her Fubbs.  The average Englishman was not as charmed: Louise was so despised that she dared not travel around London unattended.  She was loathed as being greedy, petulant, and, worst of all, for being French.  But Louise was far more complicated than that, and more intriguing, too.  Born to a genteel French family, she was sent by King Louis as a “gift” to his cousin Charles, and a spy for the French.  No one ever expected her to find a lasting place in Charles’s heart, and in English history as well.  Click here for a preview of The French Mistress, scheduled for publication next summer.

Thank you, Susan!

And thank you, readers, for joining us--and one more reminder:  One lucky commenter will win a copy of The King's Favorite.

The King’s Favorite: The Interview, Part One

An Interview with Wench Susan Holloway Scott by Wench Loretta Chase

It’s nearly July, which means the arrival of a wonderful new Susan Holloway Scott historical novel, and a chance for me to turn the tables and interview her, starting today and continuing on Monday with Part II.

Susan’s July book The King’s Favorite, like its predecessor, Royal Harlot, takes us to Restoration England.  Once again, Susan plunges us into the thick of things in the second half of the 17th century, bringing to life its enigmatic king, his Court, and his people.  For more about the era, you might want to look at the interview for Royal Harlot, where Susan gives us the lowdown on the Restoration, King Charles II, and his Court.
    This time, however, we see Restoration London from a very different perspective--because the heroine, Nell Gwyn, comes from another world entirely.  Though completely unlike Barbara Villiers Palmer, Lady Castlemaine, the heroine of Royal Harlot, Nell, too, had a place in the capricious king’s heart, and was part of his life for a long time.
    To read an excerpt from The King’s Favorite, please visit Susan’s web site.  And not only does Susan have a brand-new page on Facebook, but so does Nell Gwyn herself.  Stop by and become a friend to both of them.
    Also: Susan will be giving away an autographed copy of The King’s Favorite to a reader who posts a comment or question to this interview, so please post away!

Loretta: Susan, would you bring Nell on stage for us and tell us a little about her world: the London she grew up in and the way she grew up in it?

Susan: Nell Gwyn (one of her portraits is to the right) is a considerable departure from any other heroine I’ve ever written.  Born around 1650, at the very end of the English Civil War, her circumstances were sadly all too common at the time: soon after Nell’s birth, her Royalist father was killed in battle, and her widowed mother drifted into prostitution in London to support her two young daughters.  Her childhood was as grim as anything in Dickens.  Raised in one of the poorest neighborhoods in the city, she lived in lodgings over a brothel, where her now-alcoholic mother brought her male customers. There was never enough to eat, let alone clothing, and as a very young child barefoot Nell was soon working to earn what she could, first sweeping cinders in the street (a real-life Cinderella), then selling herring from a basket.  It was a considerable step up for her when, around age ten, she began serving ale and singing songs in the bawdy-house where her mother and older sister worked.  She was tiny for her age (and remained so throughout her short life, likely from malnutrition), yet astonishingly beautiful, and blessed with both a sunny, light-hearted personality and a very quick, saucy wit –– and a fierce determination to rise in the world. 

She couldn’t have chosen a better time in which to be a young person, poor or rich, in London.  In 1660, Englishmen decided that they’d had enough of grim Puritan rule, and welcomed back the monarchy and Charles Stuart from exile.  London after his Restoration was a delightful place to be, once again full of music, dancing, and frivolous fun.  To a girl like Nell, the handsome young king must have seemed like a fairy-tale ruler come to life, especially with his habit of wandering freely among his people.  Like most every woman in the realm, Nell dreamed of Charles, but unlike most of them, in time she managed to make her romantic dreams a reality

Loretta: You make Nell so real that it’s hard to believe you had so little to work with in realizing her character.  She was illiterate.  She never wrote letters or journals or memoirs.  You had only scraps to work with in creating a woman who is the most famous of the king’s many mistresses and who must have had a considerable comic gift.  But as you’ve mentioned previously, comedy is hard, and recapturing it –– from mere wisps of information –– seems nigh impossible.  What among the scraps of information provided the keys to unlocking her character and what it was that people found so captivating?

Susan: In some ways, there was too little, and in others, too much.  There is almost nothing remaining in Nell’s own voice, and yet because she was such a popular, public figure in her time and afterwards, there are a great many stories and anecdotes about her.  The trick was sifting through all this to decide what sounded true and right, and what clanged false.  I also tried to place her in the context of her world –– or rather, the better-documented version of her world as described by contemporaries like the famous diarist Samuel Pepys –– and create a character that was both true to her time, and to historical fact.

I think the greatest single key to Nell’s personality was her constant need to be the center of attention, which, given her wretched childhood, was understandable.  Seventeenth-century ladies were expected to languish gracefully.  They weren’t supposed to be as witty as the gentlemen, or to enjoy outrageous pranks and pratfalls.  Nell did: but then Nell was not a lady (another portrait of her, looking solemnly lady-like, is to the right). Laughter can be a very potent weapon, and early on Nell learned that being both uproariously funny and very pretty could be an unbeatable combination for attracting –– and holding –– men.  She was an excellent mimic, combined with a gift for biting satire and word-play that entertained even the most jaded courtiers. Humor can also be an excellent way to hide insecurities and doubts, which, I imagine, plagued the barefoot girl from Coal Yard Alley as she scampered among the peers at the palace.

Loretta: Nell became an actress, a highly popular one.  Would you tell us something about the theater of her time and her distinctive place there?

Susan: The rollicking English theater of Shakespeare’s time had been one of the first things banned by Cromwell’s Puritans, and one of the first that Charles restored.  But he also introduced an innovation from the French theater: the women’s roles were no longer played by men and boys, but by women. (That's the original patent for the King's Company, granted by Charles and featuring his portrait.) Overnight there was a demand for actresses, yet it was a rare woman who had the required beauty, talent, and sheer fortitude to withstand the raucous audience interaction that characterized 17th century English theater, particularly the bawdy comic roles.  Most of the new actresses were at least middle-class and literate.  Only Nell made the considerable leap from selling oranges in the pit to leading roles on the stage, but it was a gamble that paid off handsomely for the playhouse’s owners.  Nell was a born comedienne, and while still in her teens she became such a draw that playwrights like John Dryden were writing specific roles for her.  Her presence could make a play a success. She was recognized in the street by her fans, famous artists painted her portrait, and prints of her picture were sold by the score.

Loretta: King Charles had a number of lower-class lovers.  He frequented brothels.  He slept with actresses.  What was it about Nell that made her more than a one-night stand, that raised her to the level of The King’s Favorite?

Susan: While Nell truly believed she was fated to love the king, she was also wise enough not to tumble into his bed at once.  She was already a success in her own right; she could afford to withstand his considerable royal charm.  For a woman who cheerfully called herself a whore all her life, Nell was not promiscuous, especially not for the wanton times in which she lived.  Only four men can be documented as having shared her bed (though many others claimed to have done so), and none of those four were chosen on impulse.

The king was no exception. Nell became Charles’s friend long before she was his lover, and remained his friend until his death.  Charles expected his friends to entertain him; he was a clever, restless man, easily bored and with little patience for tedious company.  Nell’s audacity, humor, and boundless energy captivated him, and they both enjoyed decidedly un-royal pastimes like swimming, fishing, and long walks in the country (though just like many modern city-dwellers who don't have driver's licenses, Nell was terrified of riding horses, one of Charles's great country passions.) While unlike his other mistresses, Nell seldom meddled in politics, she did often say things to him that were so outrageously frank that she would surely have been banished from Court if she’d been a man. Her mimicry and sarcasm could be so sharp that it might have been viewed as subversive, especially coming from a common-born woman. But Charles delighted in her honesty, especially when it was worded to make him laugh, and in many ways, Nell was his perfect match.

To be continued . . . .
Please join us Monday for the second part of this interview, and more about Nell and the extraordinary world in which she lived and loved.

And do please comment:  It's your chance to win a signed copy of THE KING’S FAVORITE!

Guests! We Have Guests!

If you've been watching our Announcements sidebar, you'll know we have 2 more guests this month.  On 6/25 Mary Jo hosts returning guest Margaret Evans Porter.  This time around, Margaret will be talking about period theater.

Then on June 27 and 30 Loretta interviews Wench Susan Holloway Scott in connection with the  release of The King's Favorite: A Novel of Nell Gwyn and King Charles II.

Join the fun!  Leave comments!  Win books!!!

All Hail Honorary WordWench Kalen!

Thank you so much, Kalen, for enlightening us regarding pins, stomachers, and other such important Georgian niceties.  Since you're already an Honorary WordWench, we can't bestow that particular honor again.  But we can offer you this splendid 18th century Venetian wardrobe (the Ca' Rezzonico on the Grand Canal is holding it for you) to stash away your fabulous collection of two-hundred-year-old clothing, and wish you all the best with the sales of Lord Scandal.  Hail Kalen!

And the Wieners Are ...

Good morning from Sherrie!  Before we announce the winners of the caption contest, please take a moment to mark 6/6 and 6/9 on  your calendars.  Those are the dates of Edith's two-part interview hosted by Mary Jo, in conjunction with the release of Edith's His Dark and Dangerous Ways.

It's time to list the wieners of the caption contest.  The Wenches had a hard time deciding, because all the captions were so great.  But they finally made their choices, after much deliberation.  (Some of the Wenches included their own comments with their choices) Each winner gets an autographed book.  Thanks to everyone who participated!  This was so much fun that the Wenches are talking about doing it again at a future date. 

Winners, please send your mailing addresses to me, Sherrie, and I'll pass them on to the respective Wenches.  And now, here are the Wenches' choices:

Wench #1 - Loretta

Winner:  Cheryl C.  Caption:  This is my father's land, and you Lord Scoundrel are not welcome here.

Loretta's comment:  I had an awful time choosing a winner because they were all good and several captions in particular had me laughing helplessly, tears streaming down my face.  But at last I chose my winner.  Loretta, still laughing

Wench #2 - Susan/Sarah

Winner: Cheryl C.  Caption: I  have no wish to be a "lady." I can manage and work this estate as well as any man

Susan/Sarah's comment: I laughed out loud at Cheryl C's great caption for the photo of me at two years old after a busy day of blueberry picking in upstate New York.

Wench #3 - Jo

Winner:  Theo.  Caption:  *sigh* Isn't he just the dreamiest seven-year-old you've ever seen?

Jo's comment:  How could I resist such a romantic caption, and indeed, I do look very eager to please!  This session  had about 50 thumbnails -- whatever they called them back then -- and in some I was scowling or even crying.  I wonder what happened to them?

Ah, I found a scan of another.  I probably should have put this one in the contest, despite its poor condition.  I'm sure some of you would have had fun with those fingers!

Wench #4 - Susan/Miranda

Winner:  Sue.  Caption:   Despite her mother's admonition not to, Lady Jane insisted on hanging around with the village children.

Wench #5 - Pat

Winner: RfP.  Caption:  The acolyte mounted the stone dais to secure the captive's wrists to the ancient iron hooks.  It was a strangely familiar moment.  Despite her city clothes and new responsibilities, it wasn't that different from staking a goat on a new patch of grass.  Stifling a giggle, she nodded to the crowd to begin the chant.

Pat's Comment:  I couldn't resist this one since I'm toying with a way out story involving pre-Mayans and time travel.

Wench #6 - Mary Jo 

Winner:  Suzy Stutz.  Caption:  Well, darlin' I could tell it was you by your lovely smile ... and the way that you were looking the opposite direction from the photographer.

Wench #7 - Edith

Winner:  Cheryl C.  Caption:  Yes, yes, I know that I am the prettiest girl of the Season, but can we please just get on with this?

So there you have it.  Seven winners, seven great captions.  And don't forget Edith's interview 6/6 and 6/9.   By the way, if this post looks funky or the spacing is weird, it's because Typepad is being very strange today.  Case in point:  I cannot remove the mysteriously stray sentence, below.  Perhpaps Suzy Stutz will enjoy seeing her name in print not once, but twice! 

Winner:  Suzy Stutz.      

 

Your Scandalous Ways: the Interview, Part Uno

An Interview with Loretta Chase
by Susan/Miranda

At last, at last! The book so many of us have been waiting for this spring is finally in stores NOW.  Your Scandalous Ways by Wench Loretta Chase is already gathering a heady share of well-deserved praise, and there are plenty of people (myself included) who think it's Loretta's best since Lord of Scoundrels.  To help get readers in the proper mood, Loretta reveals the Truth behind this extraordinary book -- or at least the Truth about James, Francesca, the influence of Venice, and all those plaster putti. 

If you'd like to hear Loretta discuss this book via video (think along the exciting lines of "Garbo Speaks!"), please check out her new YouTube clips.  And please be sure to join us for Part Two of the interview of Friday.

Also: Loretta will be giving away a signed copy of Your Scandalous Ways to a reader who posts on either half of the interview.  Ask your quesitons now!

Susan/Miranda: Many of your previous books have been interconnected, but Your Scandalous Ways introduces a whole new set of characters to readers.  What inspired you to create James and Francesca?

Loretta:  Casino Royale was the spark.  It made me think, “What about a 007 in the early 19th Century?  I didn’t see Daniel Craig, though.  I saw tall, dark, and handsome.  And for some reason, I saw half-Italian.  Once James Cordier took form, Francesca came instantly to life.  The exotic looks--the elongated eyes, the wide mouth--came from a model in Brooks Brothers ads.  The movie got Venice on my mind, too.  I studied it, then Byron’s letters from his time there, and started thinking about English exiles and what they found there.  Like Byron, Francesca has left England because of a major scandal.  The scandal not only helped develop her character, but set the plot in motion--the thing that brings James into collision with her.

Susan/Miranda: Readers who remember Dain, the hero of Lord of Scoundrels, will love James Cordier, another “outsider” Englishman of unusual ancestry who chooses to live apart from polite society.  Do you think these two gentlemen would enjoy each other’s company, and why or why not?

Loretta:  Two extreme Alpha males, both with Italian blood?  I think they’d stir each other’s competitive instincts in a big way.  They’re such different men, it’s hard to imagine their having a conversation.  And while they’re trying to decide whether or not to like each other, all the women in the vicinity are swooning from testosterone overdose.

Susan/Miranda: The city of Venice is almost another character in this book, and you do a wonderful job of catching the city’s mix of East and West, and its general other-worldliness.  Yet  you’ve chosen to set your story in an unusual era in Venetian history, after the fall of the Republic and well after the city’s glory-days.  Why?

Loretta:  Mainly because it’s the time period in which I usually set my stories *g*.  But it’s still an interesting time.  The glory days were centuries earlier.  It’s always had problems with allies and enemies, disastrous wars, plagues, corruption, etc.  At the end of the 18th Century Napoleon stomps in.  That’s the end of the Republic of Venice, and it’s sad and awful. 

By 1820, the time of my story, yes, people (especially foreigners) are nostalgic about the Republic (and let’s bear in mind this is the Romantic era) but Venice, like my heroine, is resilient.  And like her, it’s fun.  Though many of its riches have been plundered, so much remains.  It’s still beautiful and mysterious and it’s still distinctively Venice--like no other city in the world.  What Byron found there was a refuge.  Old and wicked as it was, it was a place of renewal for him, a place where he wasn’t judged and where he began to do his best work.  It enchanted him--and my characters--exactly as it does visitors today.

Susan/Miranda: Courtesans are trendy right now in historical romances, albeit courtesans who often turn out to be faux-courtesans for the sake of Polite Readers.  However, Francesca Bonnard is the real thing, earning a tidy living in a city infamous at the time for being the “Brothel of Europe.”  How did you create a love story for a courtesan?

Loretta: I thought of La Traviata, and my brain does what it usually does when contemplating a tragedy:  It changed the characters and plot in a way to make a happy ending.  I had in mind, too, Harriette Wilson, the famous courtesan of the Regency Era, and so I made my courtesan unrepentant, with a zest for life, and a bawdy sense of humor.  (I ought to add that your Bad Barbara of Royal Harlot  also inspired me.)  Francesca has been left penniless and friendless.  She’s become a courtesan to survive--but she does so on her own terms.  She chooses the men who are to have the privilege of keeping her, and only a very, very few qualify.  She’s exclusive and extremely expensive.  What she needed, I thought, was a man who truly appreciated what she had to offer, who’d done enough not-so-nice things himself not to judge her and who was at the same time honorable enough to win her trust.

To be continued . . . .

Please join us Friday for the conclusion of this interview, and more delicious discussions with Loretta about Venice, courtesans, and Lord Byron.

And don't forget to leave a comment for a chance to win a signed copy of Your Scandalous Ways!

Anniversary Book Give-Away

We should probably call this the Anniversary Contest instead of Book Give-Away, but the fact is, we're going to be giving away a lot of books.  A minimum of 14, to be exact. 

Below are seven childhood pictures of the Wenches. Your job is to guess who's who.  Here's how it works:

1.  Study the pictures and send your best guesses to me, Sherrie (click on my name) with the subject line, "Wench Contest."  DO NOT SEND YOUR GUESSES TO THE BLOG OR YOU'LL BE DISQUALIFIED. 

2. The person guessing all 7 pictures correctly will win an autographed book from each of the Wenches.  In case of ties, the names of those who guessed correctly will be thrown into a hat and I'll draw one name as the winner. 

3. As an added bonus, we encourage you to suggest captions to the pictures for a chance to win even more books.  You can do that via the comments feature, but DO NOT include your guesses on the Wench identities--those go to me!  Each Wench will give one book to the person who, in her opinion, supplies the best caption to her picture.

The contest will end this coming Friday at midnight, Eastern Daylight Time, so you'll have the rest of this week to enter.  Winners will be announced on Sunday, our usual announcement day.  Be sure to check back in case you won!

So, before we start:  Wench identity guesses go to Sherrie.  Suggestions for captions can be done via the comment feature.  Got it?  Great!  Let's get started! (Click on any of the pictures to view a larger version.)

Wench #1:

She stood happily alone, making up a story in her head.

Wench #2

While picking blueberries at the age of two, this Wench shows an early tendency to get deep into her work.

Wench #3

Wench sporting a tartan bow?

Wench #4

Already determined to stand out from the crowd, this dark-haired Wench sits in the middle of her California cousins & demonstrates how (not) to eat a popsicle.

Wench #5

Despite being blinded by the light, I've always been an Indiana Jones explorer.

Wench #6

(Littlest one in picture) I liked romantic subplots in other books, but I didn't read genre romances for years because the first few I read were frankly dreadful. Who knew what I'd be doing today???

Wench #7

See? I always did have red hair!!! At least, then I did.

Happy Second Anniversary to Us!

Have we got a contest for you!

Our official anniversary was 5/22, but the Wenches decided it would work better if we celebrated our anniversary on Memorial Day with a big fanfare.

We're going to celebrate in style, with a fun contest, a flurry of free books, and some downright adorable photographs of the Wenches as children.  Later today, I'll be posting individual pictures of the Wenches, and your job will be to identify who's who.  You'll be sending your guesses to Sherrie (that would be me!).  Anyone accidentally sending their guesses to the blog will, unfortunately, be disqualified.

Here's the way it works:  I'll post a childhood picture of each of the Wenches.  You'll study the pictures and send your best guesses to me.  The person guessing all 7 pictures correctly will win an autographed book from each of the Wenches.  In case of ties, the names of those who guessed correctly will be thrown into a hat and I'll draw one name as the winner. 

If you think this will be an easy contest, think again.  Several of the Wench kiddie photos will stump you!

As an added bonus, we're going to make the contest even more fun by encouraging you to add captions to the pictures.  You can do that via the comments feature, but DO NOT include your guesses on the photographs or you'll get disqualified!  Each Wench will give one book to the person who, in her opinion, supplies the best caption to her picture. 

So get ready.  Put on your thinking caps.  And to prime the pump, here's a kiddie picture of me when I was about six-years-old. And no, I don't have a high forehead. My bangs started out just above my eyebrows, but Mom kept trying to even them up with scissors.  The result:  an uneven fringe that stuck straight out, high on the forehead.   ~Sherrie

Scandalous Loretta!

Well, not really.  But her book is scandalous.  Your Scandalous Ways, to be exact. 

To launch Your Scandalous Ways, Loretta is doing a whirlwind cyber-tour.  She's already made an appearance on Romance B(u)y the Book, and on May 27 she'll be a guest at Romance Novel TV.  Then on Wednesday and Friday, May 28 & 30 Loretta will do a two-part interview here at the Word Wenches, hosted by Susan/Miranda. 

Next stop on the tour is Vauxhall Vixens on May 29.  This is a special occasion for Loretta, as she will be the very first Vixen guest.  One of the Vixen members, Maggie Robinson, is a regular commenter here at the Wenches.

Loretta then takes a short breather before hitting the cyber-trail again on June 9 when she visits the Romance Bandits.  Next stop:  The Book Smugglers.  A date hasn't been finalized yet, but it will be in June, some time after the middle of the month.  Watch our Announcements sidebar on the right for further developments.

Hmmm.  Vixens, Bandits, Smugglers ... the perfect venue for a fallen woman.  Francesca Bonnard, the Bad Girl of Your Scandalous Ways, should feel right at home.

Cover Conspiracy!!!

By Susan/Miranda

Here at the Wenches, we like to discuss covers.  We talk about covers we’ve had (Cover Girl) and covers we wish we had (A Makeover for Lady M). Our covers, other authors’ covers (Art vs. Commerce), good covers, bad covers, and really, really ugly covers.   I suspect much of our fascination with covers is that authors often have very little input into what goes on the front of our books.  We open those jpg files from art directors with great trepidation, each time hoping against hope that we got a “good one.” 

So imagine my surprise to see that the subject of cover-art is suddenly considered big-time news in the rest of the (non-Wench) world.  There it was, in the Philadelphia Inquirer, the third-oldest surviving newspaper in the country, a venerable journal that has won eighteen Pulitzer Prizes –– there, on the front page of the section, a bold-faced headline that couldn’t be missed:

These book covers say women are dumb

Well! Not much grey area in a headline like that, is there?  The article that followed was written by one of the Inquirer’s most popular columnists, Karen Heller, and here’s the link so you can read it yourself. 

On first reading, I completely agreed with Ms. Heller.  I, too, am heartily sick of the cover-art conventions for books targeted towards women readers, from cheesy clinches to empty Adirondack chairs to the random, faceless body parts favored for chick-lit.  (Yes, I know, my last two covers have featured headless women, and yes, I would have preferred they have had heads, and we’ll leave it at that.) 

I also agree that a writer’s entire career can be determined by the pigeon-hole of a cover.  Consider all the fantastic books out there that will never even be seen by a wider audience, let alone purchased or read, because they have the single word “romance” printed on the spine, and a “romance” cover on the front.  (A good many excellent Wench books would surely fall into this category.)  Ditto “women’s fiction.”  Why are so many women writers singled out and branded like that?  Books like The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks or Love Story by Erich Segal or even Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy aren’t labeled women’s fiction, though in theory they could be. They’re just fiction, suitable for all readers, and not banished to the “girl ghetto” section.

It’s worked in reverse as well.  Consider an author like Louise Erdrich, whose complex, spiritual novels of families and lovers evolve from her own Chippewa heritage.  Currently she’s regarded as one of the most important American novelists of her generation, and deserves to be, too. But what would have happened to her career if, in the beginning, some misguided art director had given her a “western romance” type cover?  Would she have ever found her audience of both male and female readers, and the literary reputation that’s come with it? (OK, so most likely she would, but in the wonderful world of publishing, believe me, ANYTHING is possible.)

I was getting up a righteous head of steam to match Ms. Heller’s, with all kinds of proof to back it up.  But then I began to think a bit further, and realized it’s not quite so easy to win the argument with feminist indignation.

Because women DO read more than men, and buy many more books than men, too.  Every bookseller will tell you that.  Therefore tailoring cover art to the biggest possible readership makes sense, doesn’t it?  And if romance-reading-women-readers are the largest group of book-buyers, then offering them books that look like every other book they’ve already bought and enjoyed –– books that tell them in an instant what's inside –– is good business sense, isn’t it?  Why fix it if it ain’t broke?

As the wise man says, I dunno.  But maybe you do, or at least you’ll have an opinion you’d like to share.

