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| Wendy
A Zollo |
| Posted: 03
Mar - 06:49 am |
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And
as much as we all dislike fiction which has
a woman with a modern mind dressed up in
period costume, would we be able to relate
the what many women felt their role in life
was?
Lesley
Which brings up an excellent point - what roles *do* we expect
medieval women to play in modern historical fiction?
Are we looking for works like Wendy Dunns, Sharon Penman or Brian
Wainwrights 'Within the Fetterlock', where the females are portrayed
as strong and notable, where they make a difference, don't stand
on the sidelines? Or would we rather get lost in the 'knight
in shining armor' syndrome - awaiting for someone to rescue us
(women) and save us instead of saving ourselves?
Women in historical fiction can be portrayed either way and who's
to say which way is the correct way. Naturally, I prefer a female
role-model that doesn't stand back and let history trample her
and with much research I'm sure there are many example's of such
females for authors to write about - is this what were looking
for?
Wendy Z |
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| BrianW |
| Posted: 03
Mar - 11:22 am |
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Hi
Wendy!
I'll throw my twopence in here if I may. 
For me, there is a crucial distinction in medieval HF between
a strong woman and a woman with anachronistic views and attitudes.
I recently read a novel set in the mid 16th C where the heroine
expressed opinions that Mary Woolstoncroft would have found wildly
radical. For me, this did not work.
I'm all in favour of strong central characters, but there is
a danger in "overcorrecting" the passive Victorian sterotype.
There was only one Eleanor of Aquitaine and not too many medieval
women kidnapped a husband for themselves as the Countess of Carrick
did.
If anyone has not read the works of Christine de Pisan
I highly recommend them. Here is a strong woman, by any reckoning.
(In fact the first woman in the West to make a living from her
pen.) You cannot get closer to the mind of a late medieval court
lady than by reading what Christine has to say and the attitudes
she describes.
Regards
Brian |
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| Lesley |
| Posted: 03
Mar - 01:27 pm |
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I
was also thinking about attitudes. Think
of Joanna from Sharon Penman's Here Be Dragons.
She has a basically good marriage and loves
her husband, but accepts the fact that if
he's away from her for more than a night
he finds a woman to sleep with. And with
the exception of Great Maria, by Cecelia
Holland, I can't think of an example of a "good
guy" male figure who hits his wife. More
typically, hitting the wife is somewhat shorthand
for "he's a lout". As modern readers, we
know abuse is unacceptable, so much that
I wonder how much we can get inside the mind
of a woman who accepts it without question
as just part of being a wife.
Both Maria and Joanna are strong, proactive women, who just have
some very alien ideas from the 21st century woman. I'm not arguing
that medieval women should be written as early anti-domestic
violence advocates. 
Lesley |
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| Elizabeth |
| Posted: 03
Mar - 04:24 pm |
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Brian
said:
I'll throw my twopence in here if I may. For
me, there is a crucial distinction in medieval
HF between a strong woman and a woman with
anachronistic views and attitudes.
Agree all the way Brian. I nearly always end up wall banging
novels with the latter traits - or the latter traits done too
brown. As a full time writer of historical fiction I'm aware
that keeping my job involves keeping my readers, thus I'm always
aware of a very fine balancing act between writing characters
who are of their time and yet who remain accessible to modern
readers. As Lesley said in her post;
'More typically, hitting the wife is somewhat shorthand for "he's
a lout". Actually I don't believe that most decent Medieval blokes
would thump their wives, but they had the right to do it and
the woman and society as a whole acknowledged that they had that
right. I suppose we still have vestiges of that validation by
society left in the right of a parent to smack a child for what
the parent sees as unacceptable behaviour. Attitudes are in a
state of flux at the moment, but 'a good clip round the earhole'
is still seen as a sovereign remedy and condoned by vast numbers
of the population. We don't have to take a step too far to understand
how the 'control mechanism' of wife beating was understood and
controlled by society.
Lesley also said 'Think of Joanna from Sharon Penman's Here Be
Dragons. She has a basically good marriage and loves her husband,
but accepts the fact that if he's away from her for more than
a night he finds a woman to sleep with.'
I am beginning to wonder if this is largely a historical novelism.
Yes, blokes did have affairs and mistresses - just like they
do today. Think Bill Clinton <g>. But I don't think that
they got up to as much hanky panky as novelists would have us
believe - or not once they were married...unless of course they
were Henry 1 - LOL! Henry II's bastards were all born before
his marriage to Eleanor of Aquitaine, ditto John's bastards before
he married Isabelle of Angouleme. Henry had Rosamund Clifford,
but she wasn't a casual lay, but a permanent mistress.
