Latest / Mythmakers / Who's your Robin Hood: T.K. Hall & 'Shadow of the Wolf'

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Who's your Robin Hood: T.K. Hall & 'Shadow of the Wolf' · Mythmakers

• 0:00
  Hello and welcome to MythMakers. MythMakers is the podcast for fantasy fans and fantasy
• 0:11
  creators brought to you by the Oxford Centre for Fantasy. My name is Julia Golding, I'm
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  an author but I also run the activities in the centre and one of my most favourite things
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  to do is to interview my fellow authors who are working in the fantasy area and today I'm so
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  delighted that I'm being joined by Tim Hall and we're going to be discussing all things to do with
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  Robin Hood who is one of those mythic figures who pops in and out of pseudo history and fantasy
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  all over the place so we'll be talking about Robin Hood and this is because Tim's book The Shadow
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  of the Wolf which is the first part of a trilogy has just been reissued but we'll get to that
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  in a minute so first of all hello Tim. Hello Julia thanks for having me. So Tim you actually
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  publish under TK Hall if people are googling you just put that out there but I suppose I wanted
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  to ask you Tim who is your first Robin Hood? My first Robin Hood yes I was thinking about this
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  earlier and you know I was like I hadn't thought about it until recently but I'm now kind of
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  just twig that there are two first Robin Hoods so to cheat a little bit and I think actually
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  probably say enough not about how I then came to write a book of this type because I was the first
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  one but I was in primary school and you know sometimes the teachers will put on a film if they've
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  had a nurse and it's happened one day. Where the what we're going to do with the kids?
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  Exactly exactly and yeah it always always feels like a tree and one night I remember particularly
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  that was for yeah I don't know how it was it came up before I was born but it was the Disney animated
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  version of Robin Hood. I mean you know the one that's got Robin and there's a fox and I know
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  that's my first Robin Hood. Yes yeah and yeah and it's kind of it's Robin Hood at its most
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  playful isn't it so the wonderful thing about this legend that it can re-occupy such a broad range
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  of different storytelling trips and types and this Disney one is very much one end of a spectrum
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  it's Robin Hood at its absolute most fun it's full of songs and Robin beats the sheriff through
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  guile and trickery rather than any kind of violence and so yes that was a very early thing for me
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  but then a roundabout the same time and this is something that I'd almost forgotten and sure I
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  was thinking about earlier but there was a BBC program called Robin of Sherwood. Oh yes
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  in the 80s and again I don't know how old it was but I think I must have been about seven or eight
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  and therefore I don't really even remember that much about it but I remember the atmosphere of it
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  I remember that it was yeah it's almost the opposite of where that Disney film took place it was
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  very much it wasn't the green wood anymore it was a mist-filled mysterious world wood and it
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  featured her in a hunter is this sort of half man half stag sort of figure and yeah I didn't
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  I don't know sure I really understood any of any of the I was probably too young for it and
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  sometimes when you're too young and don't understand these things they go they stick pretty deep
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  don't make because you kind of yeah you would love something. I wasn't too young for it so I can
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  tell you I think the listeners will understand the atmosphere if I say the theme music was by
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  Klanat you know the is Anya isn't it the singer and the actor had two actors it had like a reincarnation
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  of Robin as so it started off with an actor called Michael Prade who was this tall dark handsome
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  I remember Robin Hood and then he moved into Jason Connery who Sean Connery's start to go over
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  and you're exactly right it was definitely the mythic Robin yeah so that's that's interesting
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  because that makes an awful lot of sense when I sort of go to look at where you've drawn on
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  the legend in your book um yeah and what about other notable robins that you may have
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  considered and rejected along the way because there have been others Kevin yeah yeah and uh I was
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  yes I can honestly I think I'm probably a fan of all of them just just about I know actually I
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  ever saw the rest of crow one but um but I um yeah and and in and in print too I love the Robert
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  Pyle uh Robin Hood so it's sort of more for children but they've got a lovely tone about them
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  um and yeah they even wrote right back now to the original balance there's all sorts of but
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  but what I suppose what what the those first two perhaps did for me was he is almost like they clashed
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  together and they and there was this sort of strange distance that said to me or even I didn't
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  you know remember you understand I don't know what's going on now I there was a sort of feeling of
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  how can these both be Robin Hood you know they they what is it that they how can these legends
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  and these myths change so radically and go undergo such transformations and yet somehow hold
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  some of the core of what they are and why do they do that and how do they do that I think that
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  was what fascinating you know and still does I I I find that so thrilling about
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  storytelling and about myth making that they can metamorphize in in such a way that that they
