Latest / The Mookse and the Gripes Podcast / Episode 102: Diving into the Past with Historical Fiction

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Episode 102: Diving into the Past with Historical Fiction · The Mookse and the Gripes Podcast

• 0:12
  SPEAKER_03: This is the Mooks and the Gripes podcast.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_03: Hello, everybody.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_03: This is Trevor and daring to disturb the universe.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_03: Paul, Paul, how are you doing today?
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_02: I am doing very well today.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I'm feeling a little, I'm ready to disturb anything.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_03: You know, what do you want me to do?
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_03: Send me out a message.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_03: You'll have some disturbing things to say for sure.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_03: I'm sure I usually do.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_03: I don't know.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_03: I guess we'll see.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_03: We are so excited to welcome back to our show.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_03: Rowan Nateson,
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_03: who joined us for the Victorian literature episode,
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_03: schooled us in such a delightful,
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_03: fun,
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_03: enthusiastic way.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_03: Rowan, it's so good to have you back.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: It's a treat to be here,
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: and I'm pretty sure you didn't need any schooling,
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: but I remember that was a delightful exchange for sure.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, it was so much fun.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_03: And I guess I always... Schooling might be the wrong word.
• 1:07
  It kind of has a derogative tone,
• 1:09
  like you schooled us or we were deficient.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_03: But I did mean that as I was just delighted, which I usually am.
• 1:19
  I think I've mentioned this on the podcast before,
• 1:22
  but I am in a George Eliot read-along.
• 1:26
  Rowan has written a book of essays about Eliot's books and then
• 1:31
  also a book that is
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_03: reading George Eliot for book clubs or Middlemarch for book clubs.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_03: I mangled that quite a bit.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_03: It's about middle March for book clubs.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_03: Let's see if that, that sticks.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_03: And,
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_03: and I always feel it just,
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_03: again,
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_03: the enthusiasm,
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_03: the insights,
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_03: the it,
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_03: and it isn't pedantic.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_03: It's, it's humane and beautifully written.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_03: I love it.
• 2:04
  So,
• 2:05
  you know,
• 2:05
  I,
• 2:06
  that's how I felt about our,
• 2:07
  our Victorian literature episode as well.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_03: It was, it was wonderful and I'm excited for today.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I appreciate that so much, really.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: And that was obviously one of my big goals here.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: I have so much love for her novels.
• 2:19
  And I just really wanted a chance to say some of the things
• 2:22
  that make them
• 2:22
  meaningful to me and to share them with other people and maybe
• 2:25
  just add to the
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: other things that they had to think about.
• 2:28
  So I have been very appreciative and happy to see you talk
• 2:32
  about that book as if it
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: had added to your enjoyment of her novels.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: That means a lot.
• 2:37
  Yeah,
• 2:38
  we're getting pretty close to the end of middle March,
• 2:41
  though we're reading it slowly.
• 2:42
  So when I say that,
• 2:43
  we still probably have a few weeks,
• 2:44
  maybe even a month left.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_03: And then on to the last one,
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_03: Daniel Duranda,
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_03: which I'll be honest,
• 2:51
  while I've heard a lot about it and know that for some people
• 2:54
  it's their favorite...
• 2:56
  I've been saving it to the point where I know nothing about it
• 2:59
  other than that
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_03: there must be a character in it named Daniel,
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_03: and I'm assuming Deronda.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_03: You're wrong.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: That's a very wide insight right there.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: You're in good condition to carry on.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: Well,
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: one thing that is sort of useful,
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: I think,
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: about Daniel Deronda when you're starting it is it has two parts,
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: one of which is in a way a kind of
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: grim rewriting of Pride and Prejudice.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: So that's all I'm going to say about that,
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: except that,
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: sometimes,
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Elizabeth Bennett gets really lucky,
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: right?
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: But not everybody does.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, I like that.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_03: I've been excited, but that just makes me more excited.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_03: So, all right.
• 3:39
  Well,
• 3:39
  I do have just a couple of people I want to thank for signing
• 3:43
  up on Patreon and Substack.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_03: And it's Antoinette.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_03: I don't know.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_03: I'm sorry, Antoinette.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_03: Is it Tomasich?
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_03: Tomasic,
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_03: I don't know exactly how to say your last name,
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_03: but I think I'm saying your first name right,
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_03: Antoinette.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you so much.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_03: And also Sam Moon.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you both.
• 4:02
  I hope that you enjoy the bonus episodes and early access to
• 4:07
  episodes and just in general,
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_03: engaging with us that way.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_03: We very much appreciate it.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_03: And we thanked you last episode, Rowan.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you so much too.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_03: You joined on Patreon and
• 4:20
  Paul and I still need to put together a March bonus episode if
• 4:24
  anybody has any
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_03: ideas for just to give us some things to ramble about.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_03: We've been on a good streak, so we can't break it.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_03: All right.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_03: Well, we are going to today be talking about historical fiction.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_03: And Rowan,
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_03: we'll get into it in a minute,
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_03: into introducing it and such,
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_03: because we've got to ask what people have been reading.
• 4:51
  But you're the one who chose this,
• 4:54
  and I'm wondering if you can give readers just a sense.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_03: We'll get into the definition and all that in a moment, but what...
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah,
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_03: I think when I brought up the idea of an episode on historical fiction,
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_03: your enthusiasm was somewhat muted at first,
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_03: and I found that interesting.
• 5:22
  There's no question that for me,
• 5:24
  historical fiction is my first and longest love as a reader.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_00: And I will show you when we get into it.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: I have a book here with me that I have been reading.
• 5:32
  Well,
• 5:32
  I guess I haven't read it in a long time,
• 5:34
  but I've had it for at least 50 years.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: So that's how long I've been reading historical fiction.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: And so I think in a way I came to it as a very, well, I was six.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: So I came to it as a very naive reader.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: And so what hooked me on it was as simple as the stories.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: And over time, the
• 5:52
  the way that good historical fiction helps you think about the
• 5:57
  past as genuinely
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: being inhabited by people who are like you,
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: but also not like you.
• 6:02
  And I have a quotation stashed away here that I might share
• 6:07
  with us later from
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: Thomas Carlyle's essay on Walter Scott,
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: where that's really what he credits Scott with.
• 6:12
  But I didn't know any of that when I started out and I just was mesmerized.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I was reading stories mostly about young,
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: girls, young women, queens and princesses and so on.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: And their lives seemed so full of drama and pathos and menace.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I wasn't really thinking of it as historical fiction,
• 6:36
  but it gripped me utterly to the point that when I was in
• 6:39
  elementary school,
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: I wrote a whole sort of attempted...
• 6:42
  play screenplay play about lady jane gray for instance you know
• 6:46
  i was i was that
• 6:47
  nerdy but also to me it was just the human story playing out
• 6:52
  and in costume and
• 6:53
  what could be greater than that and and that that i've never
• 6:56
  quite lost that naive
• 6:57
  delight in being immersed in somebody else's life and also
• 7:02
  being able to think and
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_00: that was a real person
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_03: I love that.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_03: I do too.
• 7:07
  I will say,
• 7:07
  you know,
• 7:09
  you mentioned our enthusiasm,
• 7:11
  and that may be the right word.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_03: We certainly didn't mean to come off as dismissive.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_03: Mostly,
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_03: I think it's because Paul and I,
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_03: we were both like,
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_03: ooh,
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_03: we want to hear what Rowan has to say about that.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_03: Can we add to that?
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_03: Because we don't necessarily...
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_03: Have that.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_03: Well, I think I'll be honest with you.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_03: I'll put my cards on the table.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_03: I think it's because of a relative degree of ignorance.
• 7:38
  I have had my eyes opened looking into this to realize a lot
• 7:42
  more about historical fiction,
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_03: which I'll get into.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_03: But at first, you know, I think it has maybe some stereotypes.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_03: And I was like, I don't really read that.
• 7:54
  And then you started to look around and you realized how many
• 7:57
  of your own favorite
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: books actually are historical fiction.
• 8:00
  Yeah,
• 8:00
  I read that all the time,
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  you know,
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  and so it was it was really fun to see it that way.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_03: but I'll be honest with you.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_03: It was mostly like,
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_03: can Paul and I add,
• 8:12
  or are we going to be rude and have Rowan get on and just have
• 8:16
  to talk about
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_03: something she loves while we go,
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_03: oh,
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_03: wow,
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_03: thank you.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: No, I'm absolutely confident that is not going to be the case.
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  SPEAKER_00: And as you're suggesting,
• 8:26
  I think it's such a broad umbrella term with so many different
• 8:30
  kinds of books that
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: fall under it.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_00: And what you're saying about the stereotype that
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: I understand.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: And actually,
• 8:35
  I've decided for my choices to lean into that stereotype a
• 8:38
  little bit on the guess
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: that you wouldn't be.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_00: So we'll see how that plays out.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_02: I love it.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_02: I love it.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_02: I'm excited.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_02: Real fast, Trevor.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_02: I have an idea.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_02: I think for our next,
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_02: you know how you've been reading,
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_02: like you did the Valley Girl reading last time.
