Avoidance

Hi, here's Jo, putting up a hasty Wench blog, because tomorrow morning I'll be leaving the house quite early to go to Exeter to the dentist.

With the time difference -- England is 5 hours ahead of the Eastern US -- I can, if I want, put up my blog in the morning when North Americans are still asleep. But not tomorrow. And I forgot to prepare. But no, I wasn't procrastinating; simply overlooking the practicalities.

So first, about things I skirt around when I write historicals.

The biggie -- dentistry. Or the lack of. There's no aspect of it that's good in the past, IMO. Treatment was unpleasant. Not getting treatment was unpleasant. Queen Elizabeth I suffered from rotten teeth for most of her later years. One of the pharoes died of an infected tooth.Charlie and Billy are celebrating not having any teeth at all. Though they've been known to look longingly at pizza.

Mind you, it's interesting to wonder how many people had good teeth. Apparently some people are naturally resistant to dental caries, so they don't get cavities. 

There's also the question of uneven teeth. I had a debate with another writer once because she claimed that even teeth were an anachronism before orthodonty. That's silly. For one thing, I have even teeth and braces never came near my mouth.

So on that basis, my characters all have cavity-free, even teeth. So there.

There's an article here that supports some of my rose-tinted view, though some of the treatments mentioned support it in another way!

What are the okay bodily details?

My characters do use the chamber pot or convenient bushes if appropriate -- or a close stool as shown for preference -- and my female characters menstruate if the story lasts longer than a month and they're not pregnant or strongly breastfeeding. And if they're breastfeeding, they will sometimes leak milk.

You can have a close stool of your own. That one is from a company that makes reproductions of all sorts. A fascinating collection. Click here.

The occasional reader prefers that such things don't get a mention in a romance.

So what are the day-to-day things you prefer not to see in a historical romance.

And are there some you prefer to see, where you notice the lack?

Here on the south Devon coast we've had virtually no snow, but we now have a hard frost. It's quite pretty, but it can go now. *G* Come to think of it, I don't have many romantic snow scenes in my books. I much prefer blossoms and birds.

Cheers,

Jo

 

 

 

 

 

Comments

[Janice]

I don't mind hero or heroine visiting the necessary, but any scene between them had better be on the way there, or on the way back. I never want to read a scene in it. I can't imagine any way in which that could be made to be romantic (well, maybe Carla Kelly could get away with it). Besides, that's such a vast cliche on TV - it seems all TV cops & politicos adjourn to the men's room for their significant conversations. Cynics have said that males cannot hold a coherent conversation when their willies are being touched, but apparently this is not the case.

I also don't much like to read yucky details of someone's wounds or illness; I know there's an artistic purpose for some writers when they go into detail, and I appreciate that, but I'm old enough to have become acquainted one way or another with many of the details and I don't need to have it all spelled out for me.

I'm at the point, actually, where a little of anything goes a long way, and so I generally skip over many steamy love scenes because they're rather predictable: I already know how the process works, and I know how far most authors are going to take it in print, and I know that rarely will it tell me anything about the relationship that couldn't be made clear some other way without boring me with sex scenes instead of story.

The power of suggestion is so great, so stimulating to the imagination, that I wonder that so many current authors have gone so far the other way.

[Louis]

Ms Jo...

I was 25ish when I had my first filling...and since then it has all been downhill...lots of crowns and fillings.

As for the "necessary"....you gotta go, you gotta go...why not make mention of it.

[Susanna Fraser]

I've got several fillings, but I'm another who managed almost perfectly straight teeth with no help from orthodontia.

I don't think I've mentioned teeth one way or another yet in my books, nor had my heroes and heroines use the chamber pot or go looking for concealing bushes, but menstruation is just too important not to mention when you've got a sexually active character who's going to be either relieved or disappointed not to be pregnant as the circumstances warrant.

As for what I do and don't want to see in a book, it really depends on the story and what the author is trying to accomplish. A light, frothy story that suddenly went into gritty medical detail about an illness or injury would be jarring, but in a darker story it wouldn't bother me at all.

[Jo Beverley]

Great comments.

Sex in the toilet, Janice? Yikes! Mind you, I suppose there is the mile high club...

Jo

[Cathy Schultz]

I love it when you include the minutiae of life! It takes me even further into the story which is why I read them to begin with--to live in the time period I feel I belong to (however, I agree with you concerning dentistry....I don't have perfect teeth, but if I'm going to fantasize, I'll have good, strong teeth!)

[Susan/DC]

Gory details, no, but information that enriches the setting and/or the development of character or relationship, yes. When I read a contemporary book I don't look for descriptions of the heroine's dental history or the sanitation system in her home town or whether she uses sanitary napkins or tampons. I don't need to read them in an historical either unless -- and it is a big unless -- it adds to the story. In Jude Devereaux's "A Knight in Shining Armor", the hero traveled forward in time, had a toothache, and went to the dentist. The 21st C dentist was taken aback at what he saw, and it was a detail that added to our sense of Nicholas and his life in the 16th C. Or as Susanna Fraser said, whether or not the heroine menstruates and what it implies if she does not may be an important plot point. In Mary Balogh's "Tempting Harriet", the heroine was involved in an affair and there was a brief conversation at one point with the hero where she tells him not to come to her because she has her monthlies.

[kay]

Shaving for women. Whenever a hero (historical) runs his hands up a ladies smooth leg, I always think: yes, but is it hairy?

[Jo Beverley]

Ah, body hair.