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  can be so different and I think that's what I well I just what I enjoyed about writing my Robin Hood
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  was or discovering what I thought the kind of the core of it was what I mean what can you
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  strip away and still be left with something that is I'm a Robin Hood legend and what what are
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  those elements that we need and and what are yeah that's that's I think that fascination is
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  a state with me not just you know Robin Hood but any any of those mythical characters in any of
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  those legends a booty code or or Thor or whatever it might be the way that they transpose over time
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  is something that I think is the other one is the same sort of breath as Robin Hood isn't it
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  um yeah yeah exactly so I was reminded when I was reading your story um by the beginning of
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  the fellowship of the ring when there's the voiceover from Galadriel saying history became legend
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  legend became myths and it may be think that perhaps all Robin stories are found somewhere
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  along this line in in where they where they think they sit and I think it'd be quite a good
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  scene setter if you don't mind just reading your um is it like a kind of preface or an epigraph at
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  the front of your story which I think sets the table for your telling yes you know be delighted too
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  first forget everything you've heard Robin Hood was no prince and he was no dispossessed lord
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  he didn't fight in the crusades he never gave a penny to the poor in fact of all those showered
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  legends only one holds true Robin was blind no even that's not right true to say Robin Hood didn't
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  see with his eyes perhaps after all he was the only one who saw clearly in this place of illusion
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  and eyes forget too all you know of Marion she would never have done or an abyss much less a
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  damsel in distress she was the destroying angel the most desperate and deadly of them all
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  look around you and listen the wasted world now shrunken and burned a howling winter and a
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  silent spring but it's all still here lurking amid the mist the world of gods and monsters
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  rolling their final dice a time of heroes and demons and the horror that shadows both the world
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  as Robin Hood thank you so you mentioned that thinking about it you have these sort of clashing
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  robins the the sort of Disney that I think the Disney one is a little bit error flin you know the
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  the foxes the men in tights type playful I think it's picking up on that tradition and then you've
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  got the mythic Robin of Sherwood one so how did you actually then come to sit down somewhere
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  presumably in the early 2010s somewhere around there when because your book was first published
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  in 2014 how did you actually what was the spark that made you sit down and write this yeah and he
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  was in a very specific spark as I tell it now to myself anyway I'm sorry memory could be a bit
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  slippery kind of but I am the yes though so obviously there was obviously a fascination with
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  these English legends working Arthur too but I it it was when I went I took I was working as a journalist
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  in London and took a sabbatical to go traveling into South America and as part of that trip I went
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  to the Amazon rainforest and we my my girlfriend at the time is now my wife together we took this
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  journey by canoe it we asked a couple of fishermen to take us along the waterways into the Amazon
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  we went quite a long way and I've traveled a few days into the Amazon and it was there in this
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  most amazing place something something kind of shifted in me I suppose until then my relationship
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  with the natural world had been I'd grown up in England and it's very temperate landscape
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  but I had never I'd never kind of felt threatened by it particularly we'd had you know
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  although he's in Daven and playing in the stream that sort of thing it was all a very I suppose
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  very Disney it was all very green wood and then suddenly here I was in this in the rainforest
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  in the jungle and it was a entirely different and such an alien landscape for me to be in and
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  yeah I think again well I'm not saying highly out my depth there was we saw what we thought was
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  logs floating half-semers in the water that had it be crocodiles and there were stakes disguised
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  as vines and there were howler monkeys calling from everywhere and nowhere it seemed that it was
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  this most extraordinary environment and it was there I think that I I felt kind of connected to
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  the wilderness in a way that I never had before and it was honestly pretty daunting you know there
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  was a morning when we woke up we came out of our tents the fisherman had put up hammocks we came
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  out of our tents in the morning and the fisherman had gone we're completely alone for three days
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  into the jungle and it just hit us that we were that far out of our element we had no idea how to
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  hunt or fish or how to survive in this place in any way and at the same time there were real
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  I don't thankfully they came back they'd been out early morning fishing for our breakfast and they
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  made this amazing fish juice with breakfast but then I know there were memories so it's very
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  extraordinary wonder as well we went out into this one evening at dusk and added into this forest
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  lake and things started bumping against the boat and we were worried about all this marked