• 8:51
  I think for our next one,
• 8:52
  you should read Rowan's play that she wrote in elementary school.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, I love it.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I'm willing.
• 8:57
  I at first thought Paul was going to be skirting because I've
• 9:01
  been hitting him up
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_03: with his own performance.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_03: I'd be willing to take that one on, though.
• 9:06
  You'd have to really dig in for the pathos of being blindfolded
• 9:11
  and unable to find
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: the block to lay your head on,
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: which was the final scene of Lady Jane Grey's life.
• 9:18
  I don't know if you have the emotional capacity to deliver that
• 9:21
  scene to us.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_03: I probably don't.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_03: However, there's a painting.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_03: I'm sure you know it.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_03: I can't think of who the painter is,
• 9:30
  who has her delicately like reaching out for the block and her
• 9:33
  ladies and waiting there.
• 9:35
  I can't remember the painter either,
• 9:37
  but it's a 19th century painting,
• 9:38
  I think,
• 9:38
  isn't it?
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_00: Very, very picturesque.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_00: And,
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_03: And I love it.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_03: And she,
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_03: just so you know,
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_03: I mean,
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_03: who,
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_03: who,
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_03: what,
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_03: Paul,
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_03: I'm assuming you have too,
• 9:48
  but we've all tried to write a screenplay or a play with some
• 9:53
  historical figure.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_03: And Jane, Lady Jane Grey is so fascinating.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_03: Um,
• 9:57
  I've done in my quest to do Shakespeare discussions and such to
• 10:04
  make sure I bring
• 10:04
  her up when I'm talking about the world leading up to
• 10:08
  Shakespeare's birth and such.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_03: So it would be awesome to see that.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_00: There's a tremendously sentimental movie about her called Lady Jane.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_00: I think that was Helena Bonham Carter's very first film role,
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: although I may have missed something.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: She and a very young Carrie Elwes star in it.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, wow.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_03: I have not seen that.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_03: I know there's the new ones, the Lady Jane series.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_03: where the Amazon put out.
• 10:40
  Yes,
• 10:40
  I haven't seen that yet,
• 10:41
  but it looked like a feisty heroine version of the story.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_03: Right, I've heard it's kind of fun.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_03: And it's based on a book that my wife read and liked,
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_03: and we were actually listening to it as we were traveling on holiday,
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_03: and I was really enjoying it too.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_03: There's like...
• 11:01
  Some people turn into animals and I mean,
• 11:03
  it's,
• 11:04
  it's just a,
• 11:05
  they're just having fun.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, it was, it was a hoot.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_03: It's not going to, it's not going to be historical fiction.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_03: There's the contrast, right?
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_03: That's, that one's out.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: We can all agree.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: Speculative fiction or historical fantasy,
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: or there's probably some hybrid term that we,
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_00: that we don't know.
• 11:27
  Anyway,
• 11:27
  I'm sure we will come back to all of these details when we're ready.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_03: So let's start with the question.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_03: I'm excited to hear, Rowan, what have you been reading?
• 11:39
  Well,
• 11:40
  I recently finished Charlotte Wood's Stone Yard Devotional,
• 11:44
  which...
• 11:46
  I think was as good and as memorable as everybody that I had
• 11:49
  heard talking about it
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_00: had suggested.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: But it did surprise me in a lot of ways.
• 11:53
  I don't think either of you has read it or talked about it yet
• 11:56
  that I can remember.
• 11:59
  It's a story about a woman who decides she needs to kind of
• 12:02
  step away from the craziness,
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: emotional,
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: literal of her life.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_00: And so she goes to visit a religious retreat.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: And then the next time around, she goes there and she stays.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: And so when you think about somebody retreating to live with nuns,
• 12:17
  I think you imagine it being a novel about spiritual
• 12:20
  transcendence or something
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_00: elevated like that.
• 12:23
  And I think what surprised and really interested me about it is
• 12:26
  that it is much
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: more gritty and kind of down to earth than that.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's not really...
• 12:32
  I think there is a kind of undercurrent of searching for
• 12:34
  something like grace,
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_00: but it's not a book that offers you high flown prose or anything,
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: they're infested with mice and there's like,
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_00: there's all these internal tensions,
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: but it really is,
• 12:45
  I think a book that maybe appeals to a lot of us right now with
• 12:48
  that sense that if
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_00: you could just get away for a while,
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_00: maybe with time,
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: your own head would start to quiet down the,
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_00: the
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's just not a good time right now for paying attention to everything.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: And so that was a memorable read.
• 13:03
  I finished Miranda July's All Fours,
• 13:05
  which is kind of the antithesis of Stoneyard Devotional.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_00: And then at the moment I am reading
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_00: Selina Godden's Mrs.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_00: Death,
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: Mrs.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: Death,
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: which had been kind of on my radar,
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: but I thought it might be too odd for me.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: And so I hadn't picked it up.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: And then I heard Selina Godden.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: I think she was on Backlisted on their Octavia Butler episode.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_00: And she was so interesting to listen to.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_00: And I thought maybe I had misunderstood the genre of this book.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm really glad I picked it up.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_00: I was just reading it this morning.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: And it is a
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: It's an unusual premise for me.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_00: I have,
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: as you'll see as we keep talking today,
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: and I guess you know already as a Victorian,
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_00: is I have a kind of a realist bent.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: I have a kind of a literalist streak.
• 13:47
  And this is about a writer who meets a kind of personified
• 13:51
  version of Death and
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: begins writing about Mrs.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_00: Death's experience of
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_00: life, kind of hard to put it in a sensible way.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: So it's a kind of meditation on life and death and mortality,
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_00: and it's vignettes about different deaths,
• 14:09
  and it's comments about what it's like to look at the world of
• 14:13
  your seeing it
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_00: through the eyes of death,
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: if that makes sense.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: So it's quite memorable.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: In the spirit of Paul,
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_00: who I know likes to read excerpts,
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: also I thought maybe I would just give you this a small taste,
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_00: because I think Agaddon is a poet,
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_00: and I think you can hear that
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: So they're walking around London together,
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: and she says,
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_00: or the narrator says,
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_00: sorry,
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_00: we walk all night until when it is almost dawn.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_00: I find we are down by the misty docks.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: I see the slosh of the brown and churning Thames.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: I recognize that I am somewhere near Limehouse.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: Mrs. Death walks with me there.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: She tells me the river is one of her oldest friends.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_00: She says the Thames is filled with ghosts and old spirits.
• 14:55
  The floor of the River Thames is littered with engagement rings
• 14:58
  and the bones of dead babies.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_00: We stand together on the shore.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_00: We grow cold in the black shadow of the ghosts of slave ships,
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_00: the clatter of the traders,
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: the unloading of stolen goods and treasure,
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: coffee,
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: sugar,
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: and human cargo,
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: shadows of souls,
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: and the clatter of bones.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: I am there and I am not there.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: I feel it all, though.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: I bear witness, and it is as though I have been here before.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like I remember some of this old life,
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_00: the hum and throb of a dirty young London,
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: the heat of life here,
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: the glow of flaming music halls,
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: and all of old London's worst nightmares,
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: the poor and the hungry,
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: the thieves and raconteurs,
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: the whores and the scream of life,
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: the rowdy markets.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_00: We walk for miles all along the water and the docks.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_00: I am walking with Mrs.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_00: Death,
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: and she shows me a London of layered worlds,
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: the many worlds of before,
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: I hear the cries of far away and long ago.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_00: It is all here.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: I am both in the present and in the past.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: Mrs. Death is vivid and by my side, narrating my world.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: She sings murder ballads and tells me long tales.
• 16:03
  And then we stop and sit side by side in silence by the river,
• 16:07
  watching daybreak.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: This is what I expected.
• 16:11
  Again,
• 16:12
  it's a kind of speculative fiction,
• 16:13
  but it's very meditative and kind of philosophical.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm really interested to see where it goes.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_02: And like you said, very poetic too.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_02: It's beautiful.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_03: I'm really intrigued.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_03: Mrs. Death.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_03: Mrs. Death.
• 16:30
  I don't know if I could say that in a way that can help readers
• 16:34
  Google that.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_03: It's MRS.
• 16:37
  death,
• 16:37
  so like Mrs.,
• 16:39
  Mr.,
• 16:39
  and then Mrs.
• 16:40
  meaning,
• 16:41
  you know,
• 16:43
  what is the synonym for Mrs.?
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, let's it go.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_00: Missed out on.
• 16:48
  Yeah,
• 16:49
  and I mean,
• 16:51
  there is a passage right near the beginning kind of raising
• 16:54
  questions about
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: how important death is to our appreciation of life.
• 16:58
  And of course,
• 16:59
  that's a familiar idea,
• 17:00
  but I felt like she really made it new.
• 17:02
  There's a long kind of monologue about what if we came with our
• 17:05
  expiry dates,
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_00: printed on our forehead and how much differently perhaps we would live,
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_00: maybe,
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: maybe not.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: And again,
• 17:12
  it's hard to look around at everything that's happening and
• 17:14
  wonder if people would
• 17:15
  be a little less awful to each other if they lived with death
• 17:19
  in that kind of a way.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_00: So I think it's a kind of provocation as well, a moral provocation.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm also finding it just an interesting story.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what are you going to do with this premise?