Do you agree with Ms. Heller that these book covers say women are dumb?  Is it demeaning to women readers and writers to have such “Lifetime fuzz” (Ms. Heller’s term) and other hearts-and-flowers-Barbie-pink clichés on the covers of our books?  Or is it just smart marketing?

And the Wiener is ... Elizabeth Kerri Mahon!

Drum roll, please!  We have a wiener:  Elizabeth Kerri Mahon, you have won an Advanced Readers Copy of The King's Favorite by Susan Holloway Scott!  Please contact Susan/Miranda or Sherrie Holmes with your mailing address and we'll get that in the mail to you.  Congratulations, Elizabeth!

Don't run away, now, folks!  Check out the next post, below.  It's chock full of announcements!

Wenches Rock!

Where to start?  Lots of good news on the Wench front.

Pat - Mystic Guardian
Pat's book cover is a finalist in the Cover Cafe annual book cover contest. The covers aren't up yet, but they plan to have the contest up and running by early May, so you should be able to view the finalists then. 

Jo - A Lady's Secret
Jo's book has moved up on the New York Times bestseller list and is now #10! Way to go, Jo! You better lay in a big supply of champagne. 

Loretta - Your Scandalous Ways
Loretta's book received a great review over at Publishers Weekly.  Well done, Loretta!

Mary Jo and Pat - Pioneers of Romance
Both Mary Jo and Pat attended the Romantic Times convention in Pittsburgh April 16-20 and each came away with a lovely award ("a big chunk of glass" according to Mary Jo!)  for being pioneers of romance.

Sneak Previews
Be sure to stop by on Sundays when we post announcements!  And just to give you a sneak preview, in May Jo will be interviewing a wines and spirits expert, which we'll announce in more detail next month.  In addition, Susan/Miranda will be doing a two-part interview of Loretta the end of May in connection with the release of Your Scandalous Ways. In June we're bringing back costume historian Kalen Hughes to talk about Georgian dress.

Book Reminder
Wenches have books coming out in the next few months.  In May, Mary Jo's A Distant Magic will be reprinted.  In June, two Wenches have books out:  Edith - His Dark and Dangerous Ways, and Loretta - Your Scandalous Ways. In July, two more Wenches have books out:  Pat - Mystic Rider, and Susan Holloway Scott - The King's Favorite.

So, we have some busy months coming up, and we don't want you to miss the fun.  Drop in early and often!

What's So Funny?

By Susan/Miranda

When Wench Pat recently asked the eternal question of “What Do We Really Want?”, one of the popular replies was a call for more humor.  I can understand this.  Who doesn’t want to laugh?  Yet a truly funny book is truly hard to find, and historical-funny is even more rare.

And boy, is it ever hard to write!

The hero’s best friend is killed at Waterloo, and it’s terribly tragic and sad, and everyone knows to feel that way.  The long-suffering couple finally weds, and readers share their joy.  Those are easy.  But humor is infinitely more subjective.  A scene that strikes one reader as uproariously funny seems irritatingly foolish to another.  Readers boards are filled with examples of this.  Either you get the joke, or you don’t, or maybe the joke wasn’t really there in the first place, anyway.

Historical humor is even more challenging, because much of what was rip-snorting good fun in the past –– ridiculing the handicapped, huge fake penises, anything with priests and nuns –– doesn’t exactly fly in polite company now.

Wit and wordplay hold up better on the printed page than broad slapstick, but even then there are plenty of pitfalls amongst the pratfalls.  Much humor is topical, or at least of its moment, and when the moment is past, so is the humor.  Anyone who’s labored through Shakespeare’s comedies understands this, though, to be fair, an Elizabethan audience would be left scratching their heads over an episode of Seinfeld.

Writing a funny historical character was my biggest challenge in The King’s Favorite, a historical novel set in Restoration London.  By all contemporary reports, Nell Gwyn (my real-life heroine) was uproariously funny, a class-clown personality that couldn’t resist making people laugh.  Born in a brothel, she had no education beyond “street smarts”, yet through the gift of quick wit, rose from selling oranges in the theatre to become a leading lady and, eventually, a royal mistress. As an actress, she was hugely popular playing “low” comedy: she was always cast as the sly servant with the best one-liners, the comedienne who knew how to get the most out of the earthy, physical humor of the time. 

The King adored her, in large part because she’d dare to do and say things to him in the guise of a joke that no one else at court could risk, not without a quick trip to the Tower.  Humor can be subversive that way, and Nell knew the power her wit gave her.  To many men, a funny woman is a dangerous woman.  She’s unpredictable, she has opinions, and she’s often quick to deflate male pride and vanities.  But other men find a funny woman a sexy woman, and Nell’s house was always filled with her many male side-kicks, including the Earl of Rochester and the Duke of Buckingham, who were both always ready to participate in her elaborate pranks and skits.

To Nell’s good fortune, Charles was also secure enough himself to relish a witty mistress. (Remember, this is the first English monarch to realize that women on the stage were not a sign of moral civilization's end, and finally permit actresses to play the roles written for women.) Though the official post of court jester was gone by 1670, Nell held it unofficially, and whenever things were grim and gloomy about the palace, the king would always turn to her to cheer him.  Even after he moved on to other mistresses, Nelly remained his friend and jester until his death.  Her audience from the theatre never forgot her, either.  Long after she "retired" from the stage to the palace, she was still cheered wherever she went, and when she died, her mourners filled not only the church, but the streets as well.

But how to write a funny heroine? One of Nell’s most famous roles was Mirida in a play called All Mistaken, or The Mad Couple, by James Howard. The humor comes from her suitor Pinguister’s enormous girth, and his inability to do much of anything with Mirida because of his obesity.  If the actor rolling around the stage in the “fat suit” as he tries to catch Mirida wasn’t enough, there’s also the scene where Pinguister is given an enema and a laxative, then locked in a vault with other hapless suitors, and with predictable results.  Oh, the hilarity! Oh, the [adolescent-boys-lavatory] wit!  Oh, how am I supposed to write THAT into a scene!

Of course, not all Restoration wit is like this –- much of it was, and remains, laugh-out-loud clever word-play –– but an awful lot hasn’t aged very well.  Or, as Wench Loretta noted when we were discussing this blog, “They drank a lot back then, didn’t they?”  Fortunately, there are a great many other examples of Nell's one-liners and general jesting that hold up better over time, and that I was able to incorporate into her character.  Virtuous heroines, sentimental heroines, noble, true-hearted heroines –– they're easy.  But a funny heroine's a real rarity, and I know how lucky I am to have found Nell Gwyn.

But what do you think of humor in historical fiction?  Do you enjoy funny characters or situations, or do you find the risk not worth the punchlines?  What’s your favorite historical with humor?

The jury’s still out on whether or not I was able to capture the fun and wit of Nell Gwyn until The King’s Favorite is released in July –– except for one of you lucky folk out there.  I’ll give away an Advanced Reader’s Copy of The King’s Favorite to a reader who posts to this blog before Saturday night.

Bagnigge, Explained

By Susan/Miranda

Since it's the second of "my" days, I decided to share a response from a question I'd posed in an earlier blog.  All the WordWenches blogs remain available on-line, and they can be accessed either in order, or by individual Wench (just click on a name at the end of an entry, and you'll get them all.)  Readers also continue to post replies, sometimes days or even months after the blog first appeared. 

Last fall, I wrote a blog called "Whither Bagnigge?"  I'd recently written a scene (included in the blog) for The King's Favorite, which was set in a rural  town called Bagnigge Wells, located on a branch of the Thames.  As is sadly often the case, the rural resort of 1670 where Charles II went swimming with Nell Gwyn was soon after absorbed by London's sprawling growth, with even the river covered over and forgotten.  I'd found plenty of references to the place in the past, but it was so long gone that it no longer appeared on any modern (or even 19th century) maps.  I asked readers two questions: if they knew exactly where Bagnigge Wells might have been, and also, exactly how it would have been pronounced.

And now, some months later, I've heard from an English gentleman named Robert Mitchell who answered both questions, plus added a family photograph as well.  His reply: "If you search for "gwynne place" on wikimedia commons [here's the link] you will find a photograph that I have posted that might interest you. Bagnigge is pronounced "Bagg-nidge". The girl on the steps is probably my mum, though we'll never know for sure."  Mr. Mitchell's great-grandfather was the landlord of the Bagnigge Wells public house, from whose window the photograph was taken in the early 1920s.

Thank you so much for sharing, Mr. Mitchell!  And ain't the great wide world of the internet grand? *G*

The Fabric of Life

by Susan/Miranda

Three things to know about me (at least in relation to this blog):
1) I like words.
2) I like history.
3) I like textiles.

Textiles (you know, cloth) like Rodney Dangerfield, never getting no respect.  The more literary the fiction, the fewer words will be squandered on describing who wears what. Characters are dressed, or not dressed, and that’s about it.  Conversely, the most sniggering parodies of “lady writers” will inevitably include a detailed list of the heroine’s closet, complete with designers’ names.  (“She tossed her Blackberry into her Prada bag, along with her Marc Jacob sunglasses, Coach wallet, Cross pen, and Hermes scarf.”)

Historical fiction often gets the double whammy.  Too many adjectives will be used to describe too much clothing, but using modern words and woeful history.  I’ve already written here about the sad, inaccurate state of “historical” men’s shirts (a chorus, please, Kalen!), especially the ones make of silk that button down the front.  But the ladies seldom fare much better.  Think of all the Regency misses who wear high-waisted white cotton dress with puffed sleeves, which makes for boring writing and history.

There’s so much more that can be said about how a character dresses.  It’s how she presents herself to the world. (It’s how he does, too, but to save blog verbiage, I’ll stick to the ladies for now.)  It determines how she moves, even if she moves.  Dress can show a character’s rank, income, job, marital status, religious beliefs, and sensuality.  It can be a symbol of honor, or a brand of poverty, and it can reflect whether she’s a neatnik or a slob.  It can show political beliefs, or stunning insensitivity, whether she dresses to attract men, or rebuff them. 

It’s obvious that a lady in a jewel-studded brocade gown will move far differently than her maid in linsey-woolsey.  But even an 18th century farmer’s wife would have tucked up her skirts and secured them through the slits for her pockets to keep her best glazed-wool petticoat clear of the mud in her yard while doing chores, and nearly every woman of every rank would cover her “good” clothes with an apron while doing any slightly messy task.

An 18th century Englishman’s shirt would have been made of linen, with virtually no exceptions.  But was the gentleman supporting Irish manufactures with Irish linen?  Did he care for style over politics, and buy Holland linen smuggled into London past trade embargos against the Netherlands?  Or was he of the  lower class or  “middling sort”, who still relied on linen that was processed and sewn at home?  One tidy adjective can say so much.

Careless writers will always put the common folk in cotton, reflecting the modern price (and often contempt) of this fiber.  But in 1800, before the cotton gin, cotton could be costly, reflecting either its complicated manufacture or its import from India.  Complicating things further for historians, “cotton” was also used to describe a process that raised a fuzzy nap on woolen cloth (“cottoning”), so often cotton isn’t cotton at all, but wool.

A late 18th-century woman looking over bolts or pieces of fabric in a shop would definitely have understood the differences.  She would know that ballasor, imported from India, was a cotton muslin suitable for her husband’s hankerchiefs, while  balzarine was a light-weight brocade for day gowns, a blend of worsted wool and cotton woven into fanciful patterns on a jacquard loom.  She would have requested beaverteen (a coarse, heavy, cotton twill with a thick pile) for her sons’ winter jackets.  She might have bought several lengths of Canterbury (an old-fashioned cotton brocade with a silk warp, named after the city where it was first woven) for a gown for her widowed mother-in-law.  She would have chosen jaconet (a thin woven cotton, between cambric and muslin) for infants’ clothes and caps, and perhaps a quantity of striped siamoise (a light but sturdy cloth, woven of linen and cotton) for summer slip coverings and bed hangings.  All cotton, yes, but all as different as can be, and while the fine distinctions between the fabrics may be lost to us, the words themselves are evocative of a different time.

Consider the textiles of the more recent past.  Dotted Swiss and cotton velveteen are forever the itchy, unyielding fabrics of Sunday dresses from my childhood.  Kettle cloth and wide-wale corduroy were what we all sewed into shift dresses and jumpers in Home Economics classes back in the 60s, when Home Ec was still Home Ec and not Family & Consumer Sciences.  The first of the slinky synthetic knits were appearing then, too, in Orlon, and in Banlon, that creepiest of all fabrics for men’s shirts. Say Quiana and Ultrasuede and polyester-double-knit, and it’s instantly the 70s.  Today it’s matte jersey and ramie and Tencel and Polarfleece, and Lycra laced through everything.  And just consider all the subtle variations today in cotton denim: sand-blasted, stone-washed, and double-dip-dyed, from snow to chambray to midnight.

So please, my fellow writers. I know that one writer's (and reader's) perfect telling historical detail can be another's "infodump" (and is there any more inelegant, disparaging scrap of jargon than that?)  I’m not asking for the entire inventory of the dry goods store or milliners’ shop.  Just don’t call everything cotton!

I can’t leave historical textiles alone without mentioning the two best sources out there, for readers, writers, and collectors.  First is Textiles in America 1650-1870, by Florence M. Montgomery. Written by a curator of textiles at Winterthur thirty years ago, this has recently been reissued (though with a horrible cover).  While the title implies an American bias, most of the quotes from primary sources are English.  There’s an excellent glossary of textiles, and the photographs are most useful.  But textiles are a tactile pleasure as much as a visual and historical one, and for that the series of publications from costume historians Sally Queen Associates are unrivaled.  While smaller in scope, the spiral-bound pages of these books are illustrated with 3x3 swatches of actual fabric. (Think Pat the Bunny for historians.)  Available books in the series include the 18th century, Regency era, and Victorian.  The next time you read about nankeen, you’ll KNOW what it feels like.

Any other fabric-lovers out there that have to touch everything? Do heroes in silk shirts bug you, too, or do you think I'm being hopelessly picky?  And did anyone else struggle through sewing classes in high school, or do you still find pleasure in turning a length of cloth into something to wear?

And the Wieners Are ...

We have 10 (ten, count 'em!) winners this week!

Our first winner is Talpianna, who left a comment on Mary Jo's Home Sweet Home post.  As a result, she won a copy of Mary Jo's Silk and Shadows.  Congratulations, Talpianna!

Our next 9 winners won Loretta Chase books for participating in the Dating Game post.  (See answers, below.)  Loretta generously decided to award books to all who participated, even those who Googled the quotes.  Since she didn't actually specify, "No Googling," it seems unfair to disqualify them--including those who disqualified themselves. So here are the winners:

Buggalugs
Jane George
Anne Gracie
Maya Missani
Tiffany
Jenny Haddon
Theo
Ingrid
Maria

Congratulations, to all 9 of Loretta's winners!  Please take a moment to visit Loretta's Booklist page and choose your book.  All are available except Three Weddings & a Kiss, The Last Hellion, and the Christmas Collection.  Once you've made your choice, please let Loretta or me know.  Ingrid and Maria, we don't have your e-mail address, so if you read this, please contact us off-list.

Now, are you curious about the answers to Loretta's little test?  If you are, just scroll down and read the next post.

Gender Defender

By Susan/Miranda

If the book you’re reading now didn’t have an author’s name on the cover, could you tell if it was written by a woman, or a man?

This is a heated question in my house, with both a male and a female reader (aka my DH and me) ready to jump into the fray.  I maintain that in too many books written by men, the female characters are perfunctory stereotypes at best, placekeepers of the worst sort: the hero’s overbearing mother, his girlfriend of the moment, his young daughter in jeopardy, the sweet old lady downstairs who’s murdered, the vixen of a villainess. 

We’re not just discussing manly genre books (otherwise locally known as “Dad’s boom-booms”), either. There are plenty of well-regarded male writers, past and present, who seem to falter when it comes to creating women worthy of their heroes.  Too often there’s a hollowness to the heroine, a lack of emotional depth that, as a female reader, I instantly sense.  Somehow these women just don’t behave right.

But turn-around’s fair play, and my DH says exactly the same thing about many of the books I like by women authors (including, alas, a number of my writer-friends).  He’ll concede that the writing’s first-rate, the plot’s well-paced, the research is everything you’d want to support the story, but the hero –– well, he has no use at all for the heroes.  He claims they’re too sensitive, too thoughtful, too reflective, too downright talky, to be real.  Worse, he says that the harder a female writer tries to write a tough-guy, the more false the poor shmoo will ring to a male readers ears.

As a writer, I know it’s not easy to create ANY character, regardless of the gender.  I’ve lived my whole life among menfolk, but I still can’t begin to know all the laws of their particular planet.  Whenever (and writing romance, you know it’s not often) I hear from a male reader, praising something that one of my heros did or thought, I’m overjoyed, and relieved, too.  It’s a tricky challenge to make work.  One of the things I like best about writing novels  in the first person (like King's Favorite and Duchess) is that I can stay inside my heroine’s head, and leave the hero to think whatever “Man Show” thoughts he may choose, unassisted by me.

But back to my reader-role.  I’ll hasten to say that this gender-bias doesn’t hold true for every book.  There ARE plenty of wonderful male characters written by women, and women written by men.   But there are also too many of the other kind to be ignored. 

I’m not talking about women writing behind a male pseudonym –– Georges-Sand-syndrome –– to gain respect from the literary establishment.  Though, sadly, things haven’t changed that much since Marianne’s time, either, not if you count the number of favorable reviews for male-written books in the Sunday New York Times Review of Books versus the number by women-writers. If you’re a woman writing macho-commando books, you still better abbreviate your name into genderless initials if you want to sell in an equally-macho market, just as the handful of male romance writers publish their love stories under female pen-names.

No, I’m speaking as reader expressing certain, ahem, frustrations.  Would Inman have fought through so much to return home only to die on his doorstep if Cold Mountain had been written by a woman?  Wouldn’t a woman writer have given the namesake of Memoirs of Geisha a bit more emotional depth to balance out the fascinating history that filled the rest of the book?  Couldn’t Horatio Hornblower have found true love with a woman who was less of a man than the weather-beaten Lady Barbara?  And wasn’t there some way that  Love Story could have remained a love story without killing off poor Jenny and leaving Oliver so pathetically adrift?                                                                                                            

What about you?  Have you ever read a book where the writer betrayed her or his own gender by a lack of empathy or understanding for the characters playing on the other team?  Have you ever wondered how differently a book would have been written by a man –– or a woman?  Or do you think this is all a bunch o’ hooey, and there’s no difference at all?

Rags to Riches

by Susan/Miranda

Last month, Wench Loretta’s blog Too Young to Marry? began a fascinating discussion about the ages of our historical heroines, and whether the young women of the past were more mature at an earlier age and better prepared to assume adult responsibilities than their contemporaries today.

There were many different examples given of young women, both from history and from fiction, a most capable bunch.  But the more I thought about this question, the more I realized how all the young women we mentioned, whether from the American west or a Jane Austen novel, all had a certain level of family support and education to help them on their way.  Jane Eyre was an orphan, but educated well enough to become a governess.  The women in Sense and Sensibility are said to have been left paupers when Mr. Dashwood died, yet there is poor, and there is poor, and the Dashwoods’ degree of poverty still allowed for a handsome “cottage” and a servant or two.

In male-oriented fiction, real rags-to-riches stories abound.  The orphan from the workhouse becomes the industrious apprentice who marries the master’s daughter and eventually owns the business.  The barefoot cabin-boy toils at his navigation and works his way up through the ranks to become an admiral.  The immigrant son learns English, puts himself through law school while working two jobs to support his widowed mother, becomes a crusading district attorney, and finally governor. 

But where are the girls?  Before the twentieth century made education more universal for women, there were many more girls starting life in sweatshop factories, dairies, and as servants than those sharing the comfortable “plight” of the Dashwood sisters.  Granted, the sexism and prejudice of the past would have made it quite challenging for a poor girl to work her way upwards to prosperity, yet it did occasionally happen.  Industrious, low-born women did become master silversmiths, cooks in great houses, and owners of prosperous inns and shops, though never to the same giddy heights of success that men could.  Of course the surest way for a woman to rise was on the coattails of a man, as a wife or a mistress, but even then in reality there were very few peers willing to play Henry Higgins for the sake of an aspiring Eliza Doolittles from the street.

So why aren’t there more in fiction beyond Becky Sharpe in Vanity Fair and The Unsinkable Molly Brown?  We writers are supposed to be in the business of dreams and escape and giddy “what if.”  Why don’t more girls get the Horatio Alger treatment?  In much contemporary women’s fiction, the message is even worse.  The heroines do get the chance to work hard to achieve success –– power, glamour, careers, wealth –– but their success seems only to make them miserable in a way that never affects heroes.  The only way these heroines can be truly happy is to return to their humble roots in the decaying small town/low-paying job/high school crush that they’d worked so hard to escape in the first place.  They’re almost like cautionary tales against dreaming too high.  Heck, look what happened to enterprising Mildred Pierce and her pie-shops!

But, as usual, I digress. 

I have to admit that I’d never written a true rags-to-riches heroine myself.  Oh, I’ve done a couple that came close, a fisherman’s daughter and a seamstress, but never anyone who starts out with every card stacked against her.  Which is one of the reasons I was so captivated by Nell Gwyn, the 17th century woman whose life forms the story of my next historical novel, The King’s Favorite, due out this summer.

Born in Oxford in 1650, Nell was the illegitimate daughter of a soldier and camp-follower.  When her father was killed in the English Civil War, her mother moved to London with Nell and her older sister, where they lived above the brothel where the mother worked.  By any standard, it was an appalling childhood.  Malnourished, illiterate, and beaten by her alcoholic mother, young Nell worked as a barefoot herring vendor in the street by day and served ale at the brothel by night. 

But Nell was ambitious, and refused to follow the grim path taken by her mother and sister.  She was determined to do better for herself in the raucous world of 17th century London.  She was clever, funny, and charming, a talented singer and dancer, and blessed (or cursed) with an almost insatiable need for an audience to entertain.  By fifteen, she was selling oranges in the new Theatre Royal and bantering  merrily with lords and peers.  A year later, she was one of the first actresses on the English stage.  Before her twentieth birthday, she’d made herself a headlining star, with plays written specifically to showcase her talents and crowds of fans cheering her wherever she went. 

In a promiscuous era, Nell had only four lovers during her short life.  The most famous, of course, was King Charles II, but she insisted on establishing a friendship between them long before she shared his bed –– likely the reason she was his lover for nearly fifteen years, until his death.  Yet no matter how high Nell rose, she never forgot where she’d started, and remained as great a favorite with the common folk in the street as she was at the palace.  Even today Nell Gwyn is something of a folk-hero in England, a splendid testimony to her “rags to riches” life, and a wonderful inspiration for me as I told her story.

Is your memory for books better than mine?  Can you name more true “rags to riches” heroines than I could?  Do you admire such women, or would you rather your heroine came equipped with her silver spoon rather than have to earn it?

The Lady Macbeth Interview: Part One

An interview with Susan Fraser King by Susan/Miranda

By now most readers of the WordWenches will know that Wench Susan/Sarah, known to the outside world as Susan Fraser King, has taken her career to new heights with the publication this month of Lady Macbeth: A Novel.  This is Susan's first historical novel, and it's already gathering well-deserved praise everywhere from Glamour to Entertainment Weekly to Library Journal -- not to mention a prominent place in the front of bookstores everywhere.  A fascinating new take on a notorious literary character, a richly textured story, and history in glorious detail: what's not for readers to love?

Or, in the words of Susan/Sarah's newest-favoritest-quote-from-a-fellow-writer, Lani Diane Rich (A LIttle Ray of Sunshine): "Lady Macbeth! I feel smarter just owning it!"

A recent "meeting of the Susans" between Susan Fraser King (aka  Wench Susan/Sarah) and Susan Holloway Scott (aka Wench Susan/Miranda) discussed Lady Macbeth (never named Susan, as far as I know) in all her delicious detail.  Part One appears today, with Part Two to follow on Wednesday.  As always, please feel free to ask additional questions that you may have. 

SHS: How did you choose Lady Macbeth as your heroine? Have you wanted to tell “her” story for a long time, or did you come across the idea while researching another book?