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  bigs we'd seen crocodiles and things but then the fisherman went laughing and pointing and it was
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  pink river dolphins that were bumping against the boat so there was just there was this magical
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  threatening menacing mysterious place that the and for some reason whatever it was already in me as
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  it were the the English landscape and the and the stories of Robin and I started thinking about
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  Sherwood Forest and and we would Sherwood once more a time I've seen like this to people when
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  Bingham was covered in woodland you know lots of it would have been unknown and explored would have
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  had dangerous animals in it and outlaws at various times so would would it started ideas about
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  people's relationship with forest and what that means and what it's like what it wanted would be
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  like as much as it has to to get back to a relationship with the earth where you are surviving
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  and in a more sort of a primal way of life and so that that was really good so the starting point was
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  my was the Sherwood Forest it wasn't robbing so much it was it was my dear forest and then
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  then I came back to England and I started working in London again and felt the city pressing in
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  and then I worked in Bermuda for a while and came back to England and we settled in Gloucestershire
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  where we've got woodland and so yeah and so that that original seed from the Amazon
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  grew for years and years until I think you know what it's like with storytelling you've got this
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  seed growing growing until you just can't kind of hold it anymore and it has to spill out onto
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  the page and so eventually I got on but I'm writing it that makes an awful lot of sense because when
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  I think about how you've written about the wildwood it does feel like a jungle without the
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  of tropical elements and and I think one that you what you've just described is when we think
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  back to this sort of medievalish period and that we're talking about it's you have to sort of
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  flip the tree cover from being little patches to the cleared areas being the little patches
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  and the wood being everything else until the till it was cleared by you know normans for their
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  hunting purposes and what have you and I think that's really brilliantly evoked in the story
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  just how we we now talk about the urban jungle don't we so we have feelings about cities but
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  actually for them it would have been that feeling about the forest that they do not control they
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  cannot control that has wolves and boar and the other things bears I suppose the other things
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  that were the predators at the time and just interestingly I'm thinking that of all the films
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  the kept not giving the Russell Crowe one does try and bring the harshness of that world
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  into its story but there's a lack of trees I think not trees but it does seem to try and get
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  to that grit which I think you've also captured so this is a revised version of your 2014
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  version for a new edition and you were saying to me just before we came online that you have actually
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  revised it a little bit what kind of changes have you made as because you're looking at it
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  pretty much well the decade on and how's your thoughts and feelings about the story changed
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  yes yeah it was good so let's just say it first came out in 2014 the truth is you took me a lot
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  longer than I originally planned for the various reasons I got very bogged down in the second book
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  as as happens and yeah just I over thinking I know they're thinking it and not not sort of
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  reaching the quality that myself or the publisher David Fickling books wanted and so yeah that
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  so so became a long process and I think I learned a lot in the in the meantime so the all three
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  books are finished now and by the time I got to the end of the third one I think I knew a lot
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  more about storytelling than I did when I started this first one so there were always things about
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  the first one that wouldn't quite work for me no matter how much I tried to make there when I think
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  that was part of the the problem really I was I was over trying to make everything um yeah yeah it
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  was a sort of a perfectionism but at the same time now by Talmo got to the end of the book I could
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  look back at the first one and there were one of few structural things that I wasn't happy with
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  that I was able to address and in some revisions so I really I it was large to be a
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  abridgment of the first sort of third of the book I did a fair bit of cutting down to make it
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  and make the time frame run more smoothly that was the thing that bugged me the worst in in the
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  book I mean I think you're always going to have elements of of a novel that you'll not
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  100% happy with because it's it can't it can't be perfect so there's still things I would change
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  I could but yeah um at some point you have to give it over don't you and I've given over again
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  and that's yeah it's good yes and also that thing of writing a trilogy and people sort of say
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  yes the fantasies are trilogies I mean it's actually quite it's hugely difficult to orchestrate
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  something like that to make all the pieces click into place um yeah yeah yeah so it is um yeah
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  I think you're right I think it's it's yes it's perhaps people are under as many how how hard that is