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure how it can carry on for another 150 pages.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: You know, what is going to be the momentum of it?
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: So we'll see.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: Cool.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_03: All right, Paul, how about you?
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_03: Can you follow that up?
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I don't know if I can, but I will try.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I've been continuing to read some big books, including Middlemarch.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_02: And I don't know,
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_02: maybe Rowan will be proud of me and Trevor will be disappointed,
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_02: but I have not been able to stick to the slow pace.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_02: I tried and tried,
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_02: but eventually the story got me,
• 17:58
  especially I think we've talked about the second half of that
• 18:01
  book really does take
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_02: off and
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_02: I was just finding reading it too slow.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_02: I liked it for a while,
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_02: but at a certain point,
• 18:07
  I felt like I was starting to lose a few of the plot points and
• 18:11
  the connections.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_02: And so I didn't want that to be the case.
• 18:13
  Even though this is a reread,
• 18:14
  I wanted to make sure that I gave it full justice.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_02: So I think Trevor, you and I talked about it.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_02: Again, we've talked about this before, but sometimes
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_02: You just got to make those calls as a reader.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, do what works for you.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_00: And reading was so hard.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: I'm actually reading Middlemarch with one of my classes right now.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_00: We just started it this week, and we have four weeks to read it.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I've read it in three weeks.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_00: I've read it in five weeks with the class.
• 18:35
  I'm always trying to figure out how much can they realistically
• 18:37
  manage without,
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: like you say,
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: that kind of diminishing returns.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: If there's too much space,
• 18:42
  you lose that thread and that momentum that you get when all
• 18:46
  the pieces start to
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: come together in the second half.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: It's so exciting.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_00: I think they're doing really well so far.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: I'm so happy.
• 18:53
  They were laughing a lot at the first installment and that
• 18:55
  sometimes you don't always,
• 18:57
  they're not always ready to relax into a book like that and see
• 19:00
  the humor.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm excited.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm already like thinking when will I read it a third time?
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_02: So that's a good sign.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah,
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_02: then I've also,
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_02: of course,
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_02: been chipping away at a few other books,
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_02: including one that I've been working at Percival Everett.
• 19:14
  I've kind of just been here and there picking up different
• 19:16
  books over the last
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_02: probably couple of years.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_02: And the one I'm reading now is Telephone, which came out in 2020.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_02: For those who haven't read Everett,
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_02: or those who have read him,
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_02: it'll come as no surprise to hear that this is in many ways recognizable,
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_02: but also so different.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_02: I feel like every one of his books,
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_02: you can tell it's him,
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_02: I guess,
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_02: to some degree,
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_02: but every time I'm just like,
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_02: this guy,
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_02: he never settles on the same...
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_02: subjects or styles.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_02: He's amazing.
• 19:41
  So this one's about a man named Zach Wells,
• 19:44
  who's a geologist and a biologist.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_02: And his area of expertise is super niche.
• 19:49
  It's the specific cave that's 44 meters above the Colorado
• 19:53
  River and the Grand Canyon.
• 19:55
  And so,
• 19:56
  you know,
• 19:56
  he has a wife and a daughter and he teaches at a college.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_02: And I'll just to belabor the point that Rowan just made it.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, I will be reading from this.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_00: I love it.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_00: I love that you do that.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, good.
• 20:08
  I think I'd like to blame Andy Miller because I always love
• 20:10
  that on his podcast
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_02: when he does that.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_02: I feel like it just adds to hear the author's voice.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_02: And so anyway, yeah, it says, I am Zach Wells.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_02: Wells is a good name for a geologist slash paleobiologist.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_02: And so I was one.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_02: I knew a lot about fossils and caves,
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_02: especially the bones of creatures left a long,
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_02: long time ago.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_02: I would tell my daughter that we had to take care of our bones because,
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_02: finally,
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_02: that would be all that was left of us,
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_02: all that was left to tell our stories.
• 20:37
  I knew an awful lot about one particular hole called Knott's
• 20:39
  Cave in the Grand
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_02: Canyon and the bird life that once lived in it.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_02: How arcane is that?
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I knew more than most people.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_02: To make it all clear,
• 20:47
  I should point out that most people knew more about nearly all
• 20:49
  other things than I did.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_02: All of this was and is of little significance,
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_02: or perhaps transcendence,
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_02: except that it clues you into my profound and yawning dullness.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_02: It lets you know that I could spend endless hours with bones,
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_02: rocks,
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_02: and sediments,
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_02: and not only that,
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_02: but in one very particular cavity,
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_02: in one very particular red wall,
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_02: some 44 meters above the Colorado River,
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_02: in a spot that no one can get to,
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_02: except by a helicopter,
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_02: or at one time,
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_02: a tough hold boat.
• 21:17
  That says something about me,
• 21:18
  I suppose,
• 21:19
  if there is much at all to say about me.
• 21:22
  A friend of mine died in a helicopter crash trying to get to
• 21:25
  that very particular cave.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_02: Asshole that I am,
• 21:28
  I have returned to the cave again and again and have thought of
• 21:30
  him only briefly
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_02: each time.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_02: That tells you something, though it's none too flattering.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_02: And then it skips ahead just a little bit,
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_02: and it says,
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_02: I lived in a town called Altadena in California.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_02: It was north of a town called Pasadena.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_02: Altadena means higher Dina, as in Pasadena.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_02: I do not know what Pasadena means.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_02: Apparently no one does.
• 21:49
  There are many things that no one knows,
• 21:51
  which is comforting up to a point.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_02: At the time of this writing,
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_02: I do not know whether I will live much longer,
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_02: and you don't know what I'm talking about.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_02: I was led to this point by a simple note,
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_02: marks on an odd scrap of paper,
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_02: words that could have meant nothing,
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_02: that I could have allowed to mean absolutely nothing.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_02: But that's not really possible, is it?
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_02: So I think that gives you,
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_02: he's got such an interesting style with some humor,
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_02: but like often there is like this mystery that he hints at.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_02: And then there's also so much else going on in this book.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_02: I'm always amazed that he can hold it all together,
• 22:23
  but somehow he manages to because it's talking about this guy's
• 22:26
  personal life,
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_02: his academic career.
• 22:28
  There's some things with a family member who is suffering with
• 22:31
  kind of a mysterious illness.
• 22:32
  So there's a lot going on,
• 22:33
  but it's very propulsive and interesting so far.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_02: I can't remember, Trevor, have you read that one?
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_02: I know you've read a lot of his stuff.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_03: I haven't read Telephone.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_03: I have it,
• 22:43
  and I'm excited to read it so that I can then start to look at
• 22:47
  all of the weird
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_03: things that happened with its publication.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_03: That's the one where there,
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_03: I believe,
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_03: I'm pretty sure,
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_03: that's the one where there are various editions.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, that's right.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_02: Somebody was telling me about that the other day at the bookstore.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_03: I forgot.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_03: The ISBN,
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_03: I think,
• 23:03
  clues you in as to which particular edition you may have picked
• 23:07
  up at the bookstore,
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_03: but...
• 23:09
  So I want to read it and then figure out what what did I miss
• 23:12
  because I didn't even
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_03: have the right edition or that same edition,
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_03: you know.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you're right.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_03: I forgot with the book.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_02: I forgot about that.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_02: And then I think the person told me that something to do with the cover,
• 23:21
  like the compass on the cover on certain editions is pointing
• 23:24
  in different directions.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_02: I had completely forgotten that.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_02: So, yeah, you're right.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_02: Now that I.
• 23:28
  Once I make it through,
• 23:29
  I'm about halfway through,
• 23:30
  I'll have to do some more research.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_03: So I've been,
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_03: I don't know,
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_03: saving it's the wrong word,
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_03: but looking forward to reading it and then digging into all of that.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_03: But yeah, that sounds lovely too.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_03: You were like, okay, Trevor told me to follow up Rowan.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_03: I'll pull out the big gun.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_03: Exactly.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, way to go.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_01: Call it an audible.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_03: All right.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_03: Well, I'm excited to tell you both what I've been reading.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_03: Because it introduces a new project.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_03: So for the last few months,
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_03: my wife and I have been thinking,
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_03: we finished reading Jane Austen's books together and wondering,
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_03: what do we do next?
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_03: And a lot of people have really good suggestions.
• 24:13
  But my wife had the idea because I don't know if you know who
• 24:17
  Rebecca Romney is.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_03: She's the antiquarian bookseller.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_03: She was on Pawn Stars.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_03: You know,
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_03: whenever they would have,
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_03: this old book came in,
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_03: she would be the expert who would come in and put a value on it.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_03: But she just published a book called Jane Austen's Bookshelf.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_03: And in this book,
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_03: it's kind of a,
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_03: it's almost like a memoir,
• 24:40
  but introduction as well to discover and read the works of the
• 24:48
  women who influenced
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_03: Jane Austen.