SFK: I’ve known for a long time that the historical Lady Macbeth, an 11th c. Scottish queen, was probably very different than the ambitious harridan of Shakespeare's play, but she didn't start blipping on my story radar until about three years ago. I was researching another medieval Scottish story and kept seeing references to Macbeth and Queen Gruoch. I got curious and followed the breadcrumbs, and realized that a few facts hid a story with real substance. Macbeth was treated by Dunnett and Tranter decades ago, and Lady Macbeth was a strong character in those stories, but I wanted to focus on her story and base it on updated history and what was possible for a Scottish woman in an age of Celts, Vikings and Saxons. The facts and possibilities were fascinating, and once I started to research and put ideas together, it developed pretty steadily from there.

SHS:  You chose authentic Celtic names for your characters that will be unfamiliar to many readers.  Can you tell us a bit about them, beginning with Gruadh, Lady Macbeth?

SFK: Some of the names were determined by historical record, so I had no choice, and I did my best to simplify the Celtic and Gaelic names while retaining authenticity. For instance, Lady Macbeth’s father in historical accounts is Boite, Boete, Bode or Bodhe. The modern equivalent is “Boyd” … um, no thanks! So I settled for Bodhe.

Macbeth’s queen is identified in a Latin document as "Gruoch filia Bodhe," or Gruoch, daughter of Bodhe, and she is also identified as Queen of Scots, and equal to Macbeth, and not a consort (a big clue to her lineage and rank). But “Gruoch” is not a known Gaelic female name, and appears only for this woman. It’s possibly a cleric's phonetic attempt at a Gaelic name. Although Gruoch is used by historians, I looked for a better alternative (besides, I kept typing “Grouch”).

Some genealogy charts listed her great-granddaughter as Gruaith or Gruadh, which is a legitimate Irish female name. Since it’s possible the child was named for her great-grandmother, a Queen of Scots, I used that for my Lady Macbeth. Though it could have been her actual name, no one seems to have made this connection before. I also gave Gruadh the nickname Rue, to spare the reader as well as the author.

SHS:  Any novel written in the first person needs a strong “storyteller” to carry the weight of the book.  Yet because Lady Macbeth is set in such an early historical time period, you didn’t have the letters, diaries, or journals that often inspire first-person writers.  How did you research and develop Gruadh’s strong narrative voice?

SFK: While you were writing your 17th century novels (your next one will be The King’s Favorite, about Nell Gwyn, from NAL in July 2008 -- Susan/Sarah’s plug for Susan/Miranda!) I was a bit envious of the fabulous, detailed sources you had for each woman—journals, diaries, letters, accounts of all kinds. Sigh!! The historical Lady Macbeth has one direct document to back her up. We don’t know a thing about her personally, and whatever historians and novelists come up with has to be inferred from evidence of the political circumstances around her, what is factually known of the men in her life, and what we know of the traditions of the Celtic society, women in particular; even things like what is known of the environment (the warming of a small ice age, the introduction of new crops, the trade routes, the structure of wooden fortresses, etc.) was very helpful to creating a picture of the woman.

The woman needed a strong voice to carry the book, and she couldn’t sound too modern. So I read widely in Celtic myth, poetry, chants, charms, and songs. I’ve done that for years anyway out of natural interest, since I love that area of myth and literature. That, and years of medieval studies, taught me the general voice of the times.

Whenever you read extensively in whatever era you’re writing about, you’ll naturally absorb the voice. By delving into Celtic lit, I absorbed cadence and phrasing, and little turns of phrase, all of which came in handy in creating Lady Gruadh’s voice. Years of work in medieval studies also helped me understand medieval phrasing and medieval opinions, which helped too. In the past few years I’ve also studied some Gaelic, which helped give me a sense of how the character might speak. I tried to keep in mind that whatever Lady Gruadh said would be “translated” into English for the modern reader.

SHS: Thank you, Susan (and thank you for the shout-out for Nell, too*g*)  I hope all of you will please join us again on Wednesday for Part Two.  And if you have any questions for Susan, please ask away!

A Long Time Ago (Sort Of)

By Susan/Miranda

For all of us who write and read about the past, historical time can be one slippery article.  Any time period other than our own slides into The Past, a place long ago and far, far away.  Or, to paraphrase another famous opening (L.P. Hartley’s wonderful  The Go-Between): The past is like another country. They do things differently there.

But it doesn’t take much to rattle this kind of comfortable assumption.  To begin with, the Past isn’t really so very far away.  My grandmothers were born in the 1890s.  One of them clearly remembered the San Francisco earthquake of 1906, and both of them recalled nattering old uncles who’d fought in the Civil War.  It’s an easy genealogical hop backwards through my grandmothers’ grandmothers, and the War of 1812, and another set of grandmothers beyond that to reach the Revolution.  Farther back than that hurts my head to calculate, but the gist of my rambling is that it doesn’t take too many generations to encompass all of American history.

Of course, the Past isn’t limited to Manifest Destiny and other high-concept historical facts.  It’s every-day stuff, too.  My teenaged daughter can’t believe that my high school yearbook features a page honoring the Future Homemakers of America club, but nary a word about girls varsity sports teams –– which is, of course, because there weren’t any.  To her, life before Title IX seems as remote as the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock.

The other morning, Turner Classic Movies was showing a silent John Barrymore movie from the early 1920s, with Barrymore playing Beau Brummell.  The Roaring Twenties somehow don’t seem that long ago to me (perhaps because that’s when my parents were born?), but Regency England does.  Yet the number of years between us and John Barrymore is roughly the same as between Barrymore and Brummell.  Whoa!

Historian Antonia Fraser delights in “link-with-history anecdotes.” In Royal Charles, her biography of Charles II, she describes one: “Dr. Martin Routh, President of Magdalene College, who died in 1854 in his hundredth year, used to say that, when young, he had known an old lady who as a little girl had seen King Charles walking with his spaniels in Oxford.” Fraser concludes that she herself, “as a child living in Oxford in the 1930s, likes to think she might have known someone old enough to have met Dr. Routh.”

My brother-in-law’s family emigrated to America from Ireland late in the 19th century.  While he has lived all his life in this country, he has visited Ireland many times, and still feels a deep connection to his family’s ties there.  Thanks to miracle of the internet (what ISN’T for sale on the internet?), he orders carefully prepared boxes of peat shipped to him, the same peat used for heating generations of Irish cottages –– literally pieces of the “old sod.” With great reverence, he’ll light a chunk outside on his deck, close his eyes, and let the distinctive scent carry him from suburban Connecticut back to the Ireland of his ancestors.  Less of a romantic, my sister-in-law forbids the peat-burning ritual inside the house, while their neighbors no doubt sniff the evening air suspiciously and consider calling the local authorities.  My brother-in-law doesn’t care: for him, that’s the scent of the Irish Past.

One last example: On the road I travel almost daily is a worn landmark sign pointing towards a “Historic Weeping Beech Tree.”  Here outside of Philadelphia, landmark signs are everywhere, but this is the only one I know that commemorates a tree.  And yes, it’s definitely a very, very old tree, an enormous American weeping beech  that spreads and sprawls in every direction (a diameter of at least 100 feet, by my guess) with branches like serpentine vines.  This beech has been certified by the local historical society as having been planted in 1703, by a Scottish Quaker farmer named Alexander Bane on land that was part of William Penn's original grant.  Of course that Friend’s idyllic farm was long ago broken up and “developed”, the stone farmhouse torn down and the rolling fields around it replaced by suburban houses and an elementary school, with the four noisy lanes of Route 202 destroying any lingering hints of Quakerly peace.

But Alexander Bane's  tree remains.  Now over three hundred years old, it’s an aging, brittle survivor, isolated and surrounded by a chain-link fence to protect it from nefarious teenagers and tow-trucks headed for the auto repair shop across the street.  Yet standing beneath its twisting branches, I think of how an aging William Penn might have visited the Bane family's farm. He might well have sat on a nearby bench with Alexander, drinking cider brought out to the men by Jane Bane on a warm summer evening: the same William Penn who was often at Whitehall Palace in London, lobbying Charles II on behalf of his colonists in Pennsylvania, the same time and place for my historical fiction books (Duchess, Royal Harlot, and King's Favorite).  Yeah, I know, it’s a stretch.  But when I look up at the leaves of that three-hundred-year-old tree, suddenly 17th century England doesn’t seem so long ago at all.

What about you?  Do you have something or some place that connects  you with the past?  What can carry you back: is it an old teacup that belonged to an ancestor, or a favorite hymn, or a nearby battlefield turned into a park?

More Happenings at the Word Wenches

On Wednesday, 2/6, John Dierdorf will be Jo's guest.  John loves the copy of the Oxford English Dictionary that lives on his computer. You know, the gazillion volume one that gives all the nuances of words and when they were first used, and where, and by whom? Through this lens, reading historical fiction takes on a new dimension--and writing it, a new challenge. But it's fun. Can that Regency duke drive a car? Can his lady wish him a cheery "hello"? Join in, find out, take some challenges, and have a chance to win an Advance Reading Copy of Jo's book, LOVERS AND LADIES. (details in the monthly newsletter which you've all signed up for, right?) This time the winner won't be a random pick, but John and Jo's selection of the person who enhanced John's visit most.

On Monday, 2/25 and Wednesday, 2/27, we'll have a two-part interview of Susan Fraser King in connection  with the release of Lady Macbeth: A Novel.  This is what we call a “two-fer” in the U.S.  It’s a two-part interview, and you also get two Susans for the price of one--Susan/Miranda will be the interviewer, and Susan/Sarah will be the interviewee. Such a deal!

P.S.  If you are Lynda Tisdell, be sure to read the announcement, below!

Keeping House

By Susan/Miranda

As we’ve discussed here many times before, most of the heroes and a good many of the heroines in historical romances are wealthy, or at least comfortably off.  Oh, there are the occasional governesses, poor relations, and fallen women sprinkled through the ranks of the heroines, but writers generally write what readers like to read, and that’s Characters Above the Middling Sort.

Not that I’m objecting.  If one is reading to escape modern life for the late 18th century, then it’s far more enjoyable to end up in a sunny drawing room in a grand country house than to a noisy spot beside a clattering water-powered loom in a textile factory.  Yet too often these affluent heroines (and their mothers and sisters) are depicted as frittering their days away: a little reading, a little music, a little riding, shopping, dressing, heading off to Almack’s, and, of course, a lot of doing whatever the hero is doing. 

In reality, most ladies of the time spent many hours each day in running their household.  A house was like a small business in itself, with the lady of the house (usually the wife, but depending on circumstances, an older daughter, spinster sister or widowed aunt) as the CEO, with duties that included bookkeeping, purchasing, personnel, and receiving.  Anyone who casually refers to the “idle rich” didn’t know these women, who could both micromanage the proper way to starch their husband’s shirts and oversee the large-scale social event that was a house-party at a country estate that would exhaust a score of modern professional wedding-planners.  They were caretakers of the secret family recopies for pewter polish as well as Christmas puddings, and were as adept at hiring a French governess as they were with coping with a pregnant housemaids.

All of which is an introduction to one of my favorite research books, a slender volume (why are volumes always slender, and not simply skinny books?) reprinted by the National Trust for Historic Places.  The Housekeeping Book of Susanna Whatman is a printed version of a handwritten guide kept by the wife of a wealthy paper-mill owner in the late 18th century.  The Whatmans weren’t aristocrats, but part of the newly-rising upper-middle-class. Their home, Turkey Court, was near Maidstone, in Kent, began as a sizable three-story brick house, and as Mr. Whatman prospered, gradually expanded to include a larger, more imposing estate and house that included the family’s paper mills (The estate still exists, with the house rented out for weddings and the mills refurbished as office space –– that’s it to the right.)  Their family had three children, and their staff included a governess, housekeeper, steward, butler, coachman, gardener, cook, six maids, and a half-dozen “odd men” (which referred not to their personalities, but to the diversity of their duties.)

Mrs. Whatman wasn’t writing her book for publication (like Hannah Glasse’s Servant’s Directory, or Housekeeper’s Companion, published first in 1760), but for her own use as a guide for her staff.  Mrs. Whatman knew how things should be properly done, having served as the head of her father’s equally large household after her mother’s death.  In her Housekeeping Book, she offers a fascinating glimpse at life in her house.

She expected her servants to be up early, and to bed late, having the rooms of the house ready and the fires set before the family came downstairs in the morning and yet remain awake to assist Mr. and Mrs. Whatman prepare for bed, however late that might be.  She expected them to be industrious, too.  The book outlines all the daily responsibilities for each servant, a staggering list.  Even the cook, the comparative queen of the staff, had far more to do than simply prepare food:

Cook must bake her bread in the mornings time enough for breakfast. She should bake Wednesdays and Saturdays, clean her Larder and Pantries Mondays and Fridays, and rise Tuesday to wash her own things. Thursday morning wipe her pewter . . . and iron her things instead of doing it in the evenings ...Cook should see that every saucepan, etc. is well cleaned within, but never scowered without, except the upper rim . . . [as she is also responsible for] filling the hog pails, washing up butter dishes and salad bowls, preserving the water in which meat is boiled, keeping all her places clean, managing her fire and her kitchen linens and keeping it mended.

The cook was also expected to oversee the lesser servants as Mrs. Whatman’s eyes in the kitchen:

Cook should see that heavy things are not set upon plates and dishes.  She may always call back a servant whom she sees do it, or if they leave bones or hard things such as spoons in a dish, and then put other dishes on it . . . . As it is very wrong to lay temptation unnecessarily in the way of anyone, the large joints [of meat] should never be left open to the inferior servants . . . .This duty of keeping away temptation is very necessary, as it would be difficult to detect depredations on a large joint, and a dishonest servant might contract a habit of doing injustice.

In other words, no snacking on leftovers.  But even with her own key to the wire safe with the roast joints, Cook still wasn’t the highest authority:

The Housekeeper ought always to be present, when the dinner is sent up.  Otherwise the Cook is apt to relax, and be longer dishing than is necessary.

Yet as strict as Mrs. Whatman was about duties, she was also (comparatively) indulgent to her servants.  They were permitted alternate Sundays off to attend church, given ale at their noon meals, and warm coverlets on their beds. “Broken victuals” (table scraps and leavings) didn’t wind up on the servants’ table, but were given to the deserving poor. The house had modern labor-saving devices such as a water-closet instead of chamber-pots, a mangle for pressing linen, and a range for cooking instead of an open hearth.  She even took care with choosing the calico for the maids’ gowns: “It is a finer one than I should have given them, but it is so pretty, that [I am sure they] will fall in love with it as I did.”

The furnishings of a great house were of considerable value, and Mrs. Whatman was ever-vigilant about preserving her husband’s assets.  There was a detailed daily schedule for opening and shutting each room’s Venetian blinds to prevent the sun from fading the furniture.  Carpets were turned over and swept every few days to clean them, rather than using water, which caused the dyes to run.  Mahogany pieces were rubbed, never waxed or polished, and special bellows were used to blow dust from intricate carvings.

Clearly Mr. Whatman’s library was his sanctum sanctorum.  The books were to be dusted “only as far as the wing of a goose would go,” and never taken out or disarranged.  Apparently with good reason, too, for there is a strained reference to a mislaid “philosophical index”, a casualty of an over-zealous maid: “I never saw her poor master so angry.”

We even learn how household bills were paid: “Mrs. Whatman pays all her house bills weekly, including the Butcher’s bills, and candles and flour when they are brought in.  But soap, wax candles, and grocery come down from London, and are paid by draft by Mr. Whatman.” Perhaps most telling of Mrs. Whatman’s thrifty housekeeping is that, while Mr. Whatman’s income was around £6,000 annually, the family’s expenses never exceeded £2,000 –– so certain a recipe for household happiness that Mr. Micawber himself would applaud.

Do you enjoy these more homely details of everyday life in novels?  Do you feel they add to the characters’ lives and stories, or would you rather read only about the more glamorous balls and dinners?

And the Wieners Are . . .

We said we'd be giving away a lot of books this month, and by golly, here's the proof!  We've chosen 5 winners from those who left comments on our blog posts.  Congratulations to the following:

Janice wins a Loretta Chase book of her choice
Marissa wins a copy of Edith's The Cad
Santa wins an Advance Reading Copy of Susan Fraser King's Lady Macbeth
JOYE wins a copy of Susan Holloway Scott's Royal Harlot
Betty Breithaupt wins a copy of one of the following books by Jo:  Christmas Angel, Forbidden Magic, or Winter Fire

To claim your autographed book, please send your mailing address to the appropriate Wench, or to Sherrie at sholmes@holmesedit.com. 

To the rest of you, please continue visiting us and leaving comments.  Who knows--you may very well be the next Word Wenches Wiener!  (Hint:  be sure to check in on Sundays when we post announcements, including book winners)

Happy Beginnings

With the holidays now past us, we Wenches decided we’d welcome in the new year in a new way, with a look at how we each begin a book.  There’s no right or wrong way, of course.  Not only does every writer have her own method, but every book and set of characters seems to suggest something different as well.  During our January blogs, we’ll each post the beginning to one of our favorite books, and explain how and why we chose to start the way we did.  We tend to talk more about history and characters than the craft of writing here at the Wenches, so here’s the chance to ask that question you’ve always wondered, from why we opened with the hero’s point of view, or how we chose the historical time period for the setting. We’ll be giving away copies of the featured books to a randomly chosen reply, so please post away.

And a happy, happy 2008 to you all!

Once Upon a First Page

By Susan/Miranda

I love beginning a new book.  Just like that first day of school, the first page is full of opportunity and promise.  On page one, every book’s a potential NYT best-seller.  What’s not to love about that?

But then the decision-making begins.  Choosing exactly when to begin a story can be more challenging than actually choosing the story itself.  The book I’m using as my example is Royal Harlot, my fictionalized biography of Barbara Palmer, Countess of Castlemaine.

When I write a romance, I know that the first chapter will most likely include the first meeting of the hero and the heroine.  Of course they’ll have had experiences and adventures before then, all the things that make them real to me and, I hope to readers, but the focus of the book must be the love they find for one another.

But writing about historical figures is different, and has its own special pitfalls.  The story’s already there; I can’t go changing this war or that king to suit my plot.  Instead I have to pick and choose the key events of the person’s life and times, and construct my conflicts and pacing based as much as I can on fact.  I especially have to avoid the thousand-page “cradle to grave” scenario: you know, “In Which I Am Born”, which worked very well for Victorian novelists, but would make today’s New York editors shriek with horror. 

So while Barbara had a fascinating back-story before her birth (her mother was a merchant heiress who, at fifteen, went against her father’s wishes to marry a young lord who’d fought a duel to impress her), followed by a tumultuous childhood (her royalist father was killed in the Civil War and her mother’s fortune was confiscated by Cromwell, while the infant Barbara was put out to live in the country after her mother married her dead husband’s cousin), I decided the most interesting part of Barbara’s story began after she came to London as a teenager. 

But a starry-eyed young heroine arriving in the big city is hardly an original way to begin a book, and besides, Barbara had a bit too much historical baggage to make her first appearance as an innocent ingénue.  In just about every other book, both fiction and nonfiction, Barbara is portrayed as a pretty unsavory woman, often an out-and-out villain: beautiful, seductive, and clever, but also greedy, grasping, immoral, and manipulative.  I couldn’t reform her, but I could tell her story in a way to explain why she was the way she was. 

I decided to begin with a nineteen-year-old Barbara, at the most important crossroad of her life.  (The starry-eyed ingenue now appears elsewhere in the book.)  She’s already realized she let herself be pushed into a loveless marriage.  Now, at her husband Roger’s insistence, she is about to risk her life to serve the exiled King Charles.  I wanted to show how her husband is more concerned about using her to gain favor with the king than for her own welfare.  I also hoped to earn some empathy for Barbara and her situation. 

However, Barbara is no ordinary neglected wife.  She's even more ambitious than Roger. I wanted to make it clear that she, too, is thinking of her own future outside of her marriage. Through her thoughts as she leaves her husband, I wanted to set up what would follow next: that she would meet the king and become his lover, and set the course for the rest of her notorious life.

In addition to establishing the story, I had to establish Barbara’s voice. Royal Harlot is written in first-person, as if Barbara is telling her own story.  I couldn't be the omniscient narrator explaining life in seventeenth-century England.  Everything had to be explained through Barbara's point of view.  From her first words, I wanted how she spoke to be as indicative of her character as what she was saying.  That’s why that first paragraph took me so long to get right, and why I kept coming back to it as I wrote the rest of the book.  Now you can decide if I succeeded.

I’ll be giving away a copy of Royal Harlot to a reader chosen from those who leave a comment or question.  Happy new year!

                    *   *   *
From Royal Harlot
Copyright 2007 by Susan Holloway Scott

February, 1660

    I was, I think, a gambler born. 
    I don’t mean a few pennies at whist or ombre, a piddling hand of pasteboard cards.  I speak of grander games, where the stakes are power, titles, great fortunes, even the heart of the King of England.  Mark you, I’m no coward.  I wouldn’t have survived so long if I were.  I know how to take my risks, and my vengeance, too, on those who dared to cross me.  But how I did parlay my beauty and wit to rise so high: that was the game I chose, the game that became my life.
    A gambler, yes.  Yet as I sat in the hired carriage not far from the beach and the sea, I was not half so sure of my courage.  I was only nineteen then, and I’d never yet strayed from England.  The moonless sky was black and wet as pitch, the sea below it clipped with whitecaps.  The little sloop that was to take me across to Holland bobbed and tugged at her moorings, her crew scrambling about her narrow deck with their heads bent against the wind and spray as they made their last preparations to sail.  It seemed a woeful vessel to trust with my life, as well with as the hopes of so many others.
    “There’s the signal, Barbara.”  Beside me in the carriage, my husband Roger pointed at the lantern held aloft by a sailor.  “You must go to them now.”
    “I know.”  I retied the ribbons of my hood beneath my chin, not because they’d come loose, but to give my anxious fingers some occupation.  “Though I wish the sailors could wait until dawn.”
    “Oh, yes, so all the Commonwealth’s navy can be sure to come and bid you a happy farewell.”  He sighed with exasperation.  “You knew this wouldn’t be a pleasure-boat when you agreed to go, Barbara.  It’s too late now for you to change your mind.”
    “I’ve not changed my mind, Roger,” I said, wishing he’d show a bit of concern for my welfare.  “I only hoped the weather were less fierce, that is all.”
    “It’s better this way.”  His pale face was serious in the carriage’s half-light.  “I’ve told you before that if you’re caught, no one will come to your rescue, especially if you’ve no time to destroy the letters.  You’re far safer on a night such as this.”
    I nodded, smoothing my hand along the front of my bodice with a flutter of excitement.  I was courting danger, no mistake.  Hidden between my whalebone stays and my smock were letters of great importance to the Royalist cause, letters of support and promises of money for King Charles in exile.  Sewn into my quilted petticoats were gold coins, too, destined for the royal pockets.  Not once in my short life had there been a king upon the empty English throne.  Cromwell and his sour-faced followers had seen to that with a long and hateful civil war, and hidden away all the country’s natural merriment beneath a grey pall of restrictive laws and false piety. 
    But now Cromwell was dead, and the government he’d created was falling in crumbling disarray.  There were more and more of us around the country working for the restoration of the monarchy.  Roger was thick in the middle of the plotting and planning, and well trusted by the Royalist leaders, which was why, as his wife, I’d been chosen as a courier.  Yet the old laws were still in place, and if I were captured and the papers I carried discovered, I’d be damned as a spy, and sent to the Tower until I was tried for treason.  If convicted, I’d be executed, for there was little mercy to be found among the Parliamentary judges for Royalists.
    “You’re the only one of us who could go, Barbara,” Roger continued.  “There’s no one else who could be spared from our work in London.”
    “You mean there was no one else who was willing to sail to Flanders and risk the smallpox.”  I’d had the disease the year before, one of the rare folk to survive, and with my face left clear and unpocked, too.  I could travel with impunity into any outbreak, such as the one now ravaging the city of Brussels. 
    “Your immunity is a consideration, of course,” Roger admitted.  “But that’s only part of the reason you are being sent, Barbara.  I shouldn’t have to remind you of how important His Majesty’s return is to my family’s fortunes.  I’ve personally given over a thousand pounds I could ill afford to support the king.”
    I’d grown vastly tired of hearing of this famous contribution, trotted out whenever Roger wished to puff his own importance.  “You wish such praise for your precious thousand pounds, while you think nothing that I’m to risk my life for the same cause.  A pretty balance, that.”
    His voice turned sharp, the way it often was when he criticized me.  “You’ve been quite willing to enjoy the benefits of being Mistress Palmer.  It’s high time you returned the favor to my father and me, and prove for once you can be an obedient wife.”
    I looked away at the spray-dappled glass, refusing to let him open this old quarrel again.  We’d so many of them between us for less than a year of marriage, most centered on what he perceived to be my excessive frivolity.  Yet I was no better nor worse than the others among our Royalist friends.  With so much unhappiness in our war-ravaged pasts and only uncertainty to our futures, we all took our pleasure wherever we found it, and gave no more thought when it was done.  Roger had known when we wed that he hadn’t been my first lover, any more than I had been his, and if he continued this harshness with me, I vowed he wouldn’t be my last, either.  Was it any wonder that I now lamented the grievous mistake I’d made, letting my mother push me from her house into such a marriage?
    As if to prove it, Roger’s lecture was continuing still.  “I expect you to present my family’s case to His Majesty, how much we’ve sacrificed by supporting him, and how we hope to be rewarded for our loyalty.  Be agreeable to the king, Barbara, and make good use of every minute you have in his company.”
    “But I will, Roger,” I said, and I meant it far more than my husband, so full of smug conceit, would realize.  Even in impoverished exile, Charles Stuart was reputed to be everything a monarch should: tall, virile, intelligent, and charming.  How could I not wish to break free of my husband’s overbearing shadow to meet such a man?
    “Obey me in this, Barbara,” Roger warned, his misguided idea of a farewell between husband and wife.  “I’ll hear of it if you don’t.”
    “Perhaps you’ll hear of it sooner if I do.” I opened the carriage door, my cloak whipping around me, driven as if from my own anticipation as by the wind.  “Good-bye, Roger. . . .”