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  and and and hence a lot of trilogies do will disappoint in the second and third books because
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  it's very very hard to get all those pieces to fit again and I know there's so so I am
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  it's taken a lot longer than I wanted to but I am very pleased but I feel like it's a trilogy that
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  does get better and better as the stories go on and and that's it that's quite rare I think into
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  the that's certainly the right direction to go in yeah yeah no issues exactly yeah so yeah so
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  the second book comes out in October so I'm looking forward to seeing if people agree but I
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  personally feel like it's a lot stronger than the first book yeah so I feel like it's either
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  themes that wanted to come out and a further first book the the core and the heart of the book
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  we've wanted to come out in the first book really doing the second book and then the third one
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  even more so it it becomes the the story that I think Robin Hood as it has to be started to talk
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  about it again the legend of Robin Hood transmutates over time and and goes through all these amazing
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  shifts in and and can cover such a big range and as I say I was trying to kind of distill down
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  what my Robin Hood what can you take away and still have Robin Hood and I feel like in the end
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  it's almost all of it you can take away him giving it take him in rich gifts of wise I say
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  perhaps in the first page of my book you know you don't you can take away almost everything
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  even his bow and arrow and you've still got but the one thing you can't take away from Robin Hood
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  is the forest I feel like that's his element that that's where he is and that's he represents
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  the spirit of the forest and therefore I feel like he represents the spirit of the earth he is
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  and in the in this series he he doesn't understand that in the first book but as it goes on he
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  becomes the guardian of the forest and I feel like it's very much a book about our relationship
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  with nature and where what we've done to the planet and what we continue to do and what we
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  how we might fight to change things so in that rather helpful way of publishers the story
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  comes with a sort of quote saying that it's compared with Game of Thrones and X-Men
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  do you see what's meant by these comparisons or I mean I can I can hazard a guess but
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  imagine why do you why do you why do you ask do you not see the comparison I do see it but I
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  one well Game of Thrones is easier the X-Men is because of their contemporary
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  setting within the superhero franchise that is a bit more of a stretch but
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  anyway I'm not going to gloss that tell me why you think what you think people
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  because if you like Game of Thrones and you like X-Men what are they going to find in your books
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  that will be hitting the same you know good good vibes for them yeah no it's interesting
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  I've got to be honest I've never quite loved that quote I think maybe because it talks about
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  mashup which makes it feel like you've kind of intentionally cut out different bits of things
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  and squished them together yeah but at the same time it's I can as you say I don't blame the
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  publishers for using it for one bit because it allows people it gives people a little bit of reference
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  and and Game of Thrones coincidentally actually I don't know how coincidence it is but on that
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  travel in South America and I talked about earlier oh we stayed on a hot digestive
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  burst in Bill and in this hot it was completely bare except for one book on the shelf and it was
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  Game of Thrones and that was before it was famous so I know it's all I'm considering and yeah I
• 21:16
  picked it up and thought it's been a long time since I've read any kind of high fancy as it
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  were and I thought it looks a bit draggony for me I don't think I'm not sure I'll bother because
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  within half a page I was absolutely mesmeralized because it's a it's a masterbook and I think you
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  if you're going to write a fancy now I think there are certain books you're going to have to
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  what answer to and none of the ring being the absolute epitome of that but Game of Thrones too
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  you can't you can't write a fancy now without being aware that you're either following it or not
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  following it as it were it didn't change what what fancy could do and yeah and then yeah
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  no so yes I'd be very pleased if anyone thought that in it but an excellent thing I think I think
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  specifically I'm talking about Robin Hood in my version of of the legend he takes on
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  certain arcane powers from the forest he wears the pelt of a slain wolfgold and that
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  wolf skin kind of heal it and a sort of supernatural rate it's a protection is a bit like a
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  Hercules cloak I suppose that's I think my mind was the image so yeah so I think specifically they
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  might have been around and of course he wields this bow of pure shadow that can kill through
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  pure fear so I suppose yeah I can absolutely see why in actual fact I think when I first pitched
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  the book to my agent I talked about Robin Hood being England's first superhero so I think
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  well I think I was already kind of trying to to steer people in that direction but but it was
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  actually an Batman if I often think that Batman is a big influence on it too because yeah I think
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  I'm personally I think that's closer because it's got the darkness in it hasn't it?