• 24:51
  Kind of part literary exploration,
• 24:53
  celebrating those books for their own merits.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_03: Because she, you know, this is where the kind of memoir part comes out.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_03: She's like, I love Jane Austen.
• 25:03
  And spent a lot of my life wishing she could have written just
• 25:06
  one more novel.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_03: And as she says in the book,
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_03: in a certain part,
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_03: she's going through the canon and reading these...
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_03: She reads a lot about what books have been published and...
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_03: just as part of her, her work and her interests that way.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_03: Um,
• 25:26
  but then recognizing the clues in Jane Austen's own work about
• 25:31
  other women writers
• 25:32
  who were real women writers who were writing books that Jane
• 25:35
  Austen really enjoyed,
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_03: um,
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_03: including,
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_03: Frances Burney,
• 25:39
  who's one of her books actually has the phrase pride and
• 25:42
  prejudice within it and thinking,
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_03: um,
• 25:46
  those must just not be there because Jane Austen was the one
• 25:50
  who made it finally good,
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 25:53
  and thinking that's why those women authors were excluded from
• 25:58
  the history of the
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_03: novel or,
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_03: all of this,
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_03: all this,
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_03: these books that you can get.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_03: And she said,
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_03: as I kept investigating,
• 26:06
  I soon learned that the other scholars had been noticing these
• 26:08
  clues in Austen's
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_03: writing decades before the copy of Evelina.
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_03: And she talks about
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_03: her interest becoming,
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 26:18
  almost an obsession when she founds an old copy of Francis
• 26:21
  Bernie's Evelina.
• 26:21
  It says,
• 26:23
  feminist critics had been working to recover the stories of
• 26:26
  these women.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_03: Some would eventually become my guides,
• 26:29
  yet even as scholars write new biographies of these women and
• 26:33
  their books are
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_03: studied in university classes on the 18th century English novel,
• 26:37
  Their contributions are often left out of the venues that reach
• 26:40
  the widest range of people.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_03: Popular books,
• 26:43
  introductory survey courses of English literature and high
• 26:46
  school curricula,
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_03: film and television adaptations of literary classics,
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_03: and more.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_03: Once I became aware of these gaps, I began to see them everywhere.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_03: As of this writing,
• 26:56
  the genre and style section of Jane Austen's Wikipedia page
• 27:00
  notes Austen's debt to
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_03: Richardson and Johnson,
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_03: while Bernie isn't mentioned at all.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_03: Most people don't know.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_03: I didn't know either.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_03: I felt the weight of my mistake.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_03: I spent years wishing that Austen had authored more books,
• 27:14
  but it didn't even occur to me that there were women writers
• 27:17
  whom Austen had used
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_03: as models whose books I could read too.
• 27:21
  And so we're reading this book together,
• 27:25
  but also we're going to be delving into the authors.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_03: And so it starts with a chapter on Jane Austen,
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_03: to talk about her and then goes into Frances Burney.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_03: Anne Radcliffe,
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_03: Charlotte Lennox,
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_03: Hannah Moore,
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_03: Charlotte Smith,
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_03: Elizabeth Inchbald,
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_03: Hester Lynch Thorell Piazzi,
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_03: and Maria Edgeworth.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_03: And I can't wait.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_03: I'm so excited.
• 27:50
  We're in the chapter on Frances Burney and trying to decide
• 27:53
  which of hers to read first.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_03: Do we read kind of all three of her main ones?
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_03: Do we dig deeper?
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_03: What are...
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_03: What are the parameters?
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_03: But it's all in that fun stage.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm just really excited because I, I don't know.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_03: I love a good project like this,
• 28:10
  but this one feels particularly like a treasure that I'll be
• 28:15
  sharing with my wife.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_03: So that'll be fun.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_03: And yeah, but that's what we're reading right now.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_03: Book just came out, the Jane Austen's Bookshelf.
• 28:24
  And I'm curious if either of you have ever read any of these
• 28:28
  books by these authors.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_03: I remember when I was in grad school, there was a class that would teach
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_03: some of the women authors who came before Jane Austen and I'll be,
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_03: I'm going to,
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_03: I'm ashamed to admit,
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_03: I'd rather not even say this.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_03: I didn't take it because I kind of thought,
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_03: well,
• 28:47
  I don't want to read a bunch of books that I probably am not
• 28:50
  that interested in
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_03: because they,
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_03: they were like the building blocks to get to,
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_03: to greatness,
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_03: just that dumb,
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_03: ignorant perspective of,
• 29:00
  And I'm excited to be ashamed of my old self as I read them and
• 29:05
  realize how wrong I was.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_02: I will defer.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_02: I'm going to guess maybe Rowan has a better chance.
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_02: I have not.
• 29:11
  I took that Jane Austen seminar that I've talked about quite a
• 29:14
  few times with Professor Ray.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_02: And so it's been years,
• 29:17
  but I'm sure we referenced and talked about some of these
• 29:20
  authors because she was
• 29:21
  very good about kind of creating the historical backdrop of
• 29:25
  Jane Austen's life and influences.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm sure it came up.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_02: I know.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_02: you know, a lot of the books of that time did.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_02: But I don't specifically think that I,
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_02: maybe excerpts at that point,
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_02: but I don't have any memory of having read any of those.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I have not read widely in that list of writers.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_00: I've read some Francis Burney.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_00: I used to teach Evelina actually in a class on the,
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_00: we had a once upon a time,
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_00: the luxury of a full year class on the history of the novel.
• 29:49
  So we would start,
• 29:51
  start back with Defoe and Wall Flanders and so forth and go forward.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_00: And because my own,
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_00: main expertise was in the 19th century novel,
• 29:59
  I would sort of cherry pick ones that look promising from the
• 30:01
  earlier periods and
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_00: slot them in into the course.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_00: I have a colleague whose expertise is in the Romantic period,
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_00: and technically,
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_00: Austen is a Romantic novelist chronologically.
• 30:11
  And she said once,
• 30:12
  and I know it was sort of hyperbole,
• 30:14
  but I think she also meant it.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_00: She said, well, I mean, Austen is a hack.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_00: We should be paying more attention to these other writers.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_00: She gets all this credit.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_00: She gets so much attention.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if she really believes that about Austen,
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_00: but I think there's a certain frustration with the Austen mania,
• 30:32
  the sense that Austen overshadows everybody else to such an
• 30:35
  extent that you can't
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_00: get them the attention that they deserve.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_00: But of the other writers you mentioned,
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_00: honestly,
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_00: I own copies of some of their books,
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_00: but I have never been particularly drawn to them.
• 30:48
  And partly because I'm not even really,
• 30:50
  don't tell anybody,
• 30:51
  a huge Austen fan.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_00: You know, there are a couple of Austen's novels that I
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_00: that I cherish and then the rest I can like take or leave.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_00: So, so that's not really my, my period.
• 31:03
  So I will be really interested to hear your reports and maybe
• 31:05
  you can,
• 31:06
  you can fly.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_03: I'm the,
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_03: the,
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_03: another thing that kind of,
• 31:10
  I think probably got us really interested is when we're reading
• 31:13
  Northanger Abbey
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_03: together and they keep referencing the mysteries of Udolpho,
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_03: Anne Radcliffe's novels and things like that.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_03: It, it sounds so fun to get swept up into that world.
• 31:25
  that we've probably been looking for this without knowing it
• 31:28
  for a while.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_03: Actually,
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_00: my own book club just chose Northanger Abbey for our next read,
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_00: and I haven't read Northanger Abbey in probably 30 years.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm looking forward to being reminded of how fun it is.
• 31:41
  I only read it once,
• 31:43
  and that was in preparation for our episode on Jane Austen.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_03: Now it's been a few years ago.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_03: Man, I loved that book.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_02: I know.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_02: It was so fun.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_02: So not silly,
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_02: but kind of silly,
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_02: or at least it's poking fun at the silliness,
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_02: but still having like in a,
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_02: almost a respectful way.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_02: I feel like it's, I don't know.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_02: Well,
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_03: and the,
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_03: the,
• 32:02
  the bro culture around those horses and carriages is just so
• 32:07
  funny because it's so
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_03: much like,
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_03: like you were saying earlier,
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_03: Rowan,
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_03: you find out these people lived in a time and were very much alive and,
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_03: and in many ways like us,
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_03: you find those familiarities.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_03: I loved that about North A. You're happy.
• 32:23
  What I remember most deeply about Evelina is there's a very
• 32:26
  weird scene in Evelina
• 32:28
  where they race two old women against each other and they're
• 32:31
  all kind of cheering
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_00: them on.
• 32:35
  I remember many times with my class saying,
• 32:37
  we don't understand what this is doing in here.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_00: Was this a thing people did?
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_00: Is this funny?
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_00: Is it supposed to be horrible?
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: It seems horrible.
• 32:45
  And then the other thing that I think is often brought up about
• 32:51
  poor Frances Burney
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_00: is her having a mastectomy without anesthetic.