Of course if your husband was a philanderer you didn't have much
recourse except to put up with it, and if you tried to turn the
tables you were asking for trouble. But I'm beginning not to
believe that guys had casual lays right left and centre.
Best
Susan :-)
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| Gillian
Polack |
| Posted: 05
Mar - 06:46 am |
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I
am going to sidetrack with a simple question
that often plagues me.
How many of the decisions we make about
whether a women in an historical novel
is anachronistic or not, are based upon
unchallenged assumptions about what we
expect to find in an historical novel?
There are novels where chastity belts and
other curious 
bits of historical trivia appear. When we, as informed readers,
see the glaring errors, we pounce on them (well I do) and say "Look,
stupid mistake."
It is a lot easier to spot errors in technology or animals which
belong or don't belong somewhere than it is to spot the same
errors in attitudes. So how do we judge authors - what level
of modernism is acceptable (given that some is inevitable and
even necessary - because we as readers *do* need some modern
views as bridges)?
I am not asking how medieval we really want our medieval women
to be (because you are already discussing that, and it is an
interesting discussion, too), I am asking how we identify the
attitudes that we bring to these medieval women as readers -
how do we judge, really, how much of their perceived nature is
based on our own preconceived ideas of the Middle Ages?
So much for my simple question!
Gillian |
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| Wendy
A Zollo |
| Posted: 05
Mar - 08:40 am |
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I'm
all in favour of strong central characters,
but there is a danger in "overcorrecting" the
passive Victorian sterotype.>> ( Brian)
Quite true - it's finding the fine line that balances the modern
reader's knowledge and cushioning the reality of the era the
author is writing about without removing *its* reality. Good
lord did that make any sense? 
I think we've made huge strides to in having our history unhindered,
with wonderful tales that emphasize a women's role, place, courage
and even birthright even if it isn't exactly as we pictured it
in our minds - which is the brilliance of the author's research,
which in MO, he/she should attempt to stay true to as much as
possible (Author's Note's excepted).
Wendy Z |
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| Taminator |
| Posted: 10
Mar - 07:26 pm |
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As
a reader of historical fiction, I know that
it's important to me for the basic elements
of history to be there. It's one of the reasons
I've basically stopped reading straight romance--I
cannot abide playing fast and loose with
the social norms of the day. I do believe
it's entirely possible, and even probable,
for historical women to be strong-willed
leaders, but I also believe that they were
aware of society's conventions and didn't
deliberately flout them at every turn. A
truly strong woman would, like Eleanor, find
a way to do as she wished without going outside
of society. I want my historical women to
be shown realistically for the times (which
was usually interesting enough as it was
that today's norms don't need to be superimposed).
Tammy |
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| Elizabeth |
| Posted: 13
Mar - 04:08 pm |
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Tammy:
A truly strong woman would, like Eleanor, find
a way to do as she wished without going
outside of society. I want my historical
women to be shown realistically for the
times (which was usually interesting enough
as it was that today's norms don't need
to be superimposed).
I totally agree with you, Tammy, and, like you, it was one of
the reasons that I stopped reading lighter historical romances.
I do think that there was a certain amount of double speak in
the Medieval period concerning women's roles. On the one hand
there was all the 'you will be submissive and dutiful' stuff
spouted by moralists and church leaders etc, and on the other
there was what the women actually got up to - running their own
business', defending and administering castles, keeping society
flowing along beneath the surface sun-dazzle of what we so frequently
see in popular masculine histories.
A point that does interest me about historical fiction is how
authors either come to the same conclusion, or borrow from each
other so that what starts out as one person's description becomes
accepted as almost historical fact. Like Eleanor of Aquitaine's
appearance for example, or her son John's. Sharon Kay Penman
and Roberta Gellis have painted very similar pictures of Prince
John. So have I for that matter. We've all made him dark-haired
with striking dark/hazel eyes. If I read about a Prince John
who was blond, I'd have trouble imagining him. Ditto a fair-haired
Eleanor. I've heard it said - although I don't know how true
it is, that many readers of Regency fiction will only accept
the gospel according to Georgette Heyer and that anyone who digresses
from her conventions is seen as being wrong whether they're right
or not! If we've really enjoyed a novel and the reader seems
to have done his/her research thoroughly, we tend to carry what
we've read forward to the next novel on the subject and we'll
judge our next read against what's gone before.