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  yeah yeah and Robin's more like an Indian is what's wrong the solitary aspect to it being
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  yes yes yes exactly and and the ants actually Robin is a is quite it's quite a soul search
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  you really isn't he doesn't he doesn't commit these violent acts easily he does a lot of soul
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  so she wears Marion is much more my Marion is much more pragmatic much more down to earth she's a
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  kind of whirlwind of action and vengeance we were she drives the story really she's plotting
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  it she's downfall even when she's in a jail sound she was she was she was she was the most fun
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  part of the story to write I think so I also thought that one area which I was very much reminded
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  of is werewolf stories by which I mean traditional myths and legends of werewolves not kind of
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  twilight werewolves you'd be pleased to hear and in fact I because one of the things we at the
• 24:18
  Oxford Center for Fantasy are interested in is the inklings and Charles Williams who was one
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  of the inklings and very interesting writer and poet he has a very fascinating Arthurian cycle
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  in one of which poems solace a lot turns into a werewolf it there is sort of in the style of
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  the wasteland there's sort of flashes of imagery as opposed to a narrative
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  browning style poem and I was thinking about that because you you're definitely drawing on
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  the idea of the wolf wolfish element to the word to to Robin was there any it I suppose if
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  maybe you know of another werewolf story which you had in the back of your mind or was it just a
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  natural evolution of your Robin because of his association with the dangerous sides of the forest
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  yeah it wasn't it wasn't specifically a lot I wasn't conscious of werewolf exactly although
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  um obviously he fights a creature called the werewolf but I I adapted that from Tolkien and he
• 25:23
  obviously adapted it from the word werewolf so there was obviously so yeah so I suppose it's
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  all connected somehow but it was it was it was less conscious the conscious thing I think might have
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  been met the metamorphosis of it's metamorphosis and the Greek myths I was I've always
• 25:46
  been drawn to stories of transformation and I'm not entirely sure why I think I think it might be
• 25:56
  partly to do with that those themes that I've talked about about nature and getting back to nature
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  and regaining our relationship with nature a topping back into those rhythms that seem to we seem
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  to have lost and I think probably that's partly what's happening in in those Greek myths of
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  transformation um yeah both various figures are becoming literally becoming nature uh for whatever
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  that whatever that might symbolize and show just symbolize a lot of different things but I think
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  that's what Robin is doing in in my story he is kind of almost literally becoming the forest he's
• 26:37
  putting it on he's he's adopting uh they they say this wolf skin that belonged to a forest god he is
• 26:47
  times it take control of him he is gradually during the during the story as he is becoming the
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  forest and if that I mean yes to some people that looks like uh becoming a werewolf and he's
• 26:59
  only becoming something more bestial he's certainly um getting back to yeah something more primal
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  response it's also making me think of June now with that idea of I mean in the desert context then
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  the the relationship with the sandworms or whatever they're called uh and the sort of metamorphosis
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  that goes on in the Frank Herbert stories fascinating area but in all of this raises a problem