• 32:55
  It's a very famous kind of bit of,
• 32:59
  I don't know what the right word is,
• 33:01
  but medical lore.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: But she had quite a life.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_00: Now we're all feeling really uncomfortable thinking about that.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sorry.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_03: Well, I think it might get us into the history, right?
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_03: The real lives,
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_03: the romanticism of it,
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_03: but also the realism of it and the lives,
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_03: just like we pass every second of every day we're alive.
• 33:25
  They did too with pains and boredom and discomfort and joy and
• 33:30
  just forgetfulness and,
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_03: moments of poignancy and,
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_03: And yeah,
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_03: so I think we can transition into the historical fiction discussion,
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_03: which I was enjoying your introduction to it,
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_03: Rowan,
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_03: in terms of talking about what appeals to you in this.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_03: And I certainly don't expect that you were done talking about all that.
• 33:56
  SPEAKER_03: So you're very welcome to go back into all of that.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_03: But I am also very curious about
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_03: What is historical fiction?
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_03: I mean,
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_03: I think like all genres,
• 34:07
  it's ultimately whatever we agree that it is so that we can
• 34:10
  talk about things.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_03: I mean,
• 34:13
  there will always be debates on whether a book fits snugly
• 34:16
  within a genre or skirts
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_03: the edges or...
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_03: just as completely outside of it.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_03: I do anticipate,
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_03: Paul,
• 34:25
  you'll be pushing some of those boundaries and seeing what does
• 34:30
  and doesn't fit nicely.
• 34:33
  But I think it's helpful to categorize things so that we can
• 34:38
  discuss commonalities
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_03: and explore genres and ultimately help people find them.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_03: Um,
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_03: but,
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_03: again,
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_03: I'll be honest in,
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_03: in thinking about all this,
• 34:48
  I realized really quickly that if I just say a book was written
• 34:52
  to take place in
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_03: the past,
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_03: not,
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_03: not a book that was written and now has become in the past,
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_03: like a contemporary novel that soon,
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_03: because time passes,
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_03: but was written.
• 35:04
  And at the time it was written also took place in the past,
• 35:07
  that that might be too broad to,
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_03: of a category.
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_03: You know, it takes place in history.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_03: Does that make it historical fiction?
• 35:16
  And I often find myself reading books at another time that
• 35:18
  don't quite feel like
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_03: historical fiction.
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_03: Like, for example, just yesterday, I finished A.O.
• 35:23
  and Ivy's debut novel,
• 35:25
  The Snow Child,
• 35:26
  which takes place in the early 20th century in Alaska.
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_03: And
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_03: I don't know if many people would consider it historical fiction,
• 35:34
  though it definitely evokes homesteading and trying to survive
• 35:39
  in that time and place.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_03: And talks about the food and the hunting and all that.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_03: So there are historical details.
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_03: But it makes me wonder what actually makes a book fit into this category.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_03: And
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_03: What,
• 35:57
  why is it that some genres meet up really nicely like romance
• 36:03
  and others like Westerns,
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_03: people don't tend to talk about them as historical fiction,
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_03: like Lonesome Dove.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_03: Is it, is it not?
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_03: I mean,
• 36:13
  so that's what I'm trying to get at here with maybe trying to
• 36:16
  figure out what do we mean?
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_03: You know, Paul, you were in a bookstore.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_03: My wife's a librarian.
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_03: If someone comes and says, Hey, I really love historical fiction.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_03: It doesn't give you any more details.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_03: What do you think they want when they ask you for more?
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_03: And does it matter if they're a woman who comes and asks you or a man?
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_03: You know,
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_03: I mean,
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_03: that's,
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_03: I think,
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_03: some interesting things to explore both our assumptions about this genre,
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_03: as well as to,
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 36:41
  have fun discussing some of the books that we'll bring up here
• 36:45
  in a moment.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_03: So I'll just leave all that there and see what you guys think.
• 36:51
  Yeah,
• 36:52
  I mean,
• 36:52
  I'll just jump in quickly because I can't wait to hear what
• 36:54
  Rowan has to say.
• 36:55
  But I will just say that I went through a very similar process
• 36:57
  to I think what you
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_02: were describing,
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor,
• 36:59
  with kind of an awakening for myself of some of the maybe the
• 37:03
  prejudice might be a
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_02: little strong,
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_02: but the stereotypes that I have struggled with,
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_02: because when I hear the word historical fiction.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_02: Like to your point earlier,
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_02: Rowan,
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_02: when you mentioned it,
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_02: if there was any kind of like pause,
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_02: it was probably just me kind of going through that same process.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor described like,
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_02: oh,
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_02: geez,
• 37:19
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know if I can really add to this because in my mind,
• 37:22
  this isn't really something I read a lot about or it's my mind
• 37:26
  goes to certain
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_02: types of kind of this,
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_02: the stereotypes of what this could be.
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_02: World War II, right?
• 37:33
  SPEAKER_02: World War II romances and such.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, exactly.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_02: And you can kind of picture the covers and,
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_00: and the kind of Philippa Gregory style Tudor fiction,
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_00: with the very picturesque covers.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_02: You know, that's exactly it.
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_02: And to be fair, I've read and enjoyed some of those.
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_02: So it's not even even beyond my initial experience.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_02: I was even delving into like, you've liked some of this stuff.
• 37:56
  Why do you still have this little bit of a twinge or a little
• 37:58
  bit of like a,
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_02: not a negative reaction necessarily,
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_02: but anyways.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah,
• 38:02
  but I've just really enjoyed thinking about this and I would
• 38:04
  love to hear your
• 38:05
  thoughts Rowan on kind of some of the questions that Trevor was
• 38:08
  posing because as I
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_02: was going through this,
• 38:10
  SPEAKER_02: I was trying to think like if there was a book that was written,
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_02: whatever in the fifties and it took place in the forties,
• 38:19
  Technically,
• 38:20
  you know,
• 38:20
  in some ways that would probably qualify because it was in history.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_02: It was 10 years previous.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_02: But like,
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_02: yeah,
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_02: I would love to hear you kind of break down your thoughts on that,
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_02: because I never really settled on any particular,
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_02: strong decision on that.
• 38:35
  SPEAKER_02: But I it's been really fun to just think about it.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_02: And like I said,
• 38:39
  kind of exposed to myself some of my existing prejudices that I
• 38:43
  didn't know I
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_02: really had.
• 38:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
• 38:45
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 38:45
  I think maybe the problem is with all discussion of genre is
• 38:49
  that we need these
• 38:50
  SPEAKER_00: categories in a way.
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_00: We recognize them almost instinctively,
• 38:54
  but they're also always too broad or too loose or the edges are
• 38:57
  too fuzzy.
• 38:58
  I deal with this a lot in the class I teach on detective
• 39:00
  fiction because when you
• 39:01
  SPEAKER_00: say crime fiction or mystery and detective fiction,
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_00: You have to try to figure out what does that encompass?
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_00: Is it any novel that there's a crime in somewhere?
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_00: Well, no, it's probably something a little narrower than that.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_00: But so you have the big overarching idea for historical fiction,
• 39:21
  SPEAKER_00: say,
• 39:22
  SPEAKER_00: like you were saying,
• 39:22
  SPEAKER_00: fiction that takes place in the past.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_00: But then you say, well, how far in the past?
• 39:27
  SPEAKER_00: And is any fiction that's set in some remote past,
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_00: does it,
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_00: does it seem historical or is it maybe,
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_00: and maybe this is true with Westerns,
• 39:35
  SPEAKER_00: although I would be cautious with this.
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_00: It's more about archetypes or,
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_00: it's,
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_00: it's not dealing with the past in the,
• 39:42
  SPEAKER_00: in the way we think of as a historical way.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_00: Is that what makes the difference?
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_00: And I think the, um,
• 39:48
  I think the general narrative is that the historical novel as a
• 39:51
  specific kind of
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_00: thing begins more or less with Sir Walter Scott.
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_00: Although,
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_00: these are always,
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_00: again,
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_00: you can be too precise and people can come up with counterexamples.
• 40:02
  But I think what Scott did with Waverly was the two things that
• 40:06
  he's sort of credited with.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_00: One is the subtitle of Waverly is Tis 60 Years Since.
• 40:12
  SPEAKER_00: And so Waverly is looking back about,
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_00: like two generations,
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_00: roughly,
• 40:17
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 40:17
  SPEAKER_00: not your parents,
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_00: but your grandparents,
• 40:19
  SPEAKER_00: again,
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_00: roughly.
• 40:21
  SPEAKER_00: And that's about how far it has to be to count as historical,
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_00: not just more or less contemporary.
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I find that's actually a useful gut check, right?
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_00: Is it far enough back that it's a little bit remote?
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_00: You're not just telling people about their own lives or their own pasts.
• 40:38
  SPEAKER_00: And in the great 19th century examples of this often,
• 40:42
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 40:42
  SPEAKER_00: just to make an obvious point,
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_00: maybe Middlemarch is a historical novel.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_00: It takes place in the 1820s.
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's written in the 1870s, published in the 1870s.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_00: So in that sense, it's exactly that time gap.
• 40:55
  So sometimes they're called novels of the recent past or
• 40:58
  something like that.