Susan
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| mnewton56 |
| Posted: 13
Mar - 09:38 pm |
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Gillian
said:
It is a lot easier to spot errors in technology
or animals which belong or don't belong somewhere
than it is to spot the same errors in attitudes.
So how do we judge authors - what level of
modernism is acceptable (given that some is
inevitable and even necessary - because we
as readers *do* need some modern views as bridges)?
This is a great question, and it has been debated many times
:-). I agree that an author writing today speaks from a twenty-first(or
at least twentieth) century mindset, and readers interpret from
that mindset. Even a specialist in another historical period
cannot "think" precisely in the same way that a person living
in that era would have done(IMO). I would like for an author
to give the historical viewpoint and for the characters to act
in historically appropriate ways (altho I might not know the
difference, as a reader -- it is part of the author's job to
research and develop the story, if he/she is setting it within
a specific historical period). If the author doesn't wish to
take the time and do the proper research to tell the story in
a historically accurate fashion, then they should move away from "historical" fiction
and just write contemporary stories.
Mary N. |
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| Wendy
A Zollo |
| Posted: 15
Mar - 06:43 am |
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I
am not asking how medieval we really want
our medieval women to be (because you are
already discussing that, and it is an interesting
discussion, too), I am asking how we identify
the attitudes that we bring to these medieval
women as readers - how do we judge, really,
how much of their perceived nature is based
on our own preconceived ideas of the Middle
Ages?
Gillian>>
I suppose that decision is up to the author - but ultilmately
the answer will show as a positive or negitive in book sales
(providing of course the book manages to reach the general public).
I wonder how many women want to read about the helpless female
any longer, though it may have been quite true to the era?
Our are minds just looking for that strong (or as strong as the
period allows - and perhaps then some ) female character to identify
with?
Wendy Z |
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| mnewton56 |
| Posted: 22
Mar - 10:02 pm |
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Wendy
said:
>I wonder how many women want to read about the helpless
female any longer, though it may have been quite true to the
era?
Our are minds just looking for that strong
(or as strong as the period allows - and perhaps
then some ) female character to identify with?<
I wonder how true the "helpless female" stereotype is. Yes, women
had many fewer rights and freedoms at some periods, but they
may well have had influence out of proportion to their "power".
I *do* think our minds are looking for a strong female with whom
we can identify. In the first year that penmanreview participated
in the WHM, Tamara (I think) posted an article about historical
fiction for girls that made some great points about the books
girls choose to read, and how a totally "historically accurate" portrayal
could make the character seem weak and therefore less interesting
to girls, while a portrayal that was very strong but historically
improbable, won rave reviews and was extremely popular. I think
women, as well as girls, are looking for a woman who makes her
own decisions and is able to influence those around her. It is
a great challenge for a novelist to create a character and a
story in which a woman is portrayed with historical accuracy
and also tell a compelling story.
Mary N.
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| Wendy
A Zollo |
| Posted: 23
Mar - 06:59 am |
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I
think women, as well as girls, are looking
for a woman who makes her own decisions and
is able to influence those around her.
May N.>>
What kind of women? The servant (who's story
I think would be compelling), the great Lady
(but not nobility), the commoner?
All have tales to be told and many have been
overlooked by the Maude's and Eleanor's of
their given era.
Wendy Z |
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| mnewton56 |
| Posted: 04
Apr - 09:39 pm |
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Wendy
said in regard to HF about women in history
whose stories I'd like to read:
What kind of women? The servant (who's story
I think would be compelling), the great Lady
(but not nobility), the commoner?
All have tales to be told and many have been
overlooked by the Maude's and Eleanor's of
their given era.
I agree that all of these women could be the
subjects of a compelling story. One of my old
favorites, Norah Lofts, wrote a number of books
about both ordinary women (peasant/yeoman/serf
class) and minor nobility. Her book, The Town
House, follows just such a group over several
hundred years, beginning about the time of
Richard III, and continuing in The House at
Old Vine and The House at Sunset; also her
trilogy Knight's Acre,The Homecoming, and The
Lonely Furrow covers a definite segment of
the medieval period (I think some time in the
15th century but the book is not at hand just
now). Her books set in Suffolk also tell the
stories of some of the gentry (I think that's
the correct term) who were not nobility. I
don't know for sure that her historical accuracy
reaches the level of EC or SKP, but I have
found these books credible and they tell compelling
stories about both men and women.
In more recent years, Elizabeth Chadwick has written books about
a number of non-royal and non-noble women and made fascinating
stories of them.
Hoping this post is not too late to receive any notice as the
past week has been hectic for me and I wasn't able to post before
the end of the month of March :-).
Best,
Mary |
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