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  as a writer how do you handle a character who's becoming something more than human because obviously
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  we need to remain in touch with the character who we in some ways empathize with and care about
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  um did you find that a struggle what was your what's your sort of relationship with the character
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  as Robin was changing from the the kind of abused child really a vulnerable child
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  yes yeah to being this more powerful entity yes well I my I personally didn't
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  struggle staying contact with him but whether readers do or not and I don't know um I'm
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  it's not something I'd I'd thought about consciously I kind of just followed him through his
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  his journey of transformation um but yeah I suppose the more uh the challenge there were
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  lots of challenges once he Robin takes this as you say solo journey into the forest and though
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  there were quite a number of challenges in terms of keeping an eye to going without
• 28:31
  anyone to play off of it's a quite a lonely long stretch of of story and that perhaps
• 28:37
  won't be for everyone but um but for me personally I think that's at the core of the book and
• 28:43
  it's the part of it perhaps that I enjoy the most uh as Robin as as we haven't as as the introduction
• 28:51
  would now Robin is blind in his story so there was that added challenge of of keeping
• 28:59
  the narrative descriptive without uh yeah Robin's sight because we we rely on that and awful lot
• 29:06
  yeah that's an interesting point because so many times you must be reaching for something that
• 29:11
  he's seeing when he's sensing it yes yeah yes and yeah there was quite a lot of uh one of
• 29:19
  editing went on although I've taken it out and I can't see that um but at the same time I think I
• 29:24
  think there is there is I think they do that in creative writing workshops don't they're not
• 29:28
  I've really taken any but I think there's sort of that sort of idea where you think you if you
• 29:33
  limit something it's actually quite good for creativity yeah definitely and I feel like the
• 29:39
  discipline of of writing a blind character in the in the woods was was quite good was quite
• 29:46
  it was enjoyable because I it meant I had to really sink into the other senses and find a way
• 29:54
  for Robin to sense the forest in a way that we can't I think that's that's essentially I think
• 29:59
  wise blind in this story as well as I it was a as well as thinking it was going to be a good
• 30:06
  game of thrones twist as it was when the blinding happens um I didn't I didn't want to hide that
• 30:13
  from anyone because it wasn't just for shock value it was I think he's blind because
• 30:19
  as I say the story started with the forest that was this new this more this darker more mysterious
• 30:26
  more mythical showered forest that had developed in my mind that was the start and therefore
• 30:30
  and Robin grew out of that so I knew it was to even survive somewhere like that this this
• 30:36
  Robinhood was going to need to sense the world in a way that's deeper than than we sense it
• 30:42
  and the loss of his sight was was kind of almost the pricey pay yes it's very it's there it's there
• 30:48
  in a lot of the old myths as well isn't it the Norse myths I go didn't gives up an eye for for
• 30:54
  knowledge of the world tree and and all the greatness you there's there's there's always a cost
• 31:00
  to the to the um to that kind of transformation and I think that's why Robin is it was very important
• 31:08
  Robin was like that in this story yes and I suppose that the episode of the blinding is you know
• 31:15
  it's as shocking as it is in King Lear kind of thing um and this I is it pitched as YA or adult it
• 31:24
  somewhere on the cusp isn't it as a book it it is oh yes it is it's somewhere on the cusp I
• 31:30
  I yes I think I've probably made a better problem for my publisher with that I'm not sure but
• 31:36
  again I I think I know now a lot more about how to perhaps pitch a book in a particular audience
• 31:43
  and I didn't I wasn't really particularly cognizant of that at the time why I spread a story that
• 31:50
  I would want to read and but yeah so in many ways I think it is more of a fancy book run away
• 31:57
  what YA book so that's because it meant that you weren't in any way censoring yourself in the
• 32:05
  handling of things like violence as a result which you might have done if say it's obviously
• 32:10
  clearer when you're doing something like a middle grade book you've got a set of rules that
• 32:14