• 40:59
  SPEAKER_00: But that sense that it's sort of the history of the present,
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_00: it's within living memory and it helps us understand how we got here.
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_00: It has a sense of history.
• 41:08
  as change,
• 41:09
  as development,
• 41:10
  and not just people just like us,
• 41:12
  but in different costumes.
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the other thing that Scott gets credit for,
• 41:16
  really trying to get a sense that these ancestors of ours
• 41:21
  thought differently.
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_00: They didn't just dress differently, but they had different values.
• 41:25
  SPEAKER_00: Their instincts would be different.
• 41:27
  They would be trying to understand their world in a somewhat
• 41:29
  different way.
• 41:30
  And so sufficient distance and then a sense that this is about
• 41:35
  history or historical change.
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_00: Again,
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_00: you don't want to be too narrow,
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_00: but to me,
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_00: those would be hallmarks of something I would say,
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_00: well,
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_00: that belongs as historical fiction.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_00: It has that kind of engagement with the past as a process.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't have to be super sophisticated.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't have to go all the way to,
• 41:53
  SPEAKER_00: there was a big trend in the 1980s,
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_00: especially for historiographical metafiction,
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_00: where it's all really made very,
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_00: very self-conscious,
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_00: but that you have a sense that this is a different time,
• 42:04
  SPEAKER_00: a different place,
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_00: and it's not just
• 42:07
  like yesterday does that seem reasonable or is that already
• 42:11
  getting too narrow do
• 42:12
  you think i i think it's fascinating because especially where
• 42:16
  you talk and i think
• 42:17
  this is a a key point does the book feel like it's engaging
• 42:22
  with it as history um
• 42:25
  versus just that that's the setting um is that i like what way
• 42:30
  of putting it yeah
• 42:33
  And I think the idea is that somewhere around the time that
• 42:35
  Scott is writing,
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_00: historical writing starts to change in that way.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_00: And you're not just going to the past for examples,
• 42:41
  SPEAKER_00: sort of philosophy teaching by example sort of thing,
• 42:44
  but you're starting to see organic relationships and underlying
• 42:48
  patterns and.
• 42:49
  SPEAKER_00: genuine shifts in worldview.
• 42:51
  SPEAKER_00: And so the historiography gets more complicated in a different way.
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_00: You don't just say,
• 42:55
  SPEAKER_00: well,
• 42:55
  SPEAKER_00: look at people behaving like us over time,
• 42:57
  SPEAKER_00: but you say,
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_00: wow,
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_00: we are really not like those people.
• 43:01
  SPEAKER_00: There's a strangeness to it.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_03: Well, I'm thinking about George Eliot.
• 43:06
  A lot of her novels could maybe fall under the broad category
• 43:10
  of historical fiction,
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_03: like Adam Bede's
• 43:12
  SPEAKER_03: It takes place at the end of the 1700s,
• 43:16
  SPEAKER_03: beginning of the 1800s,
• 43:17
  SPEAKER_03: but it doesn't feel as much like historical fiction.
• 43:21
  I guess there's a religious revivalism going on within it that
• 43:25
  may be particularly
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_03: set in that place.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_03: I would say if I'm looking at tiers,
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_03: we got Adam Bede doesn't feel like historical fiction,
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_03: even though it takes place,
• 43:36
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 43:36
  SPEAKER_03: 60 years before it was written.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_03: Middlemarch, maybe in the middle tier.
• 43:40
  SPEAKER_03: There's a lot about the,
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 43:43
  the changes going on in society and the industrialization going
• 43:47
  on and trying to
• 43:48
  SPEAKER_03: figure all of that out.
• 43:51
  SPEAKER_03: And then you've got something like Romola,
• 43:53
  SPEAKER_03: which feels very much historical fiction,
• 43:56
  SPEAKER_03: takes place in Italy.
• 43:57
  You've got major historical figures discussing their
• 44:01
  philosophies on the page.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_03: And I love your essay on,
• 44:09
  SPEAKER_03: almost,
• 44:09
  does she lean too much into the historical fiction part of it
• 44:13
  and leave out some of
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_03: the heart?
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_03: And I actually wonder if that might be part of it too.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_03: Is there...
• 44:19
  The reason Middlemarch doesn't feel as much like historical
• 44:22
  fiction as Romola,
• 44:23
  SPEAKER_03: I mean,
• 44:23
  SPEAKER_03: there's much more remoteness,
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_03: so it's more clear,
• 44:26
  SPEAKER_03: I think,
• 44:27
  SPEAKER_03: to me that she wasn't writing about her own time.
• 44:31
  But is that there's so much just human drama going on in
• 44:35
  Middlemarch that is
• 44:37
  SPEAKER_03: irrespective of when it took place.
• 44:39
  Yes,
• 44:39
  some of the customs and the way they look at relationships and
• 44:43
  marriage are...
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_03: different from maybe how we would look at them today,
• 44:49
  and maybe even different from how George Eliot in her time
• 44:53
  writing a couple
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_03: generations later would look at them.
• 44:57
  But the heart of that story is something else than the
• 45:02
  examination of history.
• 45:03
  Whereas Romola,
• 45:05
  there is a human story there,
• 45:07
  but it almost gets to me a little bit
• 45:09
  it's the second place to the historical setting in Florence and
• 45:14
  the people and the,
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_03: the philosophies that she's exploring from that particular time.
• 45:21
  SPEAKER_03: Is there a tier list, you know, or are they just both within it?
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_03: And it just depends on what you were looking for.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_00: Well, like your characterization of that.
• 45:30
  SPEAKER_00: And I think the thing that Middlemarch and Adam Bede have in common is,
• 45:33
  SPEAKER_00: is they have that greater proximity to her present.
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_00: And so they, they fit more into the category of, you know,
• 45:38
  SPEAKER_00: of what's sometimes referred to as the history of the present.
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_00: How did we get here today?
• 45:43
  What are the things that we're changing that we're now living
• 45:45
  out the culminations of?
• 45:47
  Whereas Romola is going way back and also tips into sort of
• 45:52
  mythical territory at
• 45:53
  SPEAKER_00: the end,
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_00: and it has a lot of things,
• 45:55
  SPEAKER_00: a lot of moving pieces.
• 45:57
  But there are just so many different things you can do with the
• 46:00
  idea of writing about the past.
• 46:02
  SPEAKER_00: So to use another 19th century example,
• 46:04
  And this is one of many categories I almost used to choose my
• 46:07
  three titles for today.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_00: I could do all Victorian examples.
• 46:10
  SPEAKER_00: And then I thought, well, we did that sort of before.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_00: But I mean, Thackeray's Vanity Fair is also a historical novel.
• 46:15
  SPEAKER_00: But in his original illustrations,
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_00: even though he's writing about the Napoleonic Wars,
• 46:21
  SPEAKER_00: he dressed all his characters in his contemporary fashions.
• 46:25
  And so one of the things Thackeray is doing is using the past
• 46:28
  to hold a mirror up
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_00: to the present.
• 46:29
  SPEAKER_00: And that's a very deliberate strategy.
• 46:32
  SPEAKER_00: How different are we?
• 46:33
  SPEAKER_00: Have we made any changes?
• 46:35
  SPEAKER_00: Are we still just the same?
• 46:37
  SPEAKER_00: So that's just a different way of using that pretty similar time gap.
• 46:41
  SPEAKER_00: 1848, he's publishing an awful 1847, 48, set that back around 1815.
• 46:48
  SPEAKER_00: Not so long before,
• 46:49
  SPEAKER_00: but long enough again that you could be like,
• 46:53
  SPEAKER_00: well,
• 46:54
  SPEAKER_00: that was then,
• 46:55
  SPEAKER_00: this is now,
• 46:56
  SPEAKER_00: or is it?
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_00: And that's another way to play the game.
• 47:00
  So maybe the other thing that is special or unique about
• 47:07
  historical fiction is at
• 47:08
  least its capacity to invite that kind of conversation between
• 47:12
  the past and the present.
• 47:13
  SPEAKER_00: It's really asking us to think about change and historical development,
• 47:17
  SPEAKER_00: progress or not,
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_00: regression or not,
• 47:20
  SPEAKER_00: things that seem to be intractable problems.
• 47:22
  SPEAKER_00: Have they really changed in all this time?
• 47:25
  SPEAKER_00: That sense of
• 47:27
  holding that mirror up is and that as in the present what we're
• 47:31
  interested in in
• 47:32
  the past is always affected by what's happening to us now right
• 47:35
  the things we
• 47:36
  choose to write about even if they are in the past might well
• 47:38
  be reflections of our
• 47:40
  own preoccupations or not right i mean people can also approach
• 47:44
  it and here's where
• 47:45
  all this stuff this temptation to generalize always starts to
• 47:49
  fall apart people
• 47:50
  SPEAKER_00: might be i really do want to get away from the present which is
• 47:53
  SPEAKER_00: still about the present, but it's a kind of escapism.