    Click here for the entire prologue.

Christmas Cranberries

By Susan/Miranda

Continuing in our spirit of holiday blogs for the month, I’m offering a copy of my new Christmas anthology, Christmas Wedding Belles, to a randomly selected reader.  Yes, my story in this anthology is a Miranda Jarrett historical romance, but be not frightened, ye historical fiction readers of Susan Holloway Scott: the hero and heroine may be invented, but the secondary lovers in this story are the very real Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson and Lady Emma Hamilton, so post away!  A winner will be chosen and announced here later this week.

As all we Wenches reminisce about our favorite nostalgic holiday food, I have to offer the all-American Cranberry.  Now despite the unending bounty at the local grocery, I’m a firm believer in eating foods in season: strawberries in late May, peaches in August, apples in autumn.  And, of course, cranberries for Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Cranberries aren’t easy to love, of course, not in the way that other berries are.  They’re a gorgeous red, but raw, they’re hard as pebbles and so tart that they require twice their weight in sugar to make them palatable.  I’ve always imagined those first settlers in Massachusetts discovering them with delight, only to pucker up with dismay at first bite. 

I suspect that it’s my old Yankee blood that makes them so appealing to me (some weird race-memory at work), or perhaps it’s pleasant memories from late-summer vacations on Cape Cod, when the bogs are being flooded for harvest and the red berries are floated to the service like thousands of cheerful, bobbing red marbles.  I know we’re supposed to be talking holly-berries in December, but the larger, rosy-pink cranberries look much more festive to me.  Heck, I even invented a fictions cranberry-licious location for one of my earlier books, Cranberry Point.

For history-nerds like us Wenches, cranberries carry a wealth of lore.  Yes, they were another food introduced by Native Americans (who mixed them with dried venison and pemmican for a long-lasting food to carry with them on hunting trips) to the Pilgrims, which explains their presence next to Thanksgiving turkeys. Likely the 17th century English settlers were already familiar with the close cousins to cranberries native to Britain: marsh berries, bog berries, and (my favorite name) fen whort.

Soon Massachusetts cranberries were staples not only of Yankee cooking, but of importers, too, sent in sailing ships to the southern colonies and to London, where they were considered a delicacy, much favored for use in sauces, preserves, and pies.  They traveled well, and didn’t spoil easily.  For that reason, they were also carried among the ships’ stores, a good Vitamin-C-laden preventative against scurvy on long voyages.

With the advent of Christmas trees in 19th century American parlors, the long-lasting qualities and bright colors of cranberries made them a ready choice for decorations as well, strung into garlands.  If you’d like to try this yourself, here’s a link to directions for a Cranberry Garland with Popcorn, suitable for an outdoor Christmas tree for wild birds as well the indoor variety.

Now cranberries can be found year-round, in many forms from granola bars to cocktails. But for me, they’re a holiday fruit, and with that in mind, I’m sharing a tasty cookie recipe.  The cranberries make them look Christmas-y, so they’ll pass as Christmas cookies at the neighborhood cookies-swap, but they taste better than many of the flashier holiday cookies.  And because they include cranberries and oatmeal, you can pretend they’re “health” cookies.  Hang the butter and white chocolate: these are actually GOOD for you!

One other recommendation: I took a box of these cookies to my agent’s office last fall, where they were devoured instantly by the staff.  Gratifying to know that I’ve done my part to keep literary agents in New York safe from scurvy.

White Chocolate Chip Cranberry Oatmeal Cookies

2/3 cup Unsalted Butter, softened
2/3 cup Brown Sugar
2  Large Eggs
1 1/2 cups Old Fashioned Oats
1 1/2 cups Flour
1 teaspoon Baking Soda
1/2 teaspoon Salt
1 Bag of Sweetened Dried Cranberries (6 oz.) (aka Craisins)
2/3 cup White Chocolate Chips

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Using an electric mixer cream butter and brown sugar together in a bowl until light and fluffy. Add eggs and mix well. Combine oats, flour, baking soda and salt in a separate bowl. Add to butter mixture in several additions, mixing well after each addition. Stir in sweetened dried cranberries, chocolate chips and walnuts.

Drop rounded teaspoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes or until golden brown.

Makes approximately 3 1/2 dozen cookies

I’ll make it easy to win a book, a simple yay or nay for cranberries.  Do you like them –– in relish, juice, or a shimmering cylinder of jelly, complete with the ribs of the can pressed into the sides –– or do you wish they’d stayed in the bogs?  And I’ll also offer you all the happiest of holiday wishes, and the most joyful of book-filled new years!
 

Wrap that (Historically Correct) Rascal!

By Susan/Miranda

One of the perennial hot topics for writers of contemporary romance is what to do about “safe sex.”  Their characters can’t plead ignorance any longer, not living in the modern world, and for heroes and heroines blithely to hop into bed without any sort of protection against AIDS and other venereal diseases makes them seem irresponsible at best.  Yet a love scene that includes the ritual foil packet or questions about having been tested hits the “ick-factor” for many readers. Romances are fantasies, they protest, and fantasies feature great sex over the safe kind.

Historical romance often seems to side-step this question.  Certainly in the glory days of Rosemary Rodgers and Kathleen Woodiwiss, characters were so busy getting busy that no one had either time or inclination.  But as more and more sex creeps into books, the absence of any mention of protection against pregnancy or disease becomes more noticeable, too.  In the Good Old Days (like five years ago), at least the hero and heroine would abstain until it was likely they’d marry, so that any baby resulting from their love-making would be wanted, and legitimate.  But now, with the sex scenes often beginning on page one, that’s no longer a given.  Add to that the vast worldly experience of most historical heroes, and you do marvel at how seldom pregnancy or the pox is ever mentioned.

I have to admit that in this, I’m no holier than anyone else.  I’ve never introduced a condom into a love scene in a historical romance, nor have I had any characters overly concerned about the pox, either.  For the most part, my heroes worry about not impregnating the heroines, and my heroines in turn do carefully consider the consequences before they leap, though I do recall one particular unhappy scene that included withdrawal –– the only birth control that many people in the past ever did employ, and a lousy one at that.

Still, condoms?  Nope.

But in the historical novel I just finished (The King’s Favorite: A Novel of Nell Gwyn & King Charles II), I couldn’t avoid the pox and all its tragic consequences.  That’s the price of writing about real people, because real people don’t tend to behave as admirably, or at least as obediently, as fictional ones do.  Real lives are messy, and when one of my main characters was John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester, matters became real messy, real fast, which is what you’d expect of a man who died of a combination of alcoholism and the pox at 33. 

All of which leads me to recommend a fascinating small book: The Humble Little Condom: A History by Aine Collier.  Though Ms. Collier is a Professor of English at the University of Maryland, this is no dry scholarly text, but a fascinating history, full of illustrations.  I don’t know what’s more entertaining: the 20th century posters and advertisements which seem so often to be directed at soldiers, or all the earlier history that I didn’t know.

For example, in the relentless way of disease, Vasco de Gama’s Portuguese sailors were the first to infect the 15th century Japanese, but soon after Dutch traders arrived to do a brisk business in protective sheaths of fine leather.  Nor had I any idea that, inspired by Thomas Malthus, early 19th century proponents of population control offered “receipts” for fashioning condoms from animal intestines, procured from the neighborhood butcher.

But is historical precedent enough for the heroes of historical romances to begin waving their be-ribboned sheathes?  John Campbell, the Duke of Argyll, did exactly that in 1708, before a packed House of Lords:  “This Certaine instrument called a Quondom, occassioned ye debauching of a great number of Ladies of Qualitie, and young gentlewomen."  (There's an example to the right.)

True, good writer can make anything work.  But do readers want that much accuracy?  Does such a detail serve to reveal more of a character’s personality and beliefs, or does it fall into the category of “too much information”?

Lord of Scoundrels Interview: Part Deux

An interview with Loretta, by Susan/Miranda

Welcome back to the second part of my interview with my fellow Wench Loretta Chase, marking the reissue of her legendary historical romance, Lord of Scoundrels -- a book that's simply too magical to be contained in a single blog. As I mentioned last time, Lord of Scoundrels is the winner of numerous awards and honors, and most recently has been named again as the number one favorite romance of all time in the All About Romance Top 100 Romances Reader Poll (#1 in the 2000, 2004, and 2007 polls; here's this year's AAR Poll if you'd like to see the rest as well.) An extra tidbit about this poll: among the thousands of romances eligible for this honor, Lord of Scoundrels appeared on over 40% of the voters' ballots.  Now that's reader loyalty!

Avon Books will be releasing a new edition of Lord of Scoundrels this week.  In addition to a beautiful new cover, the new edition includes a special letter from Loretta. If you've yet to discover this marvelous book, then you have a treat waiting for you.

This time, Loretta answers more of our most pressing questions about Dain, Jessica, and exactly how she researched Dain's underwear....

Susan/Miranda:   When Lord of Scoundrels was first published, Dain was a most unusual hero: an English peer, but one whose Italian mother made him somewhat suspect in polite society.  I’ve heard you call him a “mongrel”, an outsider.  How did you invent this pedigree for him, and how did it shape his character for you?

Loretta: What can I say?  I have a weakness for things Italian. (That's a painting of one of the Medici guys, Ippolito.) The other night I watched an Italian movie, Ginger and Cinnamon, and simply sat there in utter delight:  the language, the attitude--and the men.  Before this book, I’d written Captives of the Night , whose hero was Albanian; so it wasn’t a big stretch to create a mongrel English aristocrat.  Having Dain be half-Italian fit so many aspects of his story:  his background as well as his behavior, which does get operatic at times.  Sometimes people from two different cultures complement each other; sometimes it’s a horrific collision.  The latter is the case with Dain’s parents, and this is what warps him and makes him a misfit.  In a loving household, he would have grown up with a better self-image, and would have dealt with bullying at school in a different way, and thus would have grown up into someone altogether different from the man Jessica meets in that antique shop.

Susan/Miranda:   Smart, funny, practical heroines like Jessica Trent are rare creatures in historical romance, especially one who is also a virgin with a great deal of knowledge of men and sex.   How did her character come to you?

Loretta: If Jessica were like what we assume to be the typical young lady of her time, she could never handle Dain, and he’d think her too boring to live.  But Jessica is more like the ladies of her grandmother’s (and great-grandmother’s) generation.  They had a more practical, frank attitude toward sex.  These were bawdier, more rough and tumble generations (think of Tom Jones).  By the 1820s we’re seeing the prudery & hypocrisy that foreshadows the Victorian era.

Still, I’m not sure this was a conscious decision in creating her.  I knew instinctively that she had to be a woman Dain couldn’t crush.  Other than that, she more or less assembled herself as a character, as Dain did.  These, like every other character in the book, were quite clear from the start, while I was writing the outline. 

Susan/Miranda: Word Wenches readers are always fascinated by cover art.   Avon has given the reissue of Lord of Scoundrels a handsome new cover.   How do you feel this cover better captures your book?

Loretta:  I think the artist has definitely caught something of Jessica--certainly as Dain sees her--and I like the way the hero is a distant figure approaching her.  I love the colors--and I think it’s great that the inside clinch is actually the old one, but touched up so that it better resembles the hero and heroine.  What I have loved about my recent Avon covers (and I’m hoping to be able to show the one for Your Scandalous Ways soon) is the feeling that we are seeing the heroine as the hero sees her.  So they’re not simply beautiful paintings, in beautiful colors, but they capture the feel of the story.  There’s a consistent look, yet each cover has its own distinct feel.

Susan/Miranda: Fashion is important to Jessica, and her clothes are a constant puzzle to Dain.   You’ve already told us something about how you dressed Jessica (http://wordwenches.typepad.com/word_wenches/2007/10/dressing-jessic.html)   Why did you make the delightfully extreme women’s dress so crucial to the story?

Loretta:  Here's another link. It's for 1829, but it’s gives a good sense of what Jessica wears in 1828.  The time period was predetermined, since this book was part of a series.  But it worked out beautifully, because to me Dain is the Extreme Male & Jessica’s love of fashionable (and very expensive) clothes makes her look like the Extreme Female.  I liked having her clothes be a fun contrast to her very level-headed outlook and behavior.  She wears the frills and furbelows but she’s not a sissy girl.  Her clothes give Dain a chance to exercise his caustic wit.  Yet he enjoys the excess.

He’s an expensive man, and as I point out in the book, “his attire, unlike his character, was always comme il faut.”  He’s used his brains to make himself very, very rich, and he likes spending the money on nice things.  It was clear to me that he’d take pride in spending money on an elegantly expensive wife.  He’d like being one of the few men in the world who could afford her.

Susan/Miranda: During the (very hot!) love scenes between Dain and Jessica, you’ve spent as much care on documenting his undergarments and their removal as hers.  Men’s underwear is notoriously hard to document.  What’s the story behind your research?

Loretta:  I’ve always said that if you’re going to describe clothing in a story it has to serve a purpose:  character or plot development, preferably.  This is why, in so many books, I don’t get into details until people are dressing or undressing.  Because Jessica’s being a fashion plate was a crucial part of her character, and because Dain is so observant and articulate as he makes fun of it, there are reasons to describe her clothes.  In his case, it was important to communicate that he, too, dressed in the height of masculine fashion, down to his undergarments.  Still, as you note, men’s underwear is very difficult--and it was more so when I wrote this book.  My main sources were the Cunnington books and, IIRC, some museum visits.

Susan/Miranda: Most heroines reform their wayward heroes, but Jessica embraces Dain’s past, even his illegitimate son –– definitely not a typical saccharine romance-child, but a scruffy, ill-mannered, very real little boy.   How did you decide to include him in your story?

Loretta:  Dominic was there when I first developed the story.  He had to be part of it, and I could write a dissertation about what he symbolizes and the role he plays.  But to keep it simple:  Love in my stories is usually about a second chance of one kind or another.  In one sense, the boy is Dain:  looks like him, acts like him.  Once Dain can let himself accept and love the child, he can truly accept and love himself.  (The child in this picture is wearing a skeleton suit.  This is what Dominic dons after his bath at the inn.)

As to Jessica’s accepting the illegitimate son, it’s an interesting situation.  Today we’re more likely to see a single mother raising her children.  In those days--at least among the upper classes--the child was more likely to be with the father.  After all, it was no disgrace for a man to sire bastards; it was the woman who was disgraced.  Since a man “owned” his offspring--while the mother had no rights to them--bastards were often part of his household, or that of one of his relatives.  Lord Byron, for example, took charge of his daughter by Claire Clairmont.  So Jessica is not behaving strangely at all.  As she points out, Lady Granville brought up her husband’s two illegitimate sons by her aunt.

Thank you so much, Loretta! 

Now, Dear Readers, here's your second chance to ask a question or post a comment, and be eligible to win an autographed copy of the new Lord of Scoundrels.  The winner will be drawn later this week, so post (and enter) now!

Lord of Scoundrels Interview: Part One

An interview with Loretta, by Susan/Miranda

In a time when the shelf-life a romance can be measured in weeks, it’s a rare book indeed that earns a lasting place on the shelves of both booksellers and readers alike.  Lord of Scoundrels by Word Wench Loretta Chase is one of these magical books, a classic historical romance that’s just about perfect in every way.  The list of awards Lord of Scoundrels has won tells the story:  the Romance Writers of America Rita, a Romantic Times Reviewers Choice Award, a repeat winner in the All About Romance Top 100 Romances Reader Poll (#1 in the 2000, 2004, and 2007 polls; here's this year's AAR Poll if you'd like to see the rest as well.) and for Romance Readers Anonymous Best All-Time Historical Romance and Best Romance Novel of All Time awards. 

Avon Books agrees, and this month marks the reissue of Lord of Scoundrels in a new edition, ready to delight a whole new crop of readers. For our next two blogs, Loretta and I will chat about all things Scoundrel: Dain, Jessica, and pornographic French watches. . . .

Susan/Miranda:   For those unfortunates who have yet to discover Lord of Scoundrels, could you tell us a bit about the story?

Loretta:  Quite simply, this is my Beauty and the Beast story.  The Marquess of Dain, the hero, is truly awful:  rude, overbearing, and intimidating.  This is the man he’s become in order to overcome a traumatic childhood.  He consciously uses his monstrousness in the same way he uses his vast wealth and his social position:  to control his world and protect himself.  It’s sad, in a way, because he’s isolated, like the Beast of the fairy tale trapped in his castle.  But Dain is not pitiful by any means:  He’s smart, cynical, and sarcastic, with a sharp eye for the ridiculous.  He has a sense of humor and is adept with clever comebacks and putdowns (or “setdowns” in the language of the time).

At story’s start, he thinks he has everything under control.  He grew up as a misfit and an outcast but he now has everything he wants--or if he doesn’t have it, he can buy it.  Then one day, into a shop walks Jessica Trent, a fashion plate with a brain under her ridiculous bonnet.  She proceeds to turn his world upside down.

In my version, the Beauty of the tale is an unflappable young lady who enters the Beast’s lair of her own accord.  And no matter what he does, no matter how awful he is--and he goes from bad to worse to unspeakable--she can handle it.

Susan/Miranda:   When writers are especially blessed and all the creative stars align, a great book will go so smoothly that it almost seems to write itself.   Was Lord of Scoundrels like this?

Loretta:  It was the only book that came to me as a gift from the writing gods.  Every other book is a struggle, some bloodier than others.  This book was pure fun from start to finish.

Susan/Miranda:   Dain and Jessica meet in a shop selling art and antiques.  Two pieces are of special interest to them, and I’m sure there’s a research story behind each one of them.   What can you tell us more about the Russian icon?

Loretta:  This is one of the things people might think one makes up.  In fact, there was a Stroganov School. The works were done in the 16th & 17th centuries, and by the time of my story were prized by collectors.

Susan/Miranda:   And yes, I’m going to ask: was the pornographic French watch based on a real example?

Loretta:  Oooh, watches.  In that scene, Jessica mentions Breguet --Napoleon wore a Breguet and Marie Antoinette owned several (which she never paid for).  They were famously accurate.

As to the naughty watches--they did exist.  Unfortunately, the only illustrations I have on hand are unsatisfactory.  I got the idea from a short entry and a tiny B&W picture in Eric Bruton’s The History of Clocks and Watches.  It’s a carriage watch from the 1790s.  The book offers a description but shows only the “decent” view.  Here's one, though rather primitive.  Here are some more, but the pix are tiny.  Here's a larger pic though it’s not the type Jessica buys.  I know I found a much better illustration, but the source is either on the shelves of one of the libraries I haunted, part of a museum exhibition I visited (here or in the UK), or buried in my basement.  I think they’re even more fun than the erotic snuff boxes, because the scene can be manipulated.

Susan/Miranda:   Much of Lord of Scoundrels takes place at Dain’s house in Dartmoor.   What about this remote part of England seemed an appropriate match for Dain’s character?

Loretta:  It goes deeper than a match, actually.  He was born there during one of my infrequent trips to England.  We were in Devon in late spring, and had left our hotel on a beautifully warm day.  (The gigantic rhododendrons we encountered there and elsewhere, BTW, inspired the rhododendron love scene.)  A few miles away, we were in Dartmoor, and another world, as I describe in the book:

“His was a Dartmoor soul, where the wind blew fierce and the rain beat down upon grim, grey rocks, and where the pretty green patches of ground turned out to be mires that could suck down an ox.”

Like Dain, Dartmoor is something apart:  Lots of brooding atmosphere.  It’s intimidating.  Changeable.  Harshly beautiful.  The dangers (like the Grimspound Bog--which Conan Doyle calls the Grimpen Mire in The Hound of the Baskervilles) and the wild, desolate look of the place have given birth to many legends involving the Devil, pixies, and ghostly visitations.  Dain’s harsh exterior, the stormy weather that’s his personality, the devil who seems to rule him, and the ghosts who haunt him--all of this is Dartmoor.

Here's a Devon lane in late spring.

And if readers would like to see his house, they can check out these pictures of Hardwick Hall, on which I based it.  Here are more photos.

Here's the portrait gallery where Dominic makes his run.

You can can get another angle on the locale at my blog at the Avon Romance Books site.

And for more about Dain & Jessica, please check out my blog at Romance B(u)y the Book on Thursday, November 15.  This is a romance blog in conjunction with LifetimeTV.com -- please join me! Here are the details for accessing it:

You can get to "Let's Talk Romance" and Loretta's "GuestBlog" through the blue "Blog Box" in the lower left-hand corner of "Romance: B(u)y the Book".  Register in the blog comments area to take part in the discussion.  (Tips: Leave no spaces in your UserName.  Non-U.S. viewers, use CA/90210 as state/zip code).

Now it's your turn.  Your question or comment has a chance to win an autographed copy of the new Lord of Scoundrels.  If you don't win this time, you'll get a second chance when Part II of the interview appears on 19 November.

Whither Bagnigge Wells

By Susan/Miranda

As each of us Wenches have noted here, writing novels set in the past presents its own special challenges.  One of the hardest parts is determining exactly how much history you want or need to support your story, and then how much of your “writing time”  to invest in research to support that history.  Of course this varies from writer to writer, and from book to book, with results that vary from the most mundane “wallpaper history”, set in the indeterminate past where everyone has big houses and wears silk, to more thoughtful books with enough factual background to please a good university press.

I’m a self-proclaimed history nerd.  I love history, and I love research, and I’m perfectly happy to wallow in original sources all the day long.  This is much of the reason that I’ve shifted my writing from historical romance to historical fiction, where the characters are almost entirely based on historical figures and the plot is driven by fact.  For me, that’s more-better-funner writing, about as good as a job can get. But all that lovely research can also become as sticky as the LaBrea Tar Pits, and suck up my time like so many wallowing mastodons. 

Which is exactly what happened to me with Bagnigge Wells.

I know this sounds like I’m writing a Nancy Drew mystery (The Secret of the Bagnigge Wells).  Actually, my WIP is a historical novel based on the life and times of 17th century actress and royal mistress Nell Gwyn (The King’s Favorite: A Novel of Nell Gwyn & King Charles II).  Most of the book takes place in London, and a well-documented 17th century London at that, thanks to the writings of diarists Samuel Pepys and John Evelyn, and a surprisingly large number of other surviving letters and journals.

There are many writers fortunate enough to be able to travel to the places their books are set, and be able to walk literally in the characters’ footsteps.  Alas, I’m not one of them; I have two college-age children, and that puts a damper on research junkets to England.  And, as I’ve also realized, many of the places I’d want to see no longer exist.  Not only did the Great Fire of 1666 destroy much of Nell’s London, but another fire, later in the 17th century, claimed most of Charles’s Whitehall Palace, too.  What remained of Restoration London has since been absorbed, knocked down, remodeled, bombed, renewed, and rebuilt by successive generations. I've no choice but to rely on the descriptions of others to create my interpretation of the past.

But back to Bagnigge Wells.  In book after book about Nell, there are references made to her “summer house” on the Fleet, a bucolic retreat where she and Charles often went to swim, fish, and generally make mischief away from the court.  I liked this, and I worked it into the story as the book evolved.  I wrote along with some of those big **** in the middle of the scene, astrisks that mean Notes to Self, and are my way of saying, “come back here and put in more when you’ve researched it.” 

So with my scene more or less written, I went back to fill in the blanks regarding Bagnigge Wells.  Hah.  To begin with, I found no mention of the place in my standard 17th diaries, journals, or references books.  I figured it had to be within a day’s journey by water of the palace, but I couldn’t find it anywhere on any map, old or new.  In fact, to my chagrin, I realized that the earliest mention of the place in connection with Nell was in a book published in 1878 (Old and New London by Walter Thornbury), which had been repeated as gospel in every successive book about Nell.  Here’s the passage, in all its high Victorian splendor:

“Bagnigge Wells House was originally the summer residence of Nell Gwyn.  Here, upon the Fleet and amid green fields, she entertained Charles and his saturnine brother with concerts and merry breakfasts, in the careless Bohemian way in which that noble specimen of divine right delighted.”

I probably should have tossed the whole scene then and there.  Relying on the word of a historian writing more than two centuries after the fact isn’t generally a good idea.  But the summer house on the Fleet was certainly plausible, and entirely probable, and besides, I liked the scene, and I didn’t want to give it up.  It worked.  And I just liked the word "Bagnigge", however it may be pronounced (anyone know for certain?)

And so back I went a-hunting.

What did I learn?  That the reason I couldn’t find Bagnigge Wells on any map is that it no longer exists.  For that matter, neither does the Fleet.  The River Fleet was once one of the major rivers of London, running from its origins on Hampstead Heath, through Kings Cross and Clerkenwell, until it finally emptied into the Thames near Blackfriars.

Bagnigge Wells was located on the Fleet near St. Pancras.  The site of two wells known for their healing properties, it may also have been the location of an earlier, abandoned religious order.  In Nell’s time, the area was still surrounded by open fields, with only a single public-house (The Pindar of Wakefield) as a landmark, and the river was clear and clean, yet easily traveled back into the heart of London.  It was also considered a place with strong royalist tendencies, filled with Charles’s supporters.  In other words, the perfect place to escape the 17th century version of the paparazzi. 

But as for those “telling details” that writers so cherish: nothing.  Not a peep.  Everything dealt with Bagnigge Wells in the 18th century, when the healing wells were developed, and the spot became fashionable with the “middling sort”, who came to take the waters, flirt, and play skittles.  (To the left is a genre print of "The Bread and Buttery at Bagnigge") But by the early 19th century, the Wells were described as a ruin, with urban sprawl relentlessly approaching.  Only the old Pindar had managed to continue the connection with Nell, with a chimney piece that featured the royal arms and a portrait-bust labeled “Eleanor Gwynne, a favorite of Charles II.)

The once-sparkling Fleet had become little better than an open sewer, and by the end of the 18th century, was completely arched over and built upon.  The springs, too, vanished, and all that remains today are two streets in the area: Gwynne Place and Wells Street. (For more information, check out The River of Wells.)

I figure I spent the better part of a morning to learn all of this cool stuff, none of which was really of any use to me.  In other words, if I wanted to put Nell and Charles at Bagnigge, I’d have to do so without specifics, and to rely more on my imagination than any hard fact.   So this, then, is the sum of how Bagnigge Wells is described:

   “I vow you can’t catch me, sir,” I taunted, raising my head from the river’s surface only enough so my lips would clear it.  “Hey, ho, can’t catch me!”
    I gulped as big a breath as I could and plunged deep into the water, swimming low so Charles wouldn’t spy me.  Finally my lungs were burning and I could keep under no longer, and I popped up with a splatter, gasping.  Swiftly I looked about me for Charles, shoving aside my tangled hair that clung to my face and breasts like duckweed. 
    All around me was still: the green riverbed, the willows trailing their feathery branches into the water, the few ducks already nesting for the night in the tall grass, their heads tucked demurely beneath their wings.  The days were shorter now, making the sky that velvety blue that comes before true dusk, with stars just beginning to spark.  The evening mist floated low over the fields beyond the river, softening the horizon.  I could hear the first nightingale’s song over the rush of the water, and louder still the racing of my own heart.  Our clothes lay where we’d left them on the grass, untidy piles of pale linen, and on top of Charles’s lay two of his piebald spaniels, curled contentedly, I suppose, in his scent.  Not far beyond lay the shadowy shape of the house I’d hired for our use for the summer. . . .

That’s it.  Was a morning of research to prove I’d have no hard facts worth that paragraph?  Was this time I could ever justify well spent to my editor (if I ever had to do so, which, fortunately, writers seldom are called to do)?  Or was that morning among my research books more a general refilling of my writerly imagination, whether it generated anything immediately useful?  Could it just be chalked up to…fun?

Whether this works (or whither the Wells) remains to be seen, at least until next summer, when The King’s Favorite will be released.  But here’s a question for now: do you think you can tell when a writer has enjoyed writing a book?  Can you sense if the book was a joy, or a trial?  Have you ever read books that in some intangible way felt as if the writer had written under pressure (health, family, financial, or simply an idea that had ceased to be magical), or one that felt so right that the words must have flown from the keyboard?

The More Things Change....

By Susan/Miranda

For all of us who are fascinated by the past (and that’s probably just about everyone reading this blog), history can offer all sorts of surprises.  Research can turn up a crucial fact for a plot, or provide the details that bring a character to life, or even inspire an entire book.  But sometimes, as a true-born-history-nerd, the best part is stumbling upon Cool Stuff I Didn’t Know.

If a cartoonist were to draw me researching, I’d have a pile of book s around me, pages bristling with multi-colored Post-Its, a couple of cats, and a big, fat exclamation point of delighted amazement floating over my head.  There’s one school of thought that describes history as simply rediscovering everything that’s been forgotten.  I like that idea.  For me, one of the fun-est parts of the rediscovery process is learning that some thing/experience/invention that I’d always believed to be modern is, in fact, old.  Over and over, it seems that our ancestors have already “been there, done that, wrote about it in my diary.”

The ancient Romans can claim first inventing aqueducts, water running through pipes, paved roads, and scores of other engineering accomplishments. Much is made of Thomas Jefferson introducing pasta to 18th century Americans, but it had already been a favorite food in China many centuries before Marco Polo “discovered” it and brought it back to medieval Italy.  A large quadrangle building centered by a courtyard, sheltering coffee-shops, taverns, and over a hundred shops selling luxury goods: the description sounds like a modern shopping mall, but it’s actually the Royal Exchange, dedicated by Queen Elizabeth I in 1571. 

Of course I'm ready to offer examples. *g* Except for the style of the writing and the places mentioned, the excerpt that follows could be a description of modern New Yorkers with summer places on the Jersey shore. Instead it’s from a letter by Daniel Defoe written after visiting Epsom, Surrey, in 1705.  He sounds more than a little envious of these “men of business," too:

“The greatest part of the men may be supposed to be men of business, who are at London … all the day, and thronging to their lodgings at night….They take their horses every morning to London, to the Exchange, to the Alley, or to the Warehouse, and be at Epsome again at night; and I know one citizen that practised it for several years together, and scarce ever lay anight in London during the whole season…There is a great deal of society, mirth, and good manners, and good company among these, too….but in the winter this is no place for pleasure…good houses shut up, and windows fastened, the furniture taken down, the families removed, the leaves off the trees, and all the people out of the town.”

In fact, it’s often when our ancestors grouse that they tend to sound much more like us.  The niceties of Whigs vs. Tories are hard to fathom today, but Sarah Churchill’s early 18th century complaint about how little her children learn from travel will sound familiar to modern parents whose offspring spend entire “educational” vacations playing video games.

“Wherever the children are, they will be very idle, and notwithstanding all the pains I have taken, they will never know anything that is of any more consequence than a  curious toupee, a laced coat, or a puppet show.”

Modern editorial writers who devote waaaaaayyy too much ink to the unsuitability of teenagers’ dress would find a kindred spirit in the Reverend Joseph Doddridge, who found much lacking (like the breeches) in the attire of the local boys in 1770s Pennsylvania:

“Since the latter years of the Indian war, our young men have become enamored of the Indian dress.,.Their drawers have been laid aside, and the Indian breech clout adopted…With this, when the belt was passed over the hunting shirt (now worn in place of a coat), the upper part of the thighs and part of the hips were naked. The young warrior, instead of being abashed by his nudity, was proud of his Indian-like dress. In some instances I have seen them go into places of public worship in this dress, where their appearance did not add much to the devotions of the young ladies.”

Oh, I just best those young ladies had trouble concentrating on their devotions....

But what about you?  Have you ever been similarly struck by something from the past that seemed unusually modern? An expression of speech that “felt” like modern slang, but turned out to be 300 years old, or a 19th century Shaker chair that could be in the new Ikea catalogue?

Art vs. Commerce

By Susan/Miranda

Like most businesses, publishing is always on the hunt for the Next Big Thing, not only in what goes between the covers, but what’s on the front as well.  As Wench Pat noted in her last blog, Cover Art follows fashion like everything else.  As soon as one book with an interesting cover becomes a bestseller, every other art director in New York rushes to join the parade. In other words, Good Art is the Art that Sells.

Now what’s new is old.  Old Masters, Fine Art, or just plain Paintings (it’s all in the capitalization, I guess) are gracing popular fiction.  This kind of art has long been used on bookcovers, but usually on so-called classic fiction.  Old art equaled old writing, apparently, though in many readers’ minds, the sight of any “old” painting on a bookcover immediately brings to mind book reports and reading lists.  I really wonder at some of these choices, too.  What exactly does the worldly French Comtesse d’Haussonville (painted by Ingres in 1845) have to do with Jane Austen’s heroine Emma of a generation earlier?

The art on covers now is often cropped in more interesting ways (though don't get me started on the head-less-ness; I'll save that for another blog), and balanced with elaborate type and other design elements to make it seem more "fresh."  Period art helps give a book historical credibility if the characters are based on real people.  When I wrote about Sarah Churchill in Duchess, it made sense for my publisher to put her portrait on the cover.  Though as I discovered when my publisher was choosing which portrait of Lady Castlemaine to put on the cover of Royal Harlot, it helps if your heroine’s face can pass current standards of attractiveness (For more about this, see my earlier blogs, Beauty & the Barbara, and Cover Girl.)

Lately paintings are turning up on mass market fiction, too. It's an interesting trend, one that many of the WordWenches readers seem to be embracing.  However, for the sake of fair reporting, I have to note that fine art covers on historical romances are, in several cases, proving more confusing than enticing.  Readers aren’t “seeing” these covers as romances, and seem to feel a traditional clinch (however overdone) announces a romance much better than a 19th century portrait -- or so the marketing folk are whispering with trepidation.  Who knows for certain?

Personally, I’m all for using art from the era of the story for any historically-based book, whether it's a romance, a western, action/war, or a fictionalized biography.  I love art history, and a painting I recognize makes me much more likely to pick up a book.  Museums and other private collections are paid for the usage of these pictures, too, and I appreciate how those fees help keep such institutions afloat.  And, frankly, it’s a lot easier to have a historical romance taken seriously when it has a handsome period cover (like Pam Rosenthal’s The Slightest Provocation here) instead of another luridly sweaty bodybuilder torso.

Which leads me to my Question of the Day: With all the thousands of historical images available around the world and over time, why are publishers using the same paintings over and over?   

Yes, I know, I’ve got the art-history-nerd-girl eye that spots these things at fifty paces.  But I can’t be the only one who’s noticed this, am I?  Georgette Heyer’s books are (finally) being reissued in elegant formats worthy of her writing.  But in my local big-box store, this new edition of The Infamous Army is on a table twenty feet from Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict.  Arggh!

That’s only the beginning.  Surely with all the beautiful art produced during the Tudor era by artists like Hans Holbein, there must be scads of images to use.  Yet both The Secret Diary of Anne Boleyn by Robin Maxwell and A Lady Raised High by Laurien Gardiner have the same painting on their covers  Yes, it's a picture of Henry VIII's doomed second queen, but it wasn't done in her lifetime, or even by an English artist.  Instead it's a highly romanticized version of Anne's last days in the Tower of London, painted by Frenchman Edouard Cibot in 1835.  Go figure.

 

Another French artist has had even greater success defining English ladies of the Regency era, at least if current cover-art is to be believed.  Gerard's portrait of (the French, not English) Juliette Recamier is luminously beautiful, and one of the most famous portraits of the early 19th century. Art directors all up and down Manhattan must agree, because Juliette's turning up on covers lately with super-model frequency.  Here she is, in various forms, gracing the books of Honorary Wench Candace Hern, Mary Balough, and Amanda Elyot.

But perhaps the trend is already fading.  Philippa Gregory, the most successful of   current historical novelists, has never had a period-painting on a cover on her popular Tudor-set books.  Instead her “look” has been over-painted photographs of costumed models, with lavish gold embossing and lush type.  Yet the latest edition (the movie tie-in) of The Other Boleyn Girl looks more like one of the Gossip Girls series set in modern New York than the Tudors of sixteenth century England.

What do you think of fine art on book covers?  Does it make you pick up a book, or pass on by?  And how many other separated-at-birth covers have you seen in the stores?

Parting's Such Sweet Sorrow (Not!)

by Susan/Miranda

I’m newly returned from vacation at the same place where Loretta is now (Cape Cod, Massachusetts.)  Like Loretta, my vacation involves much reading, plus a great deal of therapeutic knitting. Also like Loretta, I, too, am by nature the proverbial whiter shade of pale, and can cope with the beach only with copious amounts of sun block.  Bronzed goddesses, we are not.

But now that I’m home, I’ve been thrown into a whirlwind of frantic activity that is destroying any shred of lingering vacation tranquility. There’s endless laundry, endless packing, and endless trips to Staples, and Ikea, and the Home Depot, and Barnes & Noble, and every other place with smiling salespeople eager to relieve me of my charge card.  In short, it’s time to ship my son back off to college, with the vast quantity of worldly goods that teenagers seem to find essential for survival. 

And when the time comes to say good-bye, I’ll cry. 

There’s absolutely no good reason for this, of course.  Such separations are a necessary part of growing up. My son is happy, healthy, and handsome, and he has finally learned not to talk with his mouth full.  His school lies in an idyllic setting snugged in the mountains, deserving of its nickname of “Happy Valley.” He has plenty of friends and a steady, charming girlfriend, two part-time jobs he enjoys, and always makes the Dean’s List.  Thanks to the miracle of modern technology, he’ll call home often, and e-mail, too. 

(And my more reasonable side reminds me how much perilous things could be.  One of my closest friends just packed her youngest son off to West Point, where, as she says, “he has spent the summer playing with guns and grenades –– but under adult supervision, of course.” It's what awaits after graduation that worries her the most, and with good reason, too.)

Yet still I’ll cry, just as I cried when I first left him at nursery school.  In most matters, I’m sturdy and sensible, but there’s something about goodbyes that reduce me to sobbing water-works that would do a hired mourner at a Victorian funeral proud.  Goodbyes may mean the beginning of a new chapter in life, but they also signal the ending of another one, and that, I suppose, is the part that gets to me.  I cry whenever I see a bride and groom go off in their bedecked honeymoon car.  I cry at Romeo and Juliet, and at cheesy telephone commercials. I cry when I drive friends or relatives to the train or airport. Both Royal Harlot and Duchess ended with farewells (which I suppose shows that while they had romantic elements, they weren't really romances), and I cried -- sobbed! -- as I wrote the last pages. When I worked at colleges, I’d cry at every graduation and reunion.

I don’t even want to consider how I would have handled the kind of farewells common in the past (and in our books) is beyond me.  In the time before globe-hopping and instant communication, any farewell could well be final.  A woman sending her beloved off to fight in the Crusades, or at Gettysburg, or the Crimea, might not learn his fate for months, or even years, after his departure.  Going off to make one’s fortune could be just as hazardous, whether that fortune lay in London, or the California gold mines, or halfway around the world with the East India Company.  For every new immigrant eager for the first glimpse of the Statue of Liberty, there were others lamenting what was left behind, as in this famously poignant painting by Ford Maddox Brown, “The Last of England.”

All of which is a roundabout way of saying that this is one more reason why historical romances can prove so satisfying for readers.  The French Lieutenant’s Woman may still be waiting for her lover, but in our books, devotion is always rewarded.  Our heroines sleep with tear-stained love-letters beneath their pillows, but there’s never any doubt in our readers’ minds that the heroes will return.  No proper romance hero or heroine is faithless.  No one changes his or her mind, or gets too lonely and finds someone else.  Love will always survive the tests of distance, time, and bad communications.  The promise that “they lived happily ever after” carries with it the additional implication that they lived that way together, without any further goodbyes or separations.

If that’s only one more example of what makes a “sappy romance novel,” well then, so be it.  Among happy fantasies, surely always coming home must be one of the happiest, and the most satisfying, too.

So where do you stand on farewells?  Are you stoic, or a sentimental weeper like me?  And do you find a good farewell in a romance serves to heighten the magic of the reunion? Or do you prefer a good-bye on the last page that leaves the future more open for the characters -- as in, say, Gone With the Wind?

Fried by August

By Susan/Miranda

Don't know what the weather'€™s like in your neck of the woods, but here in eastern Pennsylvania, we are definitely in the deepest, dirtiest Dog Days of summer.  Each afternoon the temperature flirts with triple-digits, the sky'€™s an unchanging swampy grey, and the humidity is more appropriate to the bottom of an aquarium than any human habitat. 

By now the fresh white t-shirts bought in April are limp and stained with Popsicle juice, and bathing suits are pilled with those little weird fuzzy things.  Cats and dogs lie pressed flat to the bathroom floor, children and spouses are whiny and disagreeable, and the pink cosmos by the front door are nodding thick with Japanese beetles, despite the pricey beetle trap hanging right nearby.  Summer reading lists are belatedly rearing their ugly heads, and so (already!) is the nearby Halloween Adventure. 

Let'€™s not mince words, Dear Readers.  In these parts, August stinks.

To make matters worse, I, like about half of the other Wenches, have Deadlines in early fall. Deadlines that once seemed reasonable and achievable back in the distant time when contracts were signed, deadlines that now loom like the Grim Reaper himself, like the darkest harbingers of editorial despair and futility, like the -- well, enough already. I'€™ve only got, oh, roughly a bazillion pages to write between now and the first of October. 

Which is why, this week, I'm presenting only a final iconic portrait of Barbara, Countess of Castlemaine. I don't know if I should be offering apologies to Sir Peter Lely, or Matt Groening, or both (and many thanks to the Cherries over at the Cherry Forum Book Discussion of Royal Harlot for putting this into my head.)

Just blame it on August.

So what about you?  Are you weary of summer, too?  Sick of too much air conditioning and overdone barbecue?  Feeling more than a little toasted by heat and humidity?  Or do you still have the same fond regard for the season in August that you did on Memorial Day?

Karen Harper, Honorary Word Wench

We'd all like to thank Karen Harper for visiting us here at the Wenches. In honor of your appearance, Karen, we'd like to give you a great big bouquet of virtual Tudor roses and the very best wishes for your continued success.  You're now an Honorary Word Wench, with all the noble rights and privileges this most ancient (well, from last year, anyway) title signifies.
Huzzah, huzzah, huzzah!

And the Wieners Are ...

...SusanDC and MichelleDi! Susan and Michelle, your names were chosen from commenters on the Karen Harper post, and you've each won a Harper book.  Please send me your mailing address at sholmes@holmesedit.com.  Karen says your books are packaged and ready to go.  Congratulations ladies!

An Interview with Karen Harper

by Susan/Miranda

Today I'd like to welcome Karen Harper as a Guest Wench. With frequent appearances on The New York Times and USAToday bestselling list, Karen's name is one many of us will recognize, and she's also a popular speaker  with readers and writers groups alike around the country.

Karen manages to outdo the Gemini Wenches by writing in not two, but three distinct genres: contemporary romantic suspense (for Mira Books), historical novels (for Crown and Penguin/NAL) and a series of historical mysteries (for St. Martin's).  How she manages to juggle both the research and writing for such disparate projects is just one of the questions I asked her in this interview, and I hope you'll have a question or two to ask Karen yourself.  She has generously offered to give away copies of her two latest historical novels from Crown, THE LAST BOLEYN and THE FIRST PRINCESS OF WALES to two readers who leave a comment on her interview -- so please,  ask away!

Susan:  You’ve had a wonderfully rich and varied writing career.  Yet every writer has that “how I began” story, some particular person or book that first inspired her to write.  What is yours?

Karen: I always loved to read and taught literature for years, but what drew me into professional writing was my love of historical novels when I was growing up.  I still have on my “shrine book shelf” the classics that I read and reread: 

Anya Seton’s KATHERINE  (Plantagenet); anything by Jan Westcott, but especially THE QUEEN’S GRACE (Tudor); MY LORD MONLEIGH (late 1600’s) by Jan Cox Speas.  And, of course,GONE WITH THE WIND.  What also sent me into writing historicals is my love for the British Isles and my many trips there.  I went to England in 1980 as an English teacher, but returned as writer.  I have been published ever since.

Susan:  You’re currently writing three different kinds of books:  contemporary romantic suspense, historical novels, and a historical mystery series.  Could you tell us a bit about your latest books?   

Karen: In the last few years I have written in three genres.  THE QUEEN ELIZABETH I MYSTERY SERIES from St. Martin’s Press, featuring the Virgin Queen herself as the amateur sleuth, is now nine books.  I am going to give this series a rest, at least for a while.  I wanted to keep Elizabeth quite young in the novels, and after 2700 pages, she’s getting a bit too middle-aged (at least by their standards where 30 was middle-aged!)  All of these are in hardcover and paperback.  The last book, THE HOODED HAWKE, will be out this winter in pb, so for those of you who like to have all books in a series available before reading anything, enjoy.    All my books are available through my website, www.karenharperauthor.com.

In THE HOODED HAWKE a young, dashing Francis Drake and the queen are drawn together during a royal progress to solve a murder plot which threatens them both—and they are also attracted to each other romantically.  Each Elizabeth book features some special aspect of Tudor times:  mazes, medicine, music, fashion, Christmas recipes and customs, sports…

I’ll discuss my historical novels below.  My contemporary romantic suspense novels are great fun and have put me on the national bestseller lists.  The latest are HURRICANE and INFERNO.  They may sound like “disaster thrillers” but they are a blend or thriller/mystery/romance.  BELOW THE SURFACE will be out in Feb. 2008.  These come under the nickname “page turners,” but I strive for that in all my writing.  All good writing is suspenseful in one way or the other.  These novels are from Mira Books which does a fantastic job of packaging stories and supporting authors.

Susan: Before you began writing full-time, you were a high school literature and writing teacher as well as a college English instructor.  How do you think your background has influenced you as a fiction writer?

Karen: There is no better way to learn something than to teach it. Teaching American and Brit Literature over a seventeen-year period and my own six years of college, during which I majored in English and literature, have greatly impacted my writing.  Creating subplots which reflect the main action comes fairly easily; I’ve studied that in Shakespeare.  Details—Dickens.  Dialogue—Hemingway.  Setting a mood—Poe, etc.  Teaching essay structure to college prep seniors in high school and college freshmen at The Ohio State University has given me a lot of help too.

Susan: Whether you’re writing a contemporary suspense set in an Amish community or an historical novel in a sixteenth century palace, your books always capture a distinct time and place.  Your settings are never mere “window dressing,” but intrinsic parts to the stories.  Can you share how you conduct such varied background research?

Karen: Settings are very important to me.  In my contemporary suspense novels, I actually start by picking a setting (or it picks me), then character and plot evolve from there.  In my heavily researched historicals, character and plot, or what really happened historically, drives everything.

I love writing what my agent, Meg Ruley, calls enclave books.  That is, I take the reader inside some sub-group they may not know, so that the story entertains but also educates:  my main characters often come from a world we don’t know much about, and that includes Tudor or Medieval England.  In my contemporary romantic suspense novels, I’ve used such enclaves or unusual areas as the Amish, the Shakers, the Seminole tribe of SW Florida, the Everglades, midwives, and Appalachia.  I love small, isolated, eccentric towns.  I try to work settings into my novels as if they were another character.  The setting needs to have a “personality” and character arc and to interact with the human characters. 

Hm, I may have drifted a bit off the question here about how I conduct my research.  Let me just say I both do it “the old-fashioned way” by hitting the books (Interlibrary Loan is my best friend) and the new-fangled way—on line.  I’ve interviewed through e-mails the archivist of the Undercroft Museum of Westminster Abbey and the Senior Microfiler/Digitiser of the County Hall Record Office in Worchestershire, U.K.

Let me also say that, although the Elizabethans wrote lots of letters, books and records, they gave no thought to standardized spelling, which can drive a researcher crazy.  And I often find “facts” which are just the opposite of other “facts.”  At that point, the majority rules or I just pick the most likely possibility.

Susan: One of the topics we’ve often discussed here on the WordWenches is how to balance real history within a fictional framework—in other words, deciding how much history is too little, too much, or just right for the story.  How do you establish this balance between fictitious characters and ones based on actual historical figures?

Karen: Balancing history within a fictional framework is a key concern for anyone writing good historical fiction.  Any character I can research, is present authentically; these are often upper class people, but if I can find information on the queen’s coachman (his name was Boonen,) I use that too.  Usually, my only fictitious characters in my historicals are servants. 

So, in all my historical novels, I use whatever I can research as the foundation, then interpret character and story from that.  If I say Queen Elizabeth or Mary Boleyn or the first Princess of Wales or Shakespeare was doing such-and-such at a particular time, that means (1) research shows this was the case or  (2) where the character was and what he or she was doing is unknown and so can be logically interpreted in light of what is known.  Of course, details and dialogue must be created and suggest the flavor of the era.  If I wrote the way they really talked—no readers!

An example of being true to history:  Immediately after her coronation, it is recorded that Elizabeth Tudor “took to her bed for a week and was scarce seen.”  OK, then I can have her, with her cohorts, solving a crime sub rosa during that week when she was not under observation.  However, I would not have her out-and-about in the public eye.

One other aside here:  when there is not a lot of research to be found, a writer must really rely on “the telling detail.”  I once wrote a novel about Gera Fitzgerald, the “last queen of Ireland,” who lived off and on at the Tudor courts of Mary I and Elizabeth.  It was recorded that she was very beautiful and there is an extant portrait of her, but it was hard to find details on her character, even though the Earl of Surrey dedicated love sonnets to her.  Finally, I found a briefly stated detail that gave me the core of her bold, outspoken personality:  “The lady was sent to the Tower for plainspeaking to the queen.”  Ah, the Irish rebel is still in her, however downtrodden her people and family were by the Tudors.  She is truthful and courageous—and on from there.

Susan: You’ve written many books set in the Tudor period.  What first attracted you to the era?

Karen: I have written a total of thirteen books set in Tudor England and have one on “the drawing board” now.   I think from my answers to the earlier questions, you can see it was a variety of factors that drew me to the Tudor era.  Such tumultuous times dominated by amazing personalities!  And, as discussed in the next answer, women were really coming into their own.

Susan: Your historical novel, THE LAST BOLEYN, followed the life of Anne’s sister Mary.  Why do you think modern readers are so enthralled with stories of the Boleyn women?

Karen: THE LAST BOLEYN perfectly fits the period and people I’m most interested in.  The Boleyn sisters, Mary and Anne, epitomize the growing power of women in this era, which is, of course, totally fulfilled in their niece and daughter Elizabeth.  I really resent it when Mary Boleyn is just shifted off as a brief fling Henry had before the feisty Anne caught his eye.  Mary grew greatly from being a mere pawn of her father and of two kings, Francis I of France and Henry VIII of England, to be a brave, bold woman.  She survived the bloody downfall of her family and managed to wed the man she loved and chose. 

If you have read Philippa Gregory’s THE OTHER BOLEYN GIRL about Mary, I want to make two points.  (1)  Ms. Gregory and I interpret Mary and the Boleyn family quite differently.  (2)  I wrote my book 20 years before hers appeared.  Random House reissued my novel, THE LAST BOLEYN, when historical novels became popular again.

Susan:  Like all writers who have maintained long, successful careers, you’ve adapted and evolved with the publishing market as well as with your own interests.  What changes have you see in the market, good and bad?

Karen: It’s thrilling for me to see historical novels come into their own in the current market.  When I was first published in the early 1980’s, my historical novels were packaged and sold as historical romances because that was what was popular then.  Granted, they have strong love stories in them, but they were about real woman.   Now, two of my earliest books are back in print from Random House with great new covers and titles.  Besides THE LAST BOLEYN, THE FIRST PRINCESS OF WALES is available—both were selected as Borders Books featured summer reads, which indicates the popularity of this genre.  PRINCESS is the story of Joan of Kent, wife of the Plantagenet Black Prince and mother of Richard II.  She’s a perfect heroine, because her path to true love and power was anything but smooth.

Also, Penguin/NAL has just purchased a new novel, MISTRESS SHAKESPEARE, which will be out in August of ’08.  This is not the story of Shakespeare’s wife, Anne Hathaway, but of his “other” wife, Anne Whateley.  Research shows that several days before his marriage to Anne H. of Shottery, Will Shakespeare was recorded as betrothed to wed Anne Whateley of Temple Grafton.  As you may recall, his union with Anne H. was what we would call a shotgun wedding.

Could it be Will had someone he loved whom he wished to wed, but was forced to wed Anne Hathaway?  Or could he have wed his chosen Anne in a private handfast ceremony and then been dragged into church to wed the other, pregnant Anne?  Research indicates that two Shottery farmers pledged 40 pounds (a lot of money then) and promised to produce the groom so he would wed Anne H.  Research shows that Will lived apart from Anne H. for years, despite her two pregnancies which resulted in three children.  Research shows that Will only left Anne H. his “second best bed” and that he bought the beautiful Blackfriars Gatehouse in London and made certain it did not go to Anne H. upon his death.  You get the picture.  Did Will have another wife, a London wife?  The possibility (which I and other researchers believe is a probability) makes an uplifting but heart-wrenching story of Anne Whateley, MISTRESS SHAKESPEARE. 

Ah, of such history and human hearts are novels made.

Thank you so much for visiting with us, Karen, and  I for one cannot WAIT for MISTRESS SHAKESPEARE next summer!

Susan/Miranda

Karen will be stopping by throughout Monday and Tuesday to respond to questions and comments, so please, don't be shy. We'll announce the winners of Karen's book give-away on Tuesday night.

And the Wieners Are . . .

. . . BARBARA MONAJEM, JULIE POORMAN, and INGRID!

Barbara's name was drawn at random from the list of commenters to Susan/Miranda's "Harlot Interview."  Barbara, thanks for sending us your mailing address.  A shiny new autographed copy of Royal Harlot will soon be winging its way to you.  Congratulations, Barbara!

Julie and Ingrid won books as a result of submitting comments to Jo's post titled "The Truly Horrid." Julie, you've won a copy of The Demon From Sicily by Valancourt Press.  Ingrid, you've won your choice of any Jo Beverley book she has in stock.  Please let Jo know your choice.  Both of you will need to contact Jo at jobev@shaw.ca with your mailing address.  Congratulations to the both of you!

Karen Harper Here Monday!

Ladeeeeees and gentlemen!  It is our privilege and honor to announce that Karen Harper will be our guest on Monday, July 30.  Karen writes historical novels, a historical mystery series, and contemporary romantic suspense.  Come find out what Karen has to say about the writing life.  Bonus!  Bonus!  -->  Commenter names will go in the hat and two (count 'em!) lucky winners will win Karen Harper books:  The Last Boleyn and The First Princess of Wales.  Be the first on your block to win a Harper book!

Don't go away, now!  We have more announcements.  Scroll down to the next post below, regarding Susan/Miranda's Royal Harlot being the featured book over at Cherry Forums.  Then come back later today and find out who won an autographed copy of Royal Harlot, the winner to be chosen from among those who posted comments to the Harlot Interviews.  But wait!  There's more!  This afternoon we will also be posting the names of Jo's 2 winners who commented on her "The Truly Horrid" post. Lots of happenings here at the Word Wenches.

Royal Harlot is Featured Book

Susan/Miranda's Royal Harlot gets around, just like a real harlot!  Royal Harlot will be the featured August book for the Cherry Forums Book Club, from August 1-15.  Stop by Cherry Forums and give a wave to Susan/Miranda and show your support for a Wench.  (And how appropriate is it that a Wench writes about a wench?!!)

The Harlot Interview: Part Two

Interview by Loretta Chase

Today I continue my ROYAL HARLOT interview with fellow-Wench Susan Holloway Scott.  If you missed Part One, look here.  ROYAL HARLOT is available everywhere now, but Susan will also be giving away a signed copy on Sunday night to someone who posted on either Part One or Part Two of this interview.  We know that TypePad was a little squirrelly on Tuesday, rejecting comments; if you missed out then, please be sure to add a comment here to be eligible for the drawing.

And to get you in the proper mood, here's a Restoration-era Barbie, courtesey of Wench Susan King.  Ahh, we do love our Barbies....

Loretta: Writing in the first person, you’ve created a heroine in ROYAL HARLOT who is far from perfect, yet utterly fascinating.  How did you develop your sense of who she was?

Susan: When I wrote about Sarah Churchill for DUCHESS, I had almost too much first-person information in letters, journals, even an “authorized” autobiography.  Sarah kept every letter she received and copies of the ones she wrote; Barbara either didn’t keep anything, or her descendents chose not to preserve what she’d left.  (The one exception is the Earl of Chesterfield, who did keep -- and publish -- the letters that Barbara sent to him as a head-over-heels fifteen-year-old; in the way of most teenage love-letters, these manage to be at once achingly innocent and terrifyingly worldly.)

There’s very little written directly by her, though a great deal recounting her activities in a distinctly tabloid-esque vein.  She’s mentioned repeatedly by legendary diarist Samuel Pepys (shown to the left), who, like many other men of the time,  was almost obsessed with her beauty, desirability, and yes, even her underwear (there’s a famous passage about how he made a point of walking past her house on wash-day, when her laundress would hang her lavishly lace-trimmed smocks and petticoats out to dry on the branches of her mulberry bushes, and how this was enough to fuel his dreams of her for nights afterward.)

But two of the other major contemporary histories of the Restoration were written by men who regarded Barbara as a personal enemy.  Edward Hyde, Lord Clarendon (that pompous-looking fellow in the middle left) could rightly attribute his downfall at court to Barbara’s hatred, and he returned the favor in his eight-volume history of Charles’s reign by repeating every  vile whisper about her he could find, and others that he likely invented.  In the History of His Own Time, Bishop Gilbert Burnet (the bottom one, on the left) likewise was no fan, viewing Barbara as a vile adultress, a Papist enemy of the Anglican church, and a threat to Charles's protestant soul. Consequentally he paints a very dark portrait of Barbara where no whispered scandal is too evil to repeat, even accusing her of lewd behavior in church as a little girl.  Where there’s smoke, there’s generally fire, true, but while these two gentlemen were hardly impartial chroniclers of Barbara’s life, their venomous gossip has so often been repeated that it’s often accepted as historical fact. 

For my own fictionalized version of Barbara, I sifted through the gossip to try to find the woman who could inspire such strong feelings.  To create her voice, I had to decide which anecdotes and circumstances  felt “right”, and what didn’t, and go from there.

Loretta: Though we see the world through Barbara’s eyes, King Charles II is, rightfully, at the heart of the story.  Some of the scenes involving him were quite poignant.  I've always found him hard to pin down.  What’s your sense of him as a man and as a king?

Susan: As a man, Charles has many qualities of any proper romantic hero: he was tall, dark, athletic, and handsome, had a great sense of humor, lots of power, and several nifty palaces.  He was kind and considerate of others (not a customary trait in monarchs!), and was known for his exquisite good manners.  He preferred women who were as witty as they were beautiful, loved dogs and horses, and in a time when few aristocratic fathers showed much interest in their offspring, he adored his motley family of illegitimate children, making a point of visiting them all at least once a day. 

Of course, not everything was perfect.  He had a horrible relationship with his mother, always a suspicious omen.  He was easily bored.  He was constantly short of funds, and always having to beg Parliament for money.  He didn’t seem to be able to be sexually faithful to any woman, and he was so habitually promiscuous that he almost certainly was poxed. 

As a ruler, he was an idealistic king, determined to learn from his father’s mistakes.  He was accessible to his people on a daily basis in a way no modern leader ever could be.  Not only was he approachable in the public parks during his daily walks with his small pack of dogs, but also at worship, at the theatres, and sailing or swimming in the Thames.  During the Great Fire, he didn’t flee to the safety of the country like most of his courtiers, but instead joined in fighting the fire himself, even passing buckets of water with the others.  He longed to heal his fractured country with a generous optimism that his headstrong people warily resisted.

But he was also chronically lazy in matters of state, and possibly ADD.  After a conscientious, hard-working start to his reign, he settled into a pattern of unproductive complacency, letting others make most of his political decisions.  He disliked conflict, and preferred to take the easiest course rather than the difficult choices of a successful leader. He relied too much on secret financial subsidies from his cousin Louis XIV, and was prone to listening more to his heart than his head.  He was most likely a secret Catholic, not a wise choice for the leader of the Anglican Church. His reign is generally characterized as one of great charm, but enormous wasted potential.

Loretta: In Royal Harlot, the king and Barbara are larger than life yet completely human.  Their relationship is the stuff of drama, and yet it has its endearingly domestic side.  How did you develop this view of their relationship?  What, apart from the obvious sexual attraction, do you think made this relationship last so long?

Susan: Only the most public encounters between Charles and Barbara are historically documented, and nothing of their private, personal relationship.  That’s when the researcher has to step aside and let the novelist take over.  But it did seem to me that Charles and Barbara were definitely kindred spirits.  Both were young when they lost their fathers violently (Barbara’s died of battle wounds during the Civil War, Charles’s more dramatically was beheaded.)  Both grew to adulthood with a strong senses of loss and melancholy that never quite left them, and gave something of a desperate edge to all the gaiety and merriment of their later lives.  Both were witty, handsome, and widely admired and desired, with all the baggage that so many blessings can bring. (To the right is yet another painting by Lely of Barbara as a goddess.)

Both, too, shared a similar attitude towards sex and passion, and both seemed to require constant variety.  They recognized one anothers’ virtues and flaws, and in return accepted them. 

They were also connected by their five children.  They fussed and worried over them like any other parents, and long after Barbara had left the English court and moved to France, she and Charles exchanged lengthy letters about this daughter’s marriage prospects or that son’s troubles at school that are touching by being so ordinary. (To the left is one of their daughters, Charlotte Fitzroy, with an African boy who was one of her personal servants; it was the fashion among aristocrats for children to have other children as servants, especially exotic, foreign servants -- a symbol of the growing power of the English empire.)

Loretta: This book gives us a glimpse not only of the characters whose story we followed in DUCHESS but of at least one character who's to play a lead role in your next book.  Please tell us about what's coming next and when.

Susan: My next historical novel will be The King’s Favorite, the story of Nell Gwyn.  Though Nell’s “job description” might be the same as Barbara’s (she followed Barbara as Charles II’s mistress), she’s the antithesis of the mighty Lady Castlemaine: a sprightly, diminutive redhead who rose from the streets and brothels of Covent Garden to prominence as a wildly popular actress in the Restoration theatre.  Quick-witted and generous to all, she was blessed with the rare ability both to make Charles laugh, and to win his complete trust.  If Barbara was the drama-queen at court, then Nell was the comedienne. Yet even after Nell became the king’s mistress and friends with others in the court, she never forgot her roots among the common people. (That's Nell to the right, jaunty in a blue fringed cloak.)

The King’s Favorite will be published next summer by New American Library.  Check out the first chapter on my website: www.susanhollowayscott.com.

Loretta: Royal gossip is as popular today as it has ever been.  Royals are still celebrities, after all.  But which of them would you rather read about?  Today's royals, or those of the past?  Can today's Windsor clan hold a candle to the glory-days of the Tudors, the Stuarts, or the Hanovers?  Unlike Charles II, the current Prince Charles has had only one mistress, and it has been considered despicable by many of his subjects.  (Best not to imagine what modern tabloids would make of the Countess of Castlemaine!) Do you think people today hold those in the public eye to a higher standard than in the past? 

The Harlot Interview: Part One

Interview by Loretta Chase

Susan Holloway Scott’s new historical novel, ROYAL HARLOT, A Novel of the Countess of Castlemaine and King Charles II, is a love story and then some.  The “then some” has mainly to do with the Countess of Castlemaine’s extraordinary life and the way she chose to live it. What follows is Part I (Part II appears Friday) of my picking Susan’s brains about the characters and the world she’s so beautifully created...in a book I loved so much that I read it twice. Being a history nerd, I’ve asked historical nerd kinds of questions--but you can ask your own or make your own observations. One of you who does so will win his/her own autographed copy of ROYAL HARLOT.

Loretta: Your July book ROYAL HARLOT again takes us to Restoration England, but this time we start a few decades before the setting of your previous historical novel DUCHESS.  Once again, you’ve done an incredible job of establishing time and place.  To start, I’ll ask you to help set the stage for those of us not very familiar with this era.

Loretta: What and when was the Restoration era?
Susan: The seventeenth century is one of the most complex and contradictory eras in English history.  The Restoration refers to Charles II’s reign (1660-1682) following his ‘restoration’ to the throne after years of exile following the English Civil War.  For nearly a decade, England had been ruled by an army general, Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector, and conservative Protestant extremists  who attempted to “purify” England of frivolous wickedness by banning everything from choral music and stained glass windows in churches to dancing, theatres, bright clothing, and Maypoles.  Many of the aristocratic families were ruined during the Civil War, their properties destroyed or confiscated by the new government, with many fathers and sons killed.  With Cromwell’s death in 1659, the English people decided they’d had enough, and welcomed Charles II back.  With him came the return of a very Merrie Old England.

The Restoration has much in common with other permissive eras that follow a repressive period, such as the Roaring 20s and the Swinging 60s.  (All it’s missing is a snappy modifying gerund.) Barbara typified an entire generation of aristocratic children with royalist sympathies who had grown to adulthood without the stability of homes, families, or an expected position in society.  In the most extreme cases, like Charles himself, they had led impoverished, gypsy-like existences in exile on the Continent.  As a result, many who would once again form a "ruling class" with the Restoration were rootless and wild, and often undereducated as well. (To the left is Charles in his coronation robes.)

Traditional morality went out the window.  Charles hoped England would be a country tolerant of all kinds of people and beliefs. There was a great deal of experimentation, not only in sexual behavior, but also in theatre, science, art, and music, even in fashion.   But like all such times, the high spirits of the Restoration couldn’t last: by Charles’s death, society was exhausted by so much freedom, and the pendulum swung back to a more conservative era under the sterner, more restrictive reigns of James II, William and Mary, and Anne.  It’s a fascinating time, looking forward to the humanist themes of the coming Age of Enlightenment, but still medieval enough for traitors to be hung, drawn, and quartered, their severed heads finally stuck on pikes on London Bridge as cheery warnings. 

Loretta: The court of King Charles II is not only a completely different world from the present-day royal court but from the courts with which a great many of us are somewhat familiar, those of the Georgian and Regency eras.  Would you tell us what that court was like?

Susan: Courts take on the character of their kings and queens, and Charles’s court was no different. Like him, it craved amusement and gratification, and distinctly lacked formality. He liked witty people, and surrounded himself with gentlemen who made him laugh and beautiful women of every class.  There are numerous stories of visiting ambassadors attempting to conduct diplomatic meetings which are interrupted by the appearance of some laughing, half-naked woman, much to Charles’s delight and the ambassador’s shocked disapproval.  But while Charles had great affection for his barren queen, she was marginalized in the court, and his mistresses sat brazenly at Charles’s side.  His courtiers followed his lead, and the social atmosphere was bawdy and promiscuous, and given to all manner of excess.  (That's Catherine of Braganza, Charles's Queen, to the right.)

Yet it was also a place where intellectual adventure was encouraged.  Charles’s time in exile on the Continent had widened his interests beyond those of most English monarchs.  He dabbled in scientific experiments in his own laboratory in the palace, and supported the kind of “new thinking” by men like Isaac Newton.  (To the right is a picture of Charles accepting the first pineapple to be grown in England –– a considerable horticultural feat at the time –– from the kneeling royal gardener who'd nursed the tropical plant along in a greenhouse.) After the Puritan drought, art and music were flourishing.  Charles sponsored one of London’s major theatre companies himself, encouraging new plays and playwrights for the city’s playhouses as well as court masques and entertainments with the same enthusiasm as his ancestor Queen Elizabeth I.  Clearly there was seldom a dull moment at Whitehall Palace.

There were momentous events outside the palace, too.  Charles’s reign saw the last major outbreak of the bubonic plague in England, a devastating epidemic that killed thousands of his subjects, followed soon after by the Great Fire, which destroyed much of London.  Over the same time, there were also several wars with the Dutch, which, though fought largely at sea and not on English lands, were costly both in money and life. 

Loretta: The Royal Harlot is Barbara Villiers, the Countess of Castlemaine, who seems to have been the queen of King Charles II’s many mistresses.  What made you choose this particular woman for your second historical novel?

Susan: In every fiction and nonfiction book I’d read about the Restoration, Barbara is always painted as the blackest villain: ruthless, greedy, shrewish, and manipulative.  Yet she was Charles’s favorite and friend for many years, and he showed her and their children lasting affection until his death. I guessed there had to be more to her than the convenient monster, and that it would be a fascinating challenge to tell her side of the story. (That's Barbara over there to the left in a portrait by Joseph Wright; she's dressed as a shepherdess, complete with a shepherd's crook and a fortune in pearls and sapphires from the King on her gown.)

Loretta: History has not looked kindly on Lady Castlemaine.  Do you think today’s readers are likely to find her more sympathetic or do you think she’ll always be controversial?

Susan: For the last three hundred years or so, the overwhelming majority of historians and chroniclers to address Barbara have been male. Barbara was a beautiful, high-born woman. She was also intelligent, shameless, and direct in her desires –– the infamous “woman of appetites,”  Such women are worrisome to a great many men; they’re unpredictable, challenging, and they don’t do what they’re told.  They make men nervous.

They’re also easy to denigrate: where a man is ambitious, a woman is avaricious.  A man is a shrewd politician, a woman is only a shrew, conniving and manipulative.  A man is forthright, a woman is shrill.  A man is a libertine, a rake, a player, but a woman’s a harlot, a slut, a ho.  Some things don’t seem to change, do they?   

Still, I’d like to think modern readers will be a bit more sympathetic to Barbara.  One doesn’t have to approve her immorality to find it fascinating reading.  As (female) historian Lady Antonia Fraser notes, “Barbara must have been tremendous fun.” (The portrait of Barbara up to the left is by the French painter, Henri Gascar, who had a tendency to make all his sitters look French –– which was likely why he was the favorite artist of Louise de Kerouelle, Duchess of Portsmouth, and another of Charles's mistresses.  It was also reason enough for Barbara, always acutely conscious of any slights or disregard, not to sit for him again.)

Loretta:  What do you think, readers?  Bad girls -- fun or not fun to read about?  Do you think modern readers are more sympathetic to women like Lady Castlemaine than her contemporaries who called her the "Great Imperial Whore"?  Do you believe that there's still a double standard in fiction (and in life as well) –– that heroes can be men of vast sexual experience, while heroines are expected to be either virgins or widows, or at least true to one man?

What about BEING a bad girl? How do you think you'd behave if you were in Barbara's place, riding in that carriage with the king through the gates of Whitehall Palace?  Would you be as bold and daring, or not?

Look for Part Two of the Harlot Interview on Friday!

Upcoming Interviews/Guests

Mark your calendars!  Susan/Miranda has two books out this month:  Seduction of an English Beauty, by Miranda Jarrett, and Royal Harlot, by Susan Holloway Scott.  She'll be talking about her books and the writing life on Monday and Friday, 7/23 and 7/27, so watch for the 2-part interview starting tomorrow.  Fellow Wench Loretta Chase will be the interviewer.

On the following Monday, July 30, our guest will be NY Times and USA Today bestselling author Karen Harper.  Karen writes contemporary suspense, historical, and historical mystery.  Susan/Miranda will be the host for the day.

We Have Two Book Winners!

Cathy Leming, your name was drawn as the winner of Susan/Miranda's Royal Harlot.  Please let Susan/Miranda or me know if you would like a simple autograph, of if you want the book personalized.  Congratulations, Cathy!

"LILinda" you're the winner of a copy of Pat's Mystic Guardian.  Such a deal!  Please let Pat or me know your mailing address and how you want the book autographed, and it's yours!

Hello, Harlot!

By Susan/Miranda

While this week does seem to be the endless Independence Day weekend (you know, the Second-Third-Fourth-Fifth-and-Sixth of July: that holiday), it also marks the release of my second historical novel, Royal Harlot.  Royal Harlot follows the life and career of Barbara Villiers Palmer, Countess of Castlemaine, Duchess of Cleveland (1641-1709), and the most famous/infamous mistress of English King Charles II (1630-85.)  In a way, it’s appropriate to mention Barbara and independence together, for Barbara is certainly one of the most independent women in history. 

Born to a noble family, she took her first lover at 15, married at 18, and became Charles’s lover the following year.  Following his Restoration to the throne, she was the unofficial queen of his bawdy, fun-loving court for nearly a decade, amassing enormous power and wealth along the way. She was feared for her political influence, acclaimed for her beauty, audacity, and wit, and damned from pulpits for her legendary amorality. Despite her long attachment to Charles, neither of them could stay faithful to the other, and like him, Barbara had scores of lovers, from rope-dancers to actors to high-born lords.  She was a lousy wife, but an excellent friend and mother, devoted to her six illegitimate children (all of whom survived to adulthood, a rare achievement indeed.) After their own fashion, I think Charles did love her dearly, and she him: their version of a love story, a friendship, an alliance.  They really were two of a kind.  But Barbara did what she pleased, with whomever pleased her, and she didn’t give a fig for what anyone else thought.

To judge from contemporary diaries, it seems that at least half the men in 17th century London were fantasizing about her at any given time.  And from the way she and Charles took over my writing-life for nearly a year, I’d have to say her power to fascinate is still strong after three hundred years.

As delighted as Barbara would be today to see her story in so many bookstores, I’m sure she would be horrified by her cropped, faceless portrait on the cover. I’ve mentioned here before that while my publisher wanted to use a real portrait of her, they felt that her much-vaunted beauty wouldn’t hold much appeal to modern readers.  Tastes change.  What was hot in 1660 ain’t necessarily so now, and today Barbara’s much-praised “languid eyes” look more drugged than seductive.

Yet Barbara understood the power of image in a thoroughly modern way.  She knew her power lay in her extraordinary beauty, and she knew, too, that the more people who could see her and therefore appreciate that beauty, the more power in turn she’d have as a public figure. 

Early in her relationship with Charles, she sat for artist Sir Peter Lely.  He adored her beauty, and painted her repeatedly, becoming so bewitched by her that other sitters complained he’d given them Barbara’s eyes.  In addition to seeing his portraits of Barbara hung in Palace, Sir Peter also commissioned and sold inexpensive prints of the portraits.  Soon Barbara’s face became as ubiquitous as Paris Hilton’s is to us, with prints hanging in taverns and barracks all over England, as well as in the parlors of people who wished to be fashionable. 

But Barbara’s portraits weren’t simply pretty pictures.  Seventeenth-century portraits often showed their sitters in allegorical poses, as goddesses or Biblical figures, and Barbara, knowing how Charles delighted in clever jests, took care to have Sir Peter pack her portraits with all sorts of hidden meanings.  For her first major portrait in 1661, she posed as the repentant prostitute and saint Mary Magdalene, in the wilderness with her long hair unbound (and a revealing, silver silk-satin dressing gown clasped with jewel brooches, but what else does one wear, really, for repenting in the wilderness?) 

Barbara, of course, was neither saintly nor penitent, which her contemporaries would have understood at once.  Yet they also would have understood the other, more subtle, implications of the painting –– that if Barbara were the Magdalene, then Charles, as the leader of the English Protestant Church, could also be likened to Jesus Christ –– that seem unsettlingly irreligious today.

But Barbara went further.  In 1665, she had Sir Peter paint her without jewels, in the modest blue and red robes of the Virgin Mary. In her arms is the baby Charles Fitzroy, later Duke of Cleveland, her first illegitimate son with the king.  She is also visibly pregnant. As lovely a painting as this is, it managed to be simultaneously blasphemous and yet flattering to Charles (who liked it very much), while also presenting Barbara and her son as part of the Stuart royal dynasty.  Charles was increasingly sensitive to the fact that his wife had yet to give him a much-needed heir, and he was reassured by this visible proof of his own potent virility.  At the same time, the picture was a calculated jab at Charles’s Catholic queen. Catherine of Braganza, showing Barbara as the fertile (very fertile) Protestant Madonna, and a more suitable consort to an English king. 

The 1667 portrait on the cover of Royal Harlot is another calculated allegory, designed to make everyone talk.  This time Barbara appropriates the queen’s own patron saint, posing as St. Catherine of Alexandria with the saint’s palm-front and the wheel of her martyrdom.  Her hand on the suggestive (!!) sword’s hilt represented her readiness to fight for her place at the king’s side, even to the point of usurping the queen.  Wearing decidedly unsaintly jewels (gifts from the king, natch), her voluptuous uncorseted body flaunts her obvious attractions (and the fact that she is again pregnant) in the face of the sallow little queen. 

Barbara’s sly half-smile has a certain “what, can’t you take a joke?” feel to it that somehow makes the picture even more wicked.   Did Charles see the joke, too, or had Barbara finally gone too far?  Ah, you’ll have to read Royal Harlot, and find out for yourself…

Read the prologue for Royal Harlot, and learn how Barbara and Charles first meet.

“Bad Boys” have always been a favorite kind of hero, but “Bad Girl” heroines are relatively few –– especially bad girls like Barbara who are unapologetically bad by choice, not circumstance.  Do you have a favorite fictional (or historical) bad girl?  I’ll give away a copy of Royal Harlot on Sunday night to one of the readers who post to this blog.

Most of these paintings of Barbara come from the wonderful book Painted Ladies: Women at the Court of Charles II by Catherine MacLeod and Julia Marciari Alexander.

Wenches Win!

The Wenches have been busy racking up awards left and right.  We're in some mighty fine company, here!

Milestone:
Congratulations to Susan/Miranda, who just learned from Harlequin/Silhouette that her July book, Seduction of an English Beauty, has earned her a Harlequin 25-Book Milestone Award. Way to go!

Flying Start:
Jo Beverley's new book, Lady Beware, is flying off the shelves so fast that her publisher, NAL, has had to rush to print more copies.  Not only that, Lady Beware has been on the USA Today list for three weeks, the extended NYT list for two, and the Publishers Weekly list for one. Awesome, Jo!

MJP Hits the Lists:
Mary Jo's The Marriage Spell, originally published in hardcover last summer, made the USA Today list after the paperback release.  Good show!

Top Ten:
Loretta and Jo took top honors in All About Romance’s “Top Ten Short Stories,” and Edith and Mary Jo made the “Top Ten Anthologies” list.  There’s just no stopping the Wenches! Here’s the link:  http://www.likesbooks.com/anthologies2007.html

Now, before you go away, be sure to read the next post, below, outlining our July schedule!

July Schedule

Hello!  We have lots of goodies lined up for July. Here's the schedule:

Summer Book Give-Away - The Wenches are doing weekly book give-aways from now through August, targeting subscribers to the e-newsletter.  To sign up, click the newsletter link in the right sidebar.

7/2 - "The Wenches Horse Around" with guest Sherrie Holmes (that's me!). We'll be talking about horses, horses, horses. How far can a horse travel in one day?  Stop by Monday and find out! Got a horse question?  Ask away!

7/4 - Patricia Rice will be interviewed by Susan Holloway Scott (aka Miranda Jarrett) in connection with Pat's July release, MYSTIC GUARDIAN. This is the first book in Pat's Mystic Isle series. Check out her awesome video: http://www.patriciarice.com/

7/7 - Susan Holloway Scott/Miranda Jarrett will be signing books at Turn The Page Bookstore in Boonsboro, MD with a host of other authors.  She'll be wearing her Susan Scott hat as she signs ROYAL HARLOT, and her Miranda Jarrett hat as she signs SEDUCTION OF AN ENGLISH BEAUTY. http://www.ttpbooks.com/

7/13 - "The Wenches Consult Dr. Josh."  Interview with Dr. Josh, who will talk about old time medicine and answer questions. And just in case you wondered, this newly minted doctor is the son of Susan King (aka Sarah Gabriel).

7/23 & 7/27 - Susan Holloway Scott/Miranda Jarrett will be interviewed by Loretta Chase in connection with the release of ROYAL HARLOT-A Novel of the Countess of Castlemaine and King Charles II (Susan Scott) and SEDUCTION OF AN ENGLISH BEAUTY (Miranda Jarrett).

7/30 - Guest Karen Harper will be interviewed by Susan King (aka Sarah Gabriel) in connection with the Karen's INFERNO (contemporary) and THE HOODED HAWK: an Elizabeth I Mystery.

And lastly, don't forget to peek below at the next post!

And the Winner Is....

The winner of the "Roman Holiday" drawing for copies of The Adventurous Bride and Seduction of an English Beauty is Cherie J.––congratulations, Cherie!  If you'll email me or Sherrie your snail-mail address, I'll send those your way. I hope everyone else will be sure they've signed up for the WordWenches mailing list, since we'll be giving away a book every week through August.  See below for details.

I've heard that the link to the first chapter of Seduction in my blog wasn't working earlier this week.  It is now, and if you'd like to check it out, here's the link again: First Chapter Though the official release date for the book isn't until 1July, it's already been spotted in stores, where I hope you'll find it, too. :)

Happy reading, and happy summer!
                                            Susan/Miranda

Wench Appearances

Wenches Pat and Susan/Miranda will be featured at a chat hosted by Coffee Time Romance this coming Tuesday, 6/26.  We'd love to see some Wench fans show up and join the fun!

And if you happen to be in Boonsboro, MD on Saturday, 7/7, please drop by Turn The Page Bookstore and say "hi" to Susan/Miranda, who'll be participating in a joint booksigning along with Nora Roberts, Ruth Ryan Langan, Mariah Stewart, Kathryn Caskie and Sophia Nash. The more, the merrier!

Now . . . read the next post, below, for an announcement regarding the Wench newsletter (and stay tuned for an announcement later today regarding the winner of Susan/Miranda's "Roman Holiday" books!)

Roman Holiday

By Miranda/Susan

Summer’s here, or at least here enough that everyone has the summer-travel-itch.  Our characters are no  exception.  Yes, the majority of historical romances published today take place in London and the counties that surround it, with maybe a junket or two to Bath or Brighton.  But English aristocrats have always been intrepid travelers, even in times when journeys were full of hazard and hardship.  They traveled for education, for amusement, for love, for health, and for escaping creditors or difficult spouses.  They traveled modestly by themselves, with one or two servants or friends, or with huge retinues of footmen, cooks, tutors, relatives, and traveling carriages brought from England.

Writing as Miranda Jarrett, I’m currently in the middle of a three-book series of books loosely titled “Love on the Grand Tour,” following three Georgian ladies on their tour through France and Italy.  The second book in the series, Seduction of an English Beauty, will be released 1 July (which my editor reports is a “landmark book”, my twenty-fifth for Harlequin Historicals and a rarity in these days of publisher-musical chairs!) Seduction takes place in late 18th century Rome, a wonderful place to visit in any century.  Click here for a peek at the first chapter.

Researching historical “road books” is a special challenge.  Places or experiences that fill contemporary travel guides often didn’t exist in 1784, and others that were “can’t miss” destinations to earlier travelers have since vanished.  Fortunately, it seemed that every visitor kept a journal or dairy of their trip, noting every meal, inn, famous site, and crooked innkeeper.

Rome was a favorite destination of English travelers. As the second-largest city in Italy (only Naples was larger), Rome had much to recommend it: great beauty, much edifying art and architecture, agreeable, if expensive, inns and houses, operas and theaters, a favorable climate, and hospitable inhabitants.  Portraits could be painted by one of the numerous painters in the city, and (often dubious) ancient artifacts  procured for the family collection back home. In a time when a good education always included Latin and Greek, the classical ruins of Rome were lessons brought to life.  And for Protestant Englishmen –– particularly impressionable young lords –– there was also the mixed lure of Papal Rome, a beautiful siren to be withstood at all costs, and Roman women, reputed to be among the most seductive in Europe.  Special treats could be arranged, too: for a sizable fee, some of the famous fountains of Rome could be forced to overflow and flood the surrounding streets, so the English visitors could have their carriages driven through the splashing puddles.  Praised one traveler, “Rome is so beautiful that all the rest of Italy seems to me little in comparison.”

Yet just like modern tourists, their 18th century counterparts still found plenty to complain about.  English palates at this point weren’t known for their sophistication (as one Continental wag noted, “the art of cooking as practiced by most Englishmen does not extend much beyond roast beef and plum pudding”), and they howled at unfamiliar Roman food. 

“All over Italy,” whined one English visitor in l7l7, “oil and  garlic are put in every dish.”  Roman cookery seemed too light, too insubstantial, to most English tastes –– “raw ham, Bologna sausages, figs and melons….and the soup is no better than broth.”  Appetites raised by determined sightseeing were doomed to be unsatisfied: “Any Englishman whose stomach is not depraved will soon wish to see a plain, wholesome dish or two of meat a la mode d’Angleterre set before him.”  (Not unlike the homesick college students today willing to pay top tourist-dollar for a Big Mac in Paris.)  On the other hand, nearly all of the traveling English raved about the wines they discovered in Italy, and longed to be able to transport them for their tables back home.

While most visitors found the Roman people to be charming, “full of good breeding and more obliging than any other part of Italy”, the English in particular were shocked by what they perceived as a general lack of industry.  Begging was an art form, and tourists were easy targets.  Tobias Smollet complained that, wherever he went, his carriage was “surrounded by a number of servitori di piazza, offering their services with the most disagreeable importunity."

There’s also a certain smugness to many of the Georgian travelers that unfortunately echoes the complaints modern Europeans make about American tourists.   “If one thing more than another evinces Italian candor and true good nature,” wrote Hester Lynch Piozzi with unabashed satisfaction in her Observations, “it is their generous willingness to be ever happy in acknowledging foreign excellence.” Ouch!

So what does Lady Diana Ferron, the heroine of Seduction of an English Beauty, discover on her visit to Rome?  She learns to drink the local red wine instead of afternoon tea.  She tours the Coliseum, the Forum, and the Catacombs, tosses coins in the Fontana Trevi, and attends the opera at the Teatro delle Dame.  Best of all, she finds adventure and loses her heart to a handsome, unsuitable Roman gentleman.  Sounds like a great summer vacation to me!

Now what about your plans for the summer?  Do you like to experience new things, see new sights, try new food?  Do your summer trips always involve junkets to museums or historical spots, or would you rather unwind with the familiar, and happily veg out in delicious peace?

If you’re interested in reading more, check out Ladies of the Grand Tour by Brian Dolan; The Grand Tour: The British Abroad in the Eighteenth Century by Jeremy Black, and Rome: Biography of a City by Christopher Hibbert.  The paintings illustrating this blog are by Gaspar van Wittel (1653-1736), whose glorious landscapes of Rome were highly prized by 18th century English tourists, who took them home to add to the private art collections of many a country house.

**Oops, I almost forgot the contest!  I'll be drawing a name at random to win the first two books in the "Love on the Grand Tour" series: The Adventurous Bride and Seduction of an English Beauty.  All you have to do to enter is post a comment to this blog by Friday.  The winner of the books will be announced here on Sunday.  Good luck! **

Wench Appearances

6/18:  Mary Jo - Guest at Plot Monkeys

6/19:  Loretta - Guest at Romance Readers at Heart

6/26: - Pat, Susan/Miranda - Chat at Coffee Time Romance

The Wenches are gadding about the Internet again!  Please feel free to drop in at any of the above Web sites and say howdy, leave a comment, or join in a chat.  We'd love to see you!  Thanks, as always, for your loyal support.  See you on the guest circuit!

This Noisy Old World

By Susan/Miranda

Writers and noise are not a good combination.  While some of us write to carefully chosen music and others prefer as much peaceable silence as is possible, no writer enjoys the general racket of modern life.  Nothing can wither a perfectly good visit from a Muse faster than a monstrous trash truck, working its thumping and crashing way up the street.  Teenagers cranking up rap music, weed-whackers and power-washers, high-decibel fire sirens and low-flying aircraft, all play havoc with writerly concentration. 

And there’s at least one Wench (who, me?) who has been known to charge outside in her bathrobe to confront mystified lawn-crews with leaf-blowers about their misguided commitment to blast every last blade of new-mown grass to ear-splitting oblivion.

Modern folk like to think of this general din as one of the banes of contemporary life, another of our special crosses to bear for being so technologically advanced.  “Noise pollution”, we call it, a splendidly polysyllabic term for something our more peaceful great-grandparents wouldn’t recognize.

Ah, but we history-geeks know otherwise.  The past –– especially the urban past –– was one noisy place.  True, the noises were a very different sort, but the distraction was there just the same.  A famous 18th century illustration by William Hogarth called “The Enraged Musician” shows an earlier creative-type, pitifully tormented by the sounds of the London street outside his open window.

I’ve always tried hard to incorporate sound into my writing, one more way to evoke the past.  Yet it seems my imagination has fallen far short of reality.  I’ve just discovered a splendid new non-history book (oh, be still my history-nerd heart!) called Hubbub : Filth, Noise, & Stench in England, 1600-1770 by Emily Cockayne (Yale University Press, 2007).

This is not history for the faint of heart, or the weak of stomach, either.  (All the following examples and quotes come from Hubbub.) Stuart & Georgian Londoners would have had to contend with constant traffic noise: metal-bound wheels and shod horses against paving stones, squeaking, creaking wagons and carriages, trumpets to herald arrivals and departures of coaches, and the bellowed oaths of drivers and footmen.  Traffic noise was so bad that by the late 18th century, city churches and court houses were being designed without windows on the street levels in an attempt to quiet the spaces within.

Each morning terrified livestock was herded through the streets to market and slaughter, but hundreds of other unneutered animals ran wild through the city: stray dogs, spit dogs, and family pets alike played and barked and fought.  Squabbling cats were also everywhere.  So were goats and squealing pigs, and even city-dwellers were awakened by roosters before dawn.  Early morning was also the time when the dog-skinners (I cannot begin to fathom a market for dog-skins, but then our ancestors were far more unsentimentally resourceful than we) were chasing down yelping strays.

Peddlers and vendors of every kind shouted their wares, striving to outdo one another.  Apparently the pleasing sing-song cries of legend often degenerated into wordless roars.  Milk-sellers were particularly known for their shrillness, and the writer Joseph Addison noted one seller who became infamous for her “inarticulate scream.”  There were also frequent noisy brawls between vendors over sales turf, fights that were encouraged as free sport by cheering spectators.

Scores of church bells in the city rang for services, deaths, fires, and celebrations, and to tell the time.  Street musicians played fiddles, whistles, flutes, and hurdy-gurdys, or simply sang; a loud, piercing voice was highly prized. Puppet shows, jugglers, acrobats, and other street performers added another layer of sound.  Trumpets and drums were used to “drum up” an audience, and were also employed by the recruitment officers for the navy and the army outside of taverns.   Politicians, charlatans, and itinerant preachers alike made impromptu speeches on street-corners and from balconies and windows. 

Land and real estate was valuable, and most houses for rich and poor alike shared common walls.  Without the muffle of 21st century curtains, sound-proof tiles, or wall-to-wall carpeting, voices echoed freely in most rooms and into the next.  Add to that the open windows (before modern houses became so hermetically sealed for “climate control”), and there wouldn’t have been many secrets left between neighbors.

London was a growing city, and the sounds of construction were everywhere: hammering and sawing carpenters and roofers may not have had high-pitched power-tools, but they still contributed their share of noise.  Other trades that involved striking like blacksmiths, masons, tinsmiths, coopers and coppersmiths added the clanging sounds of hammers on metal, while the rumbling grinding of mill-wheels was literally so deafening that the stereotypical miller had lost his hearing entirely.

The “great guns” (cannons) near the Tower of London were fired to celebrate royal births, weddings, victories, and other holidays.  Shooting off muskets was a more common “noisemaker” that needed little excuse, and grand displays of fireworks (from the pleasure gardens of Vauxhall and Ranleigh as well as for civic displays) routinely exploded into the night sky over the city. More ominously, the broadsides exchanged at sea between the Dutch and English ships during the Dutch wars of the late 17th century were so loud that they could clearly be heard like distant thunder in London.   

Things weren’t much quieter after dark, either. Watchmen with rattles or bells cried the hour throughout the night. “I start every hour from my sleep,” complained one visitor, “at the horrid noise of the watchmen bawling the hour through every street, and thundering at every door; a set of useless fellows, who serve no other purpose but that of disturbing the repose of the inhabitants.”  Curfews were often created, and seldom enforced.

And in a city full of ale-houses, rumshops, and taverns that were serving customers well past midnight, those celebrants stumbling home in the wee hours contributed to the noise, too.  “Great hallowing and whooping in the Fields,” noted one sleep-deprived gentleman, “by such Persons who have spent the Day Abroad, and are now returning home Drunk.”

Relative peace doesn’t seem to have arrived until three or so in the morning, when the “Whores, Bullies, and Thieves have retir’d to their Apartments; noisy drunken Mechanicks are got to their Lodgings; Coachmen, Watermen, and Soldiers are mostly asleep.”  But by then, it’s not long until dawn, when the markets and trades come back to exuberant life, and begin the whole day’s cycle all over again.

You know, maybe those leaf blowers aren’t so very bad after all . . . .

So what sounds vex you the most?  What modern "convenience" sound would you like to banish from the earth?  Or do you simply slip on the headphones to that ultimate machine of convenient sound, the iPod, and blot everything else out?

Getting Naked With the Wenches, Part III

In which the Wenches digress from ladies in the bath to Lord Byron in canals of Venice, along with a few naked Frenchmen, English kings, and Greek kouroi for good measure....

SS: Loretta, you're the Byron expert here, and I know Lord B. liked to swim.  Have you any idea of what he was wearing while he explored the, ah, beaches around Greece?

LC: My instinct is to answer that Byron would of course swim naked, no matter where he was.  Swimming, he couldn't hide his deformed foot, so what would be the point of hiding anything else?  He really was more Georgian in his thinking than what we think of as Regency, and even for his time, he was pretty wild.  He was also very direct in his speech, noting, after the outraged reaction to Don Juan, "...the outcry has frightened me.-I had such projects for the Don--but the Cant is so much stronger than C--t [meaning the other monosyllable]--now a days..."   So I simply cannot imagine him swimming in anything but the altogether.

JO: We really do miscalculate the early 19th century in this respect, I think. In many ways it was still very Georgian, very bawdy and free-spirited, but changing rapidly, leading to conflicts. Byron is probably a prime example.

LC: I will see if I can find out exactly what Byron did or didn't wear--he swam Venice's Great Canal, too, BTW, in a race with somebody--but swimming attire is one of those taken-for-granted aspects of life men seldom bothered to mention in their letters & journals.  Today, OTOH, we women at least might mention a style of swimsuit we prefer, and which men, if any, should wear Speedos--but today it's taken for granted that one wears swimwear, except on a nude beach.

SS: My guess would be that he was especially proud of his swimming ability because, unlike running,his deformity wasn't a factor in the water.  Of course, he found plenty of other places where it wasn't an issue, either. *g*

My favorite King Charles was a famous (or notorious?) swimmer, often rising at five to go swimming in the Thames while his attendants shivered on the riverbank.  No mention of what he was wearing, though; would a king go skinny-dipping in the middle of London?

EL: King Charles ll would go skinny dipping anywhere he wanted to.

There's a reason he's just about my fav monarch.

LC: As to King Charles II--I am with Edith in thinking if anyone could be buck naked in the Thames, it would be the king--and he's my favorite, too.

SS: I think it's pretty safe to say that Charles certainly did.  Whenever his appearance is described by contemporaries, his great height (he was over six feet tall, towering over most of his 17th century subjects) and the proportionate size of the rest of him were great cause for wonder, and national pride as well.  When Lord Rochester wrote of the king "Nor are his high desires above his strength/His sceptre and his [you can fill in the word, oh, worldly Wench readers] are of a length", no one questioned the earl's statement.

And yes, Edith, he's my favorite king, too. *g*

JO: As I see it they had a completely different attitude to male nudity, which was part of the reason for keeping some areas/activities for men only. These romantic heroines who absolutely insist on invading such places probably got some surprises. Again, somewhere, I have a print of boys swimming in the Thames, all starkers, and I'm sure I've come across references to men swimming naked in rivers and such. There were no approved swimming clothes and why get something wet?

I have this French picture of swimmers, and I can't figure out what they're wearing as it's hardly standard underwear, but swim trunks? I do wonder if they were painted on later. Any votes?

I also have references to "open" bathing in Brighton (without a bathing hut), for both men and women, on different and widely separated beaches. It's not clear whether they bathed naked or in very light clothing (which when wet would be as good as) but it was considered indecent and outlawed in 1806. The following implies to me that he was naked.

One man did it anyway. From the Morning Herald, August 28th 1806. "The greatest novelty, however, that this part of the coast exhibited this morning was in a gentleman undressing himself on the beach for the purpose of a ducking, in front of the town, attended by his lady, who sans diffidence, supplied him with napkins, and even assisted him in wiping the humid effects of his exercise from his brawny limbs, as he returned from the water to dress." (Quoted in BRIGHTON IN THE OLDEN TIMES by John George Bishop, , 1892.) He was fined five pounds, quite a hefty sum then, which seems to have discouraged the practice, but not obliterated it. Also, on the men's beach, even using machines, it was often possible to see the bathers. (They didn't usually swim, merely take a "dipping." Which is why the gender segregated beaches were off limits, and also why telescopes were popular with the ladies as well as the gentleme -- especially before the bylaw!

LC I found a 1789 print of King George III sea bathing (the scene is Weymouth) in what seems to be the altogether (Note bathing machines in background.  Note his shaved head.

LC:  And here are women sea bathing at Brighton.

SK: There's the Rembrandt painting of Hendrijcke Stoffels, his common-law wife, going for a dip in a pool -- her clothes are slung on a rock behind her, and she's wading into the water with her shift hiked up. No skinny-dipping going on there. And naked in bed, or not -- there's another by the same artist showing a woman in bed -- she's wearing a shift, with shoulder and arm exposed. Rembrandt's a good source because he's often painting what he sees, even with posed models, so real life details are very reliable.

There's always lots of nakedness in art, natch -- and young ladies in the 19th c. would naturally see it, and be free to examine great works of art, despite the amount of anatomical correctness on display. Oooooooh let's go look at the Greek statues....  *g*

SS: Maybe during the Regency, but by high Victorian times, it's a different story.  The mid-19th century marks  the appearances of fig leaves and extra drapes added to museum statues.  Women artists were forbidden to sketch nudes, and banned from life drawing classes.  Art collections were definitely segregated, too, with certain exhibitions not open to the ladies.  Even in the much more open 18th century, the true connissieurs of classical art with a naked or erotic turn were all gentlemen and their collections very private, with no ladies allowed to the party.  Like these gentlemen in 1781 -- "Charles Towneley and His Friends" by Johann Zoffany, who are most properly dressed to study the naked classical stautes.

JO: Just as a counterpoint, I do have this photo of a very erotic statue from the Lady Lever Gallery. I think it's Victorian, but I'm not sure right off hand and I don't know where it was displayed. Lacking in anatomical detail, though. Who was it -- Ruskin? -- who was shocked to find his wife had pubic hair?

SS: Yeah, Ruskin.  Supposedly that was enough of a shock on his wedding night to make him swear off his new wife entirely.  One wonders what her reaction must have been to HIM.

SK: Egyptian wall paintings, Greek vases (anatomically correct), and of course lots of erotica in Greek and Roman art, no modesty gettin' in the way there. Though it's questionable whether some of the stronger stuff would be available to Regency heroines, for example. Earlier we talked about medieval bath scenes...in medieval art, couples were sometimes shown in sexual situations, though they're mostly demure images of lovers tucked snug in bed, though with a trace of raunchy now and then.

And there's the well-known February image from Tres Riches Heures -- a man and a woman warm themselves by the fire, revealing themselves as buck-naked under their clothing and not too worried about letting it all hang out, while the lady with them is much more demure, keeping her knees (and crotch) covered. So there's a class difference in attitudes of modesty recorded by the artist.

Nudity was prevalent in the Renaissance, of course -- just lots of respect for and curiosity about the body. In every era there are erotic and pornographic images produced (the Italians being real champs at this, and the French and even the English no slouches either), so it's almost impossible to make a blanket statement about they did, or they didn't, show nudity and nekkidness in art in this, that, era.

Mary Jo asked about pre-Raphaelites and so on -- the classical images and excuses prevail where nudity is concerned, and otherwise they're covering up where they can.

While we're talking nakedness, a word about the Scots (since I write Scottish most of the time) -- there's always the tired old joke, and natural curiosity, concerning what Scotsmen wear, or wore, under their kilts. Some of the time nothing at all, yes it's true. Some of the time, black or dark underwear (modern guys). Early on, since shirts were long and multi-purpose garments, shirttails were often wrapped fore and aft (diaper style--not very sexy but nonetheless the case) -- and tucked up to be held in place by the belted plaid.

As Susan Miranda pointed out in her Shirt Blog, there's a reason shirts were changed and laundered often. There's a clan battle well-known in Scottish history, Blar na Leine, traditionally known as Field of the Shirts-- the Highlanders on both sides stripped away their plaids and fought in their shirts, or completely naked on a hot July day in 1544. This shows the freedom that Scotsmen felt, even in the 16th c., to strip down and go at it like ancient Celtic warriors (who were known for fighting stark naked.

And Scottish women, who were often described as very modest but affectionate in greeting in every century, including the 19th, would very often be seen with bare feet -- even well-born ladies on occasion (such as the Duchess of Queensberry, but she mostly did whatever she wanted). ;)

Jo: One of the travelers to England in the early 19th century noted that children were nearly always barefoot. So many lovely details, some of which I deliberately ignore when writing because they would at least distact and maybe dismay the reader, who I want to be lost in my story.

SS: Most children in America were barefoot, too, esp. in summer, and well into the 20th century.  Shoes were expensive, and as every parent can testify, those little feet sure do grow fast! 

JO: It's true we can include more historical detail in a historical novel, but I'm really talking about the jarring detail. It might be true, but the reader is disrupted enough to be jerked out of the story. Of course, if we've created great trust, they'll absorb and read on, fascinated. We can hope.

LC: Re naked bathing:
Well, I've seen the ladies in the bathtubs, in their shifts, with the tubs draped with linens.  But there's more to bathing.

Early in Vic Gattrell's CITY OF LAUGHTER, there's a Gillray print of 1782, showing Lady Worsley bathing. This is not a bathtub but one of those step-down baths--like a swimming pool--usually found in outbuildings. She's holding a cloth in front of her nether regions, but she's otherwise naked--and her husband has hoisted another man onto his shoulders so the other guy can peek through a high window at Lady Worsley. The print is titled "Sir Richard Worse-than-Sly, Exposing his Wifes Bottom---O Fye!" This print was published during the Worsley divorce case.

JO: One of the quotes I found relates to that voyeur/bathing scandal. "It was proven, for example, that at the Bath in Maidstone, Worsley had raised Bissett upon his shoulders so that Bissett could view his naked wife bathing." (This is from TRIALS OF LOVE, the guidebook to a Valentine's Day exhibit at the Harvard Law Library. This has led to a database, but at a quick glance I don't see how to access it. Can anyone here figure it out? I'm pressed for time right now. Studies In Scarlet database) I can't find any more yet about a baths along the lines of the ones in Bath, at Maidstone. It's clear the event took place at a public baths, but some people did have those "Roman Baths" in their houses. They were quite the thing. I used that in Dragon's Bride.

LC: According to CITY OF LAUGHTER's Introduction (it deals with 18th century through Regency, mainly), "People do appear to have experienced their bodies differently then.  Both sexes dressed their bodies differently from us, and they thought about and had sex differently also (less nudity and orality and more standing up than today, it seems)."  The authors sees a change in attitude--increased taboos, prudery--in and after the 1820s, which I, too, feel was the case.  Regarding positions and how much clothing, here's a link to some Rowlandson erotica (BE WARNED:  These are explicit).

There's another naked lady in CITY OF LAUGHTER.  This print is from 1803, artist anonymous.  It's four panels.  "A Backside and Front View of a Modern Fine Lady...or the Swimming Venus of Ramsgate."  Again, it's not a lady in a bathtub.  But this is interesting, because I was under the impression that women wore bathing dresses in the sea.

Then we have NYMPHS BATHING, 1810, another anonymous artist--and a cruel one.  Ten naked women, all with less than nymph-like figures, again at the sea (or perhaps a lake).

SS:   Oh, this is such a FANTASTIC book, Loretta! (City of Laughter: Sex & Satire in Eighteenth-Century London by Vic Gatrell) Anyone who's interested in this time period should really get thee posthaste to a copy of their own.  The scores of illustrations and images are often shown for the first time, and in beautiful, lavish color.  And where else will you find examples of the bawdy jokes printed in late 18th century ladies's magazines? Highly readable, and highly reccommended. 

City of Laughter

JO: There's more in Trials of Love that relevant here.

From the trial of Georgina Ann Fawkener for adultery with the Rt Hon. John, Lord Townsend c 1791 "Though he had not witnessed any act of adultery, Pezzy (a servant) deposed that he believed the two to have 'slept naked and alone in the one and the same bed together…'"

Viscountess Elmore for adultery with the Earl of Ancram, c 1793
These lovers went off together to Calais, so I don't suppose the details were in much doubt, but their cook there deposed that "the whole of the said time slept in one and the same bed together naked and alone."

There's a formula to this "naked and alone" that suggests that sleeping together wasn't complete proof, especially if others were there, too. That makes sense, given that travelers often did that if beds were scarce. (Something else not exploited in romances as best I know.) So, sharing a bed wouldn't clinch it if they had clothing on or others were present. They might consider underwear "naked", but I don't think so.

LC:  Given the OED definitions, I'm guessing that some of the couples were nude and some were not.  We really can't be positive what they meant by naked--or even nude, considering that so many equated Grecian costume with nudity. Still, even sleeping together wearing only an undergarment would be incriminating.  At this point, my feeling is--as with so much else--one cannot make a pronouncement, beyond "Some did and some didn't sometimes and sometimes not."  And so we needn't clothe our heroines for a bath, and it's OK for H/H to get naked together.

SS: One more illustration from 1822 -- "Making Decent" by George Cruikshank -- from CITY OF LAUGHTER to demonstrate the coming prudishness of the Victorian age.  A tiny crusading Mr. Wilberforce tries to hide the genitals of the giant nude statue of Achilles in Hyde Park with his hat.  The caption reads: "A hint to the Society for the Suppression of Vice...This print commemorative of Anglo French brass and true British chastity, is inscribed with veneration to that worthy man Mr. Willbyforce who with saintlike regard for the morals of his country has undertaken to make the above figure decent from 10 in the mg. till dusk." 

Yes, the cartoon's in jest, but it sure looks like the bawdy ol' times of the Regency and earlier are coming to an end....

SK: A very good example would be the Elgin marbles, which I think were in  place in the British Museum in 1816, certainly known in engravings before that date. The heroic nude males of the pediments and metopes would be highly instructive sights for Regency ladies, and it would be sooooo very proper to appreciate them...and worthy of not only viewing, but sketching, too, enabling the ladies to study them freely in detail. Kouroi figures in museum collections would also be excellent examples of male nudity, and likely to raise female curiosity. One of the hallmarks of the Kouroi is that they are young men, where a good number of the Elgin dudes are more mature men.

The Elgin Marbles were a very big deal at the time they were put in place, with crowds lining up to see these things, stolen out of Greece with nary a flicker of conscience. *g* Nor were they the only examples of nude sculpture. It would be nearly impossible for ladies to avoid seeing male nudity in art, as Jo points out, with grand house collections of fine art. Library collections would have them too, since engravings in books were a major way to view great art. Greek, Roman, Renaissance, Baroque, there were nude boys and men all along the way, as we've all pointed out in our blogs.

Engravings of the Sistine, of the Florence David, of Bernini and Donatello, etc., would be very instructive, but wow, there's nothing like that 3D sculpture experience. There had to be a good proportion of young ladies in the Brit Mus crowds, perhaps told to look away by their guardians and escorts--and of course many young ladies might have peeked. Sketching art was popular and approved, too, wasn't it?

The Romans could sometimes be prudish, adding fig leaves and strategic drapery to copies of Greek originals, and there was plenty of Roman art about in Europe and Britain by the 19th century. But in genuine ancient Greek art, the Greeks went for the whole enchilada without qualm. With more Greek art finding its way into Britain--ahh, very nice education! (btw, one way to ID a Roman copy of a Greek original -- look for the tree trunk growing out of the leg; when copying, Roman engineer-brains didn't always trust the physics of the pieces, although the Greek sculptures, especially peak Hellenistic pieces, might have been standing without props, beautifully balanced, for centuries). Anyway, all very illuminating for proper young heroines!

JO: That's the sort of "exposure" I meant for our Regency ladies. So very educational! Come to think of it, even in my younger days such works of arts were much appreciated.*G*

PR: And so comes an end to the Wenches' First Naked Anniversary!  I hope all of you have enjoyed the illuminating repartee in our exclusive salon.  We have certainly enjoyed the company and hope you will continue to return to add to the general merriment.  Have a wonderful weekend, one and all!

Getting Naked With the Wenches, Part II

Still inspired by Kay's question about whether or not 19th century ladies (and their earlier sisters) got naked for bathing, the Wenches continue:

SS: While the current crop of misbehaving Hollywood actresses seem to believe they invented the art of revealing too much, nude pictures of celebrity women are hardly new.  There's a 1570 portrait by Clouet of Diane de Poitiers, the favorite of the French King Henry II, that shows her quite unabashedly naked (and in a draped tub, too.) 

My historical novels are set in 17th century England, during the reign of Charles II.  For the first time women were allowed on the English stage, and those actresses were also quick to exploit their celebrity by having themselves painted with bared breasts, or even entirely nude -- something no respectable lady would dream of doing.  Even among the royal mistresses, there was a hierarchy of how much was revealed.  If you'd moved from the stage to the palace (like Nell Gwyn or Moll Davis), then you could pretty much display all your wares in your portraits.  But if you were a lady by birth (like the Countess of Castlemaine, my heroine in Royal Harlot, shown over there on the right as some sort of quasi-goddess), you were painted fully covered, but without any undergarments beneath that thin layer of silk and with breasts threatening to tumble out, so that very little was left to the imagination.

Here's a painting by Sir Peter Lely of Nell Gwyn as Venus. She was an actress, and common-born mistress to Charles II, which gave her two excuses to be shown nude. Not only did the king hang this painting in his dressing chamber where the queen unhappily saw it, but Nell invited a small crowd of male friends to drop in to the artist's studio while she was posing. A popular girl, Nell.  I can think of other royal mistresses painted in various degrees of undress as well as ladies coyly playing at being goddesses in revealing drapery, but I can't think of any men, gentlemen or rogues, who had their portraits done sans clothes.  Can anyone else?

MJP: Not that I can think of.  But in that era, men were pretty much power and money objects, not sex objects.  Portraits would show their wealth, not their probably flabby abs.

JO:I'm pretty sure I've seen a couple of portraits done in classical robes, probably late 18th century, but I can't find any now. Anyone know any?

SS:  I did think of a prominent male who liked being naked, and he sure wasn't a royal mistress.  Supposedly American founding father Benjamin Franklin was a great believer in "air baths": each morning upon rising, he would remove all his clothes and sit in the middle of his bedchamber for an hour with as much fresh air as he could tolerate, depending on the season.  No visual on that, please! *g*

Jo: Definitely not. There are plenty of almost naked Renaissance men, of course, especially representing gods. Venus and Adonis? This one is by Goltzius, 1614. Not quite naked, but the sort of thing an upper class lady could see on the walls of her family's home. 

But real people, ever noticed how few young hunks had their portraits painted? When they were older, they weren't about to expose their wrinkly flesh and flab, were they?

I have a late 18th century, I think, French print of swimmers where the men are wearing shorts that look painted on over nakedness. Actually, I have references to men bathing naked in Brighton, which is why the male beach was off limits, and also why telescopes were popular with the ladies. I think they stopped it by the Regency period, but at least one man did it anyway in protest.

As I understand it, men generally swam naked.

SS: Here's one of the more famous 19th century paintings of naked guys swiming, by Thomas Eakins.  They were Americans, but I imagine there's not much national difference. *g*

PR: My thoughts exactly. It's not as if historically men watched their waists, and outside of the few young bucks at Gentleman Jackson's, there wasn't much in the way of gyms. So that big shirt hid a multitude of sins but could quickly drown an inexperienced swimmer.

Despite culture, people are people. If it was hot, I assume they'd strip down in privacy unless they wanted to hide their flaws from their partners or---mostly in the case of women, I suspect, but not entirely---unless they were excessively modest.  It's not nakedness but modesty and how one feels about one's body that predicts the cultural norm.  If one is surrounded by servants, a modest tent of cloth of some type might be required by an upper class woman, an older woman, or one raised to be modest about her body. A woman in the habit of following sheep into the river to shear them is not likely to be as modest as a woman who has never allowed anyone to see her in anything less than silk or lace.

And just think about male hang ups!  Ones that think they're excessively well-endowed are probably much more likely to jump naked into the river on a hot summer day and encourage others to do the same. But that "hot summer day" bit precludes most of England, most of the time, so the temptation simply wouldn't be there often.

Personally, considering how many times a day the upper classes changed clothes, I'd think they'd get excessively tired of it after a while. And if bathing wasn't a convenient option, why bother stripping? I think we'd have to investigate sexual attitudes, preferences, and knowledge in historical periods just to see if they even bothered with much foreplay.  Really, we've been applying our own modern concept of sex to our historicals, but the truth is probably far cruder in normal cases outside the Don Juan types.

SS: Ah, I did think of another! There's a larger-than-lifesize statue of George Washington by Horatio Greenough in the Smithsonian that shows the first president bare-chested and classically heroic (if more than a little silly.)

Jo: That need to put great men in a classical context could lead to peculiarities, couldn't it? *G* I think that having servants would take some of the edge off a fixation on modesty per se. I mean, would a woman really go behind a screen rather than change her shift in front of one or two maids? Very few, I'd guess.

And as well as paintings, they were surrounded by all those classical statues. I used that element in my first book, Lord Wraybourne's Betrothed, where Jane had been raised quietly and modestly in a strictly Christian home. Her first look at a classical statue was quite a shock.

This all depends on the period, of course. We've always got to be very careful not to impose Victorianisms onto the Regency. We have so much more primary material from that era. It did take a very weird turn.

Much of the Regency was closer to the Georgian than the Victorian, especially in the upper class.

LC:  I do agree with this.  I think there's confusion with the Victorian period because our doyenne of the Regency was Georgette Heyer, writing from the late Victorian/Edwardian POV.

SS: You're totally right, Loretta. Modern readers often forget that Heyer is writing about the past from her time period, and her pov is inevitably filtered through it -- the curse of every writer writing about a time other than her own. Jane Austen, writing during and about her own time, is far less squeamish.

MJP: As for nakedish males in paintings--SK, can you think of any? Maybe among the Pre-Raphaelites?  As an example of the opposite, I'm thinking of a well known late-19th century painting (I think) that shows a mixed group picnicking by a pond, and the men are in full Edwardian gear and the women are naked, IIRC.  Most men--and most male painters--like looking at and painting nekkidy females.

SS: I'm not sure if this was meant to be an art history exam-question or not, but I'll bite.  The painting you mean must be "Dejeuner sur l'herbe" by Manet, and in fact it did cause a huge scandal when it was first shown.  One of the men was Manet's brother, another artist, and the  woman was Manet's favorite model, so as I recall this was supposed to be a picnic-break in the middle of painting.  So at least she has a reason for being naked -- though of course there are few careers further beyond the respectable pale than being an artist's model.

MJP: Ah, that's the one!  Thank you.  I figured one of the art historians would know it.  But I'm not buying that she had a reason to be naked other than the fact that's what the artist wanted.

SS: Nor do I.  The artists are male and the patrons are male, so of course there are going to be many more naked women than naked men.  ::sigh::

MJP: Hmm, interesting. I went to Google to see a larger image of the painting, and I see that the woman in the background is in a shift, albeit more or less transparent.  Perhaps that supports the theory that even when swimming or bathing, women were usually covered. Looking at the picture, I can't help thinking that, depending on the weather, either the women are going to be cold or the men are going to feel hot with all those clothes on....

SS: OK, Regency-writers, I'll ask your opinion on a notorious naked vs. clothed question. What about the Regency women who supposedly dowsed their muslin gowns with water to make them transparent to the point of nudity?  True, or only historical gossip?

JO: Exaggeration, at least. Like many fashion extremes, one person does it, and later people think everyone did. We only have to look at fashion magazines today to see that it's not exactly representing normal dress.

LC:  From ENGLISHWOMEN’S CLOTHING IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY “When the first engravings of the Grecian costume--as nudity was called--were brought to England, they shocked every modest woman; and it was not thought proper to look at them in the presence of gentlemen.”  They do not identify the quotation source, saying only that it was written retrospectively in 1818.

The Cunningtons do make the point elsewhere that some hysterical references to shocking fashions are not reliable--shocked people can exaggerate--and I do suspect the damped muslins is an urban myth, though maybe one or two "fast women" or harlots did it.  Also, they and other costume experts point out that the Grecian or “classical” style of clothing (that we consider Regency style) certainly did look like nudity compared to the dress of previous decades.  Here’s an illustrative print.

PR: The wenches will get down and dirty--or squeaky clean--on Friday, the final part of our naked dialogue.  But I can't resist Loretta's comment above--shocked people can exaggerate. Boy, can they ever! They say "damn" in GWTW! They write sex scenes in romances! What other "shocking" references can you think of?

Getting Naked With the Wenches, Part I

Jo here, but It's our anniversary, so we're heading into a special week. Yes, it's been a full year of heroic journey, goal, motivation and conflict, learning and growing. All that good stuff in fiction, some of which we'd rather avoid in real life.*G* But we've survived and enjoyed, and we hope the readers here have, too. If there was a highlight of the year, let us know in a comment below. If you're a lurker who never posts, uncloak and speak. There will be prizes!

We Wenches thought we'd do a combined blog for this event, and run it all week, and we've settled on the subject of nakedness in the past -- the fiction and the non-fiction -- sparked by a reader question. I hope you enjoy the following and please, share your comments and insights, including on the crucial question -- in fiction, do you prefer accuracy on this point, or behavior more in sync with modern ways?