  you're following in similar to a sort of cinema certification but you didn't actually have
• 32:21
  that in your mind when you were writing it's I mean they're very powerful scenes very shocking
• 32:25
  scenes but they're also very medieval which is of course the point it's not it's the world
• 32:32
  it happens to people yeah no I think that's right okay I don't I don't I don't remember being a
• 32:39
  particularly conscious decision I just think it's probably influences as much as I was I love
• 32:44
  the burn of Cornwall Arthurian trilogy and they're very violent very just very
• 32:51
  um yeah but but in a way that seems to fit that world at the time yeah yeah um and I
• 32:58
  don't grow up on two thousand eighty comics of full of action violence so I think it was
• 33:03
  but again it seemed very very much how how those words would be so yeah hopefully hopefully
• 33:13
  um it doesn't come across as returitas too often no it doesn't so I would say that
• 33:20
  it's not comic book violence it's earned violence that's integral to a world that
• 33:29
  you're creating so it's a very different different way of looking at it maybe you had a problem
• 33:36
  writing particularly in the middle book um but you've now got the three in place so do I take
• 33:45
  from that that you were you didn't set out with knowing how it ended for example you you were
• 33:50
  setting out to see how it unfolded was that your writing experience yes yes it was I always knew it
• 33:57
  was going I just thought it would be a bigger series as they fell it fell like two bigger stories
• 34:03
  for one book for for sure I had a sort of vague idea how I thought this second but would go
• 34:11
  probably thinking about it I had two good ideas I thought the second book would go and that is
• 34:16
  part of what many things tangled me up but I think one of them was yes but thinking I knew
• 34:25
  what where I wanted the second book to go and I've learned I think very much the hard way
• 34:32
  I'm I think in four books now because I wrote a book for younger children called Earthswall
• 34:40
  and now I'm I'm just started on my fifth novel and I think over those books I think I've
• 34:49
  learned that where I should stand in relationship to planning and and I um I mean I was always
• 34:56
  going to be working progress but I think I can definitely over plan more than more than under plan
• 35:02
  I know my probably should David's thinking is I think it's been sort of hinting at to me from
• 35:07
  the beginning that um you're better off not knowing too much about a story and well that's
• 35:13
  follow because of course in David Fickling's um I don't know what they call it this day his
• 35:19
  collection of authors is Philip Pullman who I've heard him talking about writing into the dark
• 35:24
  this idea that you write about exploring and then somebody else who's been edited by
• 35:28
  Dave Fickling said that David always said to him the pen is in your hand you know so not
• 35:34
  an interventionist editor um who would you want the plan in advance so that's that's the deal
• 35:41
  you get with David Fickling you know absolutely it is and I and I and I very much value it and
• 35:47
  for it I've not always listened to his great wisdom I've always known it wisdom when I've heard it
• 35:53
  um but I've you probably have to meet your own mistakes even when people are telling you
• 35:59
  the right way and he yes he's in the particular phrase of his that really stuck with me
• 36:07
  um was he he says the the place for writing to be is one step ahead of your one step ahead of the
• 36:13
  reader one step behind the story and that that I often think of if I feel like if I am in that zone
• 36:20
  then then I'm okay I don't want to I always just like the feeling that I was making it up
• 36:26
  which is the sword which was over when I first thought that I'm just making this up I thought
• 36:30
  though that's that's a bit strange but it is it's a it's a feeling of being too conscious about it
• 36:35
  if I'm if I'm consciously making up a story then that's not that's not where where where it works
• 36:42
  at all and the these scenes in in Shadow the Wolf were Robbins alone and blind in the forest
• 36:49
  those I had no idea what was going to happen next yeah and yeah I wasn't completely lost because
• 36:57
  I was building it you know bit by bit you know that that feeling of
• 37:01
  of no no way pass where your next footstep is but not be able to see the end of the path
• 37:06
  I know what what over the metaphor is they would have a better metaphor than I've got but um
• 37:11
  but yes so that's that's I think I think a large part of the a large part of the
• 37:16
  game of writing stories for me has it has been very exciting really as hard as in
• 37:23
  challenging as it's been it's been learning how to do it learning what your relationship
• 37:28
  needs to be with your unconscious and learn how how to allow these words through and that's some
• 37:37