• 47:58
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah,
• 47:58
  SPEAKER_03: and I do,
• 47:59
  SPEAKER_03: in thinking about this,
• 48:00
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 48:01
  SPEAKER_03: I think that sometimes the reason people might come to the bookstore,
• 48:04
  SPEAKER_03: say,
• 48:04
  SPEAKER_03: and want historical fiction is that sense of escaping a bit of nostalgia,
• 48:09
  SPEAKER_03: sometimes to a time where in their mind,
• 48:11
  SPEAKER_03: things were better or different,
• 48:13
  SPEAKER_03: or at least not now,
• 48:15
  SPEAKER_03: versus someone who comes in and wants,
• 48:18
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 48:18
  SPEAKER_03: war and peace,
• 48:19
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 48:20
  SPEAKER_03: something that
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_03: is very much about a specific time and specific people and,
• 48:27
  SPEAKER_03: and,
• 48:28
  SPEAKER_03: and all of that,
• 48:29
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 48:29
  SPEAKER_03: there's,
• 48:29
  SPEAKER_03: there seems to be room within the genre,
• 48:32
  even as we're discussing it and trying to narrow and figure it
• 48:35
  out room for both of
• 48:36
  SPEAKER_03: those readers to find what they want.
• 48:40
  SPEAKER_03: And maybe even some books do both for some of those readers.
• 48:44
  SPEAKER_03: One, I think maybe my first one might hit both of those,
• 48:49
  SPEAKER_03: types of urges that we might find within ourselves.
• 48:55
  SPEAKER_03: Really quickly, to keep pushing a little bit on some of this,
• 49:01
  And you mentioned that you do teach a,
• 49:04
  I don't know if you said crime or mystery class.
• 49:08
  SPEAKER_00: The course is called mystery and detective fiction,
• 49:11
  SPEAKER_00: but we spend a lot of time,
• 49:12
  SPEAKER_00: or I do anyway,
• 49:12
  trying to parse out this vocabulary in class to try to figure
• 49:16
  out why it might matter.
• 49:17
  SPEAKER_00: So that's a little meta level that we get into.
• 49:21
  Well,
• 49:21
  I don't think anyone put this as a book that they might discuss
• 49:25
  later on.
• 49:26
  SPEAKER_03: But I did think about something like a lot of these,
• 49:31
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 49:31
  SPEAKER_03: detective novelists who write about a different time period,
• 49:37
  SPEAKER_03: they do a lot of research.
• 49:39
  SPEAKER_03: And sometimes that's very essential to the setting and to the plot.
• 49:44
  You know,
• 49:44
  I'm thinking of like Anne Perry's The Cater Street Hangman movie.
• 49:48
  SPEAKER_03: And her whole Thomas and Charlotte Pitt series that takes place in,
• 49:52
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 49:53
  SPEAKER_03: Victorian England.
• 49:55
  SPEAKER_03: And the Cater Street Hangman is the first one of those.
• 49:59
  SPEAKER_03: And I think this is the one that explores...
• 50:04
  SPEAKER_03: I could be wrong.
• 50:05
  SPEAKER_03: Maybe it's a different one.
• 50:07
  But one of their books is very much about Jack the Ripper and
• 50:11
  real theories about
• 50:12
  SPEAKER_03: who he was and going through a lot of that.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_03: I don't think it was the Cater Street Hangman.
• 50:18
  SPEAKER_03: But anyway, she does a lot of research.
• 50:20
  SPEAKER_03: And so there is that sense of place and time.
• 50:23
  Do you think of something like that as fitting nicely within
• 50:29
  the boundaries of
• 50:29
  SPEAKER_03: historical fiction?
• 50:30
  SPEAKER_03: Or is it historical fiction adjacent?
• 50:32
  SPEAKER_03: Like, not quite.
• 50:34
  SPEAKER_03: We get where you're coming from, but that's a little bit outside.
• 50:39
  SPEAKER_03: They touch on the border.
• 50:43
  Yeah,
• 50:43
  I mean,
• 50:43
  I think what we're getting at as we keep trying to go down this
• 50:47
  kind of,
• 50:47
  you know,
• 50:49
  vague path,
• 50:50
  which is inevitable,
• 50:51
  again,
• 50:51
  with this problem of trying to define things.
• 50:53
  SPEAKER_00: What we're discovering is the questions we want to bring to our examples.
• 50:57
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what is it doing with the path?
• 50:58
  SPEAKER_00: What is it doing with history?
• 51:00
  SPEAKER_00: How does it fit?
• 51:01
  SPEAKER_00: What's interesting about this?
• 51:02
  SPEAKER_00: Which is kind of what I would do with my mystery class as well,
• 51:05
  SPEAKER_00: where the options to assign are so proliferating,
• 51:08
  SPEAKER_00: like endlessly.
• 51:09
  You're trying to get a sense of what are the useful questions
• 51:11
  to ask about what
• 51:13
  SPEAKER_00: this book does or where it fits or what kind of tradition or...
• 51:16
  SPEAKER_00: One book that I teach that I would describe as a genre hybrid,
• 51:19
  SPEAKER_00: which I think is what you're talking about here too,
• 51:21
  SPEAKER_00: right,
• 51:21
  SPEAKER_00: is like,
• 51:22
  SPEAKER_00: yes,
• 51:23
  SPEAKER_00: it's historical and it's detective.
• 51:25
  And so what is interesting about that is Walter Moseley's Devil
• 51:29
  in the Blue Dress,
• 51:29
  SPEAKER_00: which is written or published anyway in the early 1990s.
• 51:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's set in 1948, just after the Second World War.
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_00: So it has that spread again of a generation or so.
• 51:41
  SPEAKER_00: And it invites reflection.
• 51:43
  SPEAKER_00: I think Mosley has been quite deliberate about this as his detective,
• 51:47
  who is trying to navigate a world that's very dangerous to him
• 51:51
  as a black man in
• 51:53
  SPEAKER_00: 1940s America,
• 51:53
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_00: is...
• 51:57
  SPEAKER_00: What has changed?
• 51:58
  SPEAKER_00: He gets picked up by the police for walking down the street.
• 52:01
  SPEAKER_00: Has this changed?
• 52:04
  SPEAKER_00: The things that went on,
• 52:05
  SPEAKER_00: desegregation in the Second World War,
• 52:07
  which might be seeming like they were opening up a new era in
• 52:10
  American race relations.
• 52:11
  SPEAKER_00: In 1992,
• 52:12
  SPEAKER_00: do we look back on that and say,
• 52:14
  SPEAKER_00: yes,
• 52:14
  SPEAKER_00: we have fulfilled that promise,
• 52:15
  SPEAKER_00: or do we see how we are still dealing with a crime that is
• 52:20
  fundamental to American history,
• 52:22
  which is the crime of slavery and its aftermath.
• 52:26
  So he's using both genre structures or elements or something at
• 52:33
  the same time in
• 52:34
  SPEAKER_00: this really productive way.
• 52:35
  And by productive,
• 52:36
  I mean,
• 52:38
  both sets of questions turn out to be really relevant to each other.
• 52:41
  SPEAKER_00: What is a crime?
• 52:42
  SPEAKER_00: What is justice?
• 52:42
  SPEAKER_00: How does that change over time?
• 52:44
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's how these things can interact, I think.
• 52:49
  I was thinking of another book that I thought about poking at
• 52:52
  the edges to fulfill
• 52:53
  SPEAKER_02: my usual duty,
• 52:54
  SPEAKER_02: but I was good this time,
• 52:55
  SPEAKER_02: I think.
• 52:56
  SPEAKER_02: But Octavia Butler's book,
• 52:58
  SPEAKER_02: Kendred,
• 52:58
  SPEAKER_02: which is very much in the speculative fiction realm,
• 53:01
  SPEAKER_02: but is doing exactly what you were just describing,
• 53:03
  SPEAKER_02: I think,
• 53:03
  SPEAKER_02: because there's
• 53:05
  SPEAKER_02: At the time,
• 53:05
  SPEAKER_02: a modern day black woman,
• 53:06
  SPEAKER_02: I think it's set in the 70s,
• 53:08
  SPEAKER_02: if I'm not mistaken,
• 53:09
  SPEAKER_02: 1970s,
• 53:10
  SPEAKER_02: who gets kind of sucked back into like,
• 53:13
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 53:13
  SPEAKER_02: the 1860s,
• 53:14
  SPEAKER_02: I think it is,
• 53:14
  SPEAKER_02: or,
• 53:15
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 53:15
  SPEAKER_02: the height of kind of plantation era United States.
• 53:18
  SPEAKER_02: And so she is,
• 53:20
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 53:21
  very literally dealing with the ramifications of those 110
• 53:25
  years or whatever difference.
• 53:27
  SPEAKER_02: And so,
• 53:27
  SPEAKER_02: again,
• 53:28
  SPEAKER_02: like you said,
• 53:28
  there's a way that some of these genres can touch and play
• 53:31
  together in ways that,
• 53:33
  SPEAKER_02: yes,
• 53:33
  SPEAKER_02: it's kind of fun,
• 53:34
  SPEAKER_02: I guess,
• 53:35
  SPEAKER_02: or at least interesting,
• 53:35
  but also there can be some very productive work done by using
• 53:40
  this lens of,
• 53:42
  SPEAKER_02: in this case,
• 53:42
  SPEAKER_02: time travel,
• 53:43
  SPEAKER_02: which,
• 53:44
  SPEAKER_02: you know...
• 53:44
  From a genre point of view,
• 53:45
  again,
• 53:46
  some people might hear that and just be like,
• 53:47
  ugh.
• 53:48
  SPEAKER_02: But then you start reading it and realizing what they're doing.
• 53:51
  SPEAKER_02: And I think there's a lot more going on than it would sound like.
• 53:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, I'm teaching P.D.
• 53:55
  SPEAKER_00: James as an unsuitable job for a woman in the mystery class right now.
• 53:58
  SPEAKER_00: And it's a bit of an odd choice, but I happen to really like it.
• 54:01
  SPEAKER_00: So it's my class and I can do what I want and nobody can stop me.
• 54:04
  SPEAKER_00: But the...
• 54:06
  James was very articulate about the value she found in the
• 54:09
  structure of crime fiction.
• 54:11
  She started writing crime fiction because she needed to make
• 54:14
  some money but thought
• 54:14
  SPEAKER_00: she would switch to doing real novels later.
• 54:17
  SPEAKER_00: Then she's like, you know what?
• 54:18
  SPEAKER_00: This is great.
• 54:19
  SPEAKER_00: I have the very fundamental elements of my plot already decided for me.
• 54:23
  SPEAKER_00: There will be a crime.
• 54:24
  SPEAKER_00: There will be an investigation.
• 54:26
  SPEAKER_00: Now I can do whatever else I want with that structure.
• 54:29
  SPEAKER_00: And it's a useful discipline.
• 54:30
  I have certain things I have to get done,
• 54:32
  but then I can go as far as I want.
• 54:34
  SPEAKER_00: And so I guess for me,
• 54:36
  one of the things about these genre labels is they're mostly
• 54:40
  helpful to prevent
• 54:41
  SPEAKER_00: category mistakes in our response,
• 54:44
  SPEAKER_00: right?
• 54:44
  SPEAKER_00: If someone reads a romance novel and says,
• 54:46
  SPEAKER_00: yeah,
• 54:46
  SPEAKER_00: but it's so formulaic that,
• 54:48
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 54:48
  SPEAKER_00: they meet,
• 54:48
  SPEAKER_00: they fall in love,
• 54:49
  SPEAKER_00: they have a happy ending that's so predictable,
• 54:52
  SPEAKER_00: right?
• 54:53
  SPEAKER_00: They're making a kind of category mistake.
• 54:54
  SPEAKER_00: That's the point of that genre.
• 54:56
  SPEAKER_00: And then the question is, what do you do with that structure?
• 54:58
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, it's so formulaic.
• 54:59
  SPEAKER_00: There's a crime.
• 55:00
  SPEAKER_00: There's a solution.
• 55:01
  SPEAKER_00: We find out who done it at the end.
• 55:02
  SPEAKER_00: Well, of course you do.
• 55:03
  SPEAKER_00: That's the kind of book it is.
• 55:05
  SPEAKER_00: Historical fiction, it's not subject to the same plot conventions.
• 55:10
  SPEAKER_00: It's not predictable in that way.
• 55:12
  But if someone says,
• 55:14
  oh,
• 55:14
  I don't know,
• 55:14
  there was just so much info dumping.
• 55:16
  SPEAKER_00: There was just so much description of the past or something.
• 55:19
  SPEAKER_00: Well, not sure what you expected.
• 55:21
  SPEAKER_00: Hmm.
• 55:22
  SPEAKER_00: And that still leaves all the other questions.
• 55:24
  SPEAKER_00: What is it saying?
• 55:25
  SPEAKER_00: What does it mean?
• 55:26
  SPEAKER_00: What's interesting about it?
• 55:27
  SPEAKER_00: Does it do something unexpected with the genre?
• 55:29
  SPEAKER_00: Or do you care?
• 55:30
  Are you going to it because you enjoy that visit to the past
• 55:32
  and that's what you want?
• 55:34
  SPEAKER_00: So I feel like we can't do away with these genre categories.
• 55:38
  SPEAKER_00: And working in a bookstore, you know better than I do.
• 55:40
  SPEAKER_00: People go in and often they know the kind of book they want.
• 55:44
  SPEAKER_00: And they want a good example of it or a new example of it.
• 55:48
  SPEAKER_00: They either want to be comfortable in it or be stretched in it.
• 55:51
  SPEAKER_00: But they don't just walk in and say, I want any book ever.
• 55:56
  And so there's something valuable in at least doing what we're
• 55:59
  doing and trying to
• 56:00
  SPEAKER_00: figure out,
• 56:00
  SPEAKER_00: well,
• 56:01
  SPEAKER_00: what helps us decide what kind of book it is?
• 56:04
  SPEAKER_00: How much does it affect how we read it?
• 56:06
  SPEAKER_00: Should it affect how we read it?
• 56:09
  we have a genre that has novels about the Tudor period that are
• 56:12
  written by Philippa
• 56:13
  SPEAKER_00: Gregory and Hilary Mantel,
• 56:15
  SPEAKER_00: right?
• 56:15
  SPEAKER_00: We have an umbrella that's big enough to include those kinds of books.
• 56:19
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's useless because those two kinds of books are so different,
• 56:23
  SPEAKER_00: I think,
• 56:23
  SPEAKER_00: in the reading experience they invite people into.
• 56:26
  SPEAKER_00: On the other hand,
• 56:27
  SPEAKER_00: putting those two books side by side,
• 56:28
  SPEAKER_00: it raises the kinds of questions we're asking,
• 56:30
  SPEAKER_00: like what makes something a historical novel?
• 56:33
  SPEAKER_00: Does it have to be
• 56:34
  SPEAKER_00: the kind of book that Hilary Mantel writes to be worth our attention?
• 56:38
  SPEAKER_00: Are we being kind of snobby?
• 56:39
  If we look at,
• 56:41
  I'm using Philippa Gregory as an example because she used to be
• 56:44
  very prominent.
• 56:45
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sure there's people who've stepped up in that space.
• 56:50
  And the sense that reactions are often a little bit gender specific,
• 56:54
  that this is like,
• 56:55
  It's like romance and being seen as a kind of women's genre if
• 56:59
  you're looking in a
• 57:00
  SPEAKER_00: particular area of it.
• 57:02
  SPEAKER_00: And so it doesn't get taken really seriously.
• 57:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
• 57:06
  SPEAKER_00: so I think that's why,
• 57:08
  SPEAKER_00: again,
• 57:09
  SPEAKER_00: when I was thinking of what to bring to this discussion,
• 57:12
  SPEAKER_00: had a whole list of very...
• 57:14
  SPEAKER_00: literary historical novels, so many that I love.
• 57:18
  And then I thought,
• 57:19
  well,
• 57:19
  there's the sort of Victorian ones or there's the metafictional ones.
• 57:24
  SPEAKER_00: And then I thought, you know what?
• 57:26
  I'm going to embrace the genre as a genre that is at one sort
• 57:31
  of robust end of it
• 57:34
  SPEAKER_00: that maybe doesn't get taken as...
• 57:37
  SPEAKER_00: It's not what necessarily gets cited all the time.
• 57:40
  SPEAKER_00: Again, with the mystery class, it's kind of a touchstone for me.
• 57:42
  I know people who teach that kind of class and they lean very
• 57:45
  much into the very
• 57:47
  clever postmodern detective novels or novels that subvert the
• 57:53
  genre or transcend
• 57:54
  SPEAKER_00: the genre.
• 57:55
  SPEAKER_00: And I think of how Ian Rankin, who is a great practitioner,
• 57:59
  SPEAKER_00: of the modern detective novel, he hates that.
• 58:03
  SPEAKER_00: He hates that phrase, transcends the genre.
• 58:05
  SPEAKER_00: He finds it really patronizing.
• 58:06
  He says,
• 58:07
  you can be a good novelist if you're a straight-up crime novelist.
• 58:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so for my course, I assign straight-up crime novels.
• 58:14
  SPEAKER_00: I don't get fancy with it.
• 58:15
  SPEAKER_00: We're reading Negatha Christie.
• 58:17
  SPEAKER_00: We're reading Sarah Paretsky.
• 58:19
  SPEAKER_00: We're trying to find out what's interesting about that.
• 58:22
  SPEAKER_00: We're not reading
• 58:23
  SPEAKER_00: Paul Auster or the ones that say,
• 58:26
  SPEAKER_00: oh yeah,
• 58:26
  SPEAKER_00: I'll do a crime novel,
• 58:27
  SPEAKER_00: but I'm going to show you that,
• 58:29
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 58:29
  SPEAKER_00: you're kind of slumming it and I'm doing it the clever way.
• 58:31
  SPEAKER_03: There's no solution.
• 58:33
  SPEAKER_03: There's no crime.
• 58:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's it.
• 58:36
  SPEAKER_