That's an interesting one, too. As far as British books go, many people are from a fair haired gene pool, so even without hair removal a lady might not have heavily haired legs.

That raises another point which is not exactly to do with the blog, but it's not uncommon for virile manly men in Britain to have hairless chests. Again, it's the gene pool.

If you ever see the As You Like It movie, watch the bath scene when all the men leap out of the baths stark naked. There's about two with noticeable chest hair.

Jo :)

[Janice]

Didn't ladies have methods of removing unwanted body hair? In Forever Amber the heroine prepares to screw the king by, among other things, having her maid use a pumice stone to remove the hair on her arms and legs - which would exfoliate as well. Before my mom would let me shave my legs, I would use some sandpaper things called Hollywood Hair Mits; I think something like them is still sold today. It was more time consuming but it worked. I would imagine the lady's maids of brunette beauties would have used something along those lines.

[LouisaCornell]

I tend to agree that if it isn't something I would find in a contemporary romance I certainly don't need to know about it in a historical. And I further agree that the tone of a romance should dictate the nature of the gritty or not so gritty details.

However, I love reading odd little bits of obscure every day life details in a historical. Something to further anchor me in the setting and the era.

And as for the love scenes, well the mechanics may be the same, but the emotions involved and some great technique will certainly keep me reading!

[Linda Banche]

One of the things I don't want to read about is body odor. I know romances clean up the lack of deodorant and the difficulty of bathing. Everyone is always clean. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

An exception to the above are romances where the heroine likes the sweaty hero's masculine odor. Arg! Hasn't she ever smelled a sweaty male? "Good" is not the word for his odor.

And I notice a lot of Regencies written now have the heroes forgetting to shave. The stubble look is in now, but it wasn't then. And I question the sanity of any heroine who enjoys whisker burn.

[Jo Beverley]

Janice, I think some women did use pumice to remove some body hair, but it would be pretty arduous. Not for the average heroine.

Linda, I so agree about the unshaven look. I don't find it at all sexy. I don't even get the point. Is it supposed to be a sign of virility? It could be that he grows face hair so fast he can't keep up with it (but is that truly linked to virility?), but we all know it means he goes too long between shaves.

As for body odor, a lot of that is what we're used to. I assume that my characters back then are accustomed to a level and type of smell and won't notice it. They will notice unusual smells, or unusual pungency.

We can assume that we don't smell, or our homes don't smell, but in fact people accustomed to, for example, country smells can find cities stink, and detect the smell of chemical cleaners and yes, even deodorant, and find it unpleasant. We all smell of something all of the time.

It's all what we're used to, which IMO is what makes historical fiction interesting. I get irritated when I detect too much of the modern author's senses in the description of the world.

Jo

[Susanna Fraser]

See, to me sweaty men DO smell good, as long as they're basically clean and the sweat is fresh--that "just came in from playing basketball with the boys" scent. Now, if they don't jump in the shower shortly thereafter, the smell gets stale and stinky in a hurry, but new sweat on a clean guy is fine.

I wouldn't write a hero who *forgot* to shave, but I might put one in circumstances where for whatever reason he *can't* shave for a time. In one of my manuscripts I had a character forced to flee with nothing but the clothes on his back, and he was passing through stubbly and well on the way to bearded before he had access to such creature comforts as a razor again. *He* felt unkempt, but I left it open for the reader to think, "Actually, that sounds kinda hot," should she so choose.

[Janice]

Jo, I recall an older regency by Barbara Hazard called Queen Bee, in which a major character is an aging beauty fighting tooth & nail to hang onto her looks because they are the source of whatever power she has in her life. Afternoons she would retire upstairs to 'rest' for the evening's activities, but, rather than being laid down upon her bed, her dresser was putting her through a beauty regimen of exercises & treatments that would exhaust a Marine. I don't know where Hazard got her information, but all the methods & potions she shows the lady's dresser using sounded plausible in the times. The dresser regarded her job as a profession, and was not personally loyal to her employer; when the years finally made her efforts less effective, she fully intended to move on to another aging beauty anxious for her services.

[Linda Banche]

Reminds me, in my latest, I'll have to go back and have my hero shave before he dresses. No unkempt heroes for me.

[Laura from Rome]

Jo I think your books are perfectingly balanced between dayling things and emotions I appreciate details about life at that time. Sometimes I wonder if sex scenes were useful or not, now I think that sex is part of life in every time so I think it gives a sense of reality.
Sorry for my english.

[Jo Beverley]

Thanks, Laura. It's true that sex is a part of life, and a part of a love story, for sure.

Jo

[Darla Mundwiller]

I think the mention of going into the bushes or using the privy would be ok. But I think I'd skip over the actual description of what they were doing in there. That would be tmi. As to body hair? I think most did not remove it. My grandmother was a lady and she would not have thought about removing it. She lived in a time where things were just different. Do I want my heroines to have lots of body hair? not really but if it is not specifically mentioned I can envision them any way I'd like.

[Erin Fitzpatrick-Bjorn]

Interesting discussion here! Thanks for the gorgeous frost photo, too.

[Jessica M.]

I agree with what some others have said... going to the "necessary" is, well, a pretty necessary part of life so I don't think it's a big deal but I would prefer not to read through a lengthy description of it. But I don't think that's really the case in the books I've read anyways, I don't think I've ever come across a description where I thought there was far too much detail in it for my taste.

I am quite curious about the body hair issue now that others have mentioned it though. The pumice idea seems to make sense, and seems quite similar in idea to things that we would do now (like body scrubs and other means of exfoliation).