  yeah that's that's what I think will always be low but I still I feel like I now have a
• 37:42
  a much better fit mother third book of this trilogy for instance I I feel like it
• 37:47
  you know it had it had several full stars but that's only because not only because but the
• 37:51
  the characters were finding out how to then relate to the first and second but once they did
• 37:58
  then they very much played out the rest of the story for me and and that happened the third book
• 38:03
  happened much more smoothly as a result so if you would like to read a modern take on mythic take
• 38:11
  on Robin Hood the Blind Bowman the shadow of the wolf by TK Hall is available now with
• 38:18
  hearts two and three um shortly to be with us so what are the public publication dates for part two
• 38:25
  and three oh who but I think the second October anyway this year for part two and then part three is
• 38:32
  February so all within the next two months excellent yeah so just to sort of finish yourself on a
• 38:38
  sort of cheery note um I like to ask my guests where in all the fantasy worlds that they've come across
• 38:46
  it could be ones you've read about in books or on films or comics really the choices yours
• 38:54
  I suppose a video games these days as well where in all those places is the best place to be
• 39:00
  Robin Hood and you can interpret it how you like so you can take the old stealing from the rich
• 39:05
  to give to the poor version or you can take your mom mythic one and where would you like to be
• 39:10
  Robin Hoods well in in all fantasy worlds I think this brings to mind would be um Alan Moore's
• 39:19
  Swamp Thing graphic novels they were big sort of conscious influence on this on this book
• 39:28
  and um yeah I feel like they were I think I just love that world I love being in that world I reread
• 39:34
  those graphic novels most years and um so yeah I'd like to see Robin Hood meet Swamp Thing that would
• 39:43
  be a happy phone to stay self yeah that's the kind of superhero and Swamp Thing is the kind of
• 39:48
  superhero that I would that I could relate this Robin Hood to because he's he's yeah sort of
• 39:54
  primal um he because he is the Swamp um I mean it's it's so many intriguing places you could
• 40:00
  thought I mean isn't there because you could do a thought on him and bring him into something like
• 40:04
  the Marvel Universe that would be quite fun that would be fun yeah well I think green arrow is
• 40:10
  I think green arrow is based on Robin Hood yeah no it's not English enough no no no sorry you know
• 40:17
  I fail with my point of view um but also being the Disney one being a fox that would be quite
• 40:24
  cool but I was thinking that the place I wouldn't mind bringing him is the Lee Bardugo's um
• 40:31
  worlds circle of crows that world which is about thieves I think being Robin Hood dare would slot
• 40:38
  right in you're if you're doing the steals from the rich give the poor your morals are probably a
• 40:42
  bit better than most of her characters yes yes you know uh I think it would be an interesting
• 40:49
  challenge for Robin Hood to parachute into that world yes yeah it's a difficult question of Robin Hood
• 40:55
  because for me in my mind as I say the one thing you can't take away from Robin Hood is the
• 41:01
  forest English forest um so it would have to it would have to come with it um yeah so but
• 41:10
  but yeah but but let's say he as well as this truth he goes on he kind of um now we're going
• 41:16
  to give too much away actually so maybe I shouldn't but he yes he he his powers go to the degree where
• 41:22
  he he kind of um he can generate forests so it's uh yeah maybe he can take it with him
• 41:28
  well he would be quite good actually you mentioned Tolkien and of course Tolkien is
• 41:32
  often the people listening to his favorite author Robin Hood in middle earth would be quite fun
• 41:39
  because a lot of the admirable um human characters are quite sort of within the power structures
• 41:47
  you know arrogant and faramir and actually having a erogish thief knocking around yes yeah no
• 41:55
  yeah I think that's right I think all stories can can benefit from my outlaws essentially I mean
• 42:00
  they've got I've got them and I think again I think that's why we're so part of why we're so
• 42:05
  drawn back to the Robin Hood stories is the very fact of outlawed and yeah we we we feel so I think
• 42:12
  ever since civilization began I think we've felt hand in by all the rules and obligations and laws
• 42:18
  and the idea that we could just cast on that off and live free is he's very attractive
• 42:25
  again merrily under the green wood boughs yes indeed thank you so much Tim and all the best with
• 42:32
  the reissue of well the reissue of this book and the completion of the trilogy within the next
• 42:37
  few months thank you very much for joining us thank you Julia
• 42:46
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• 42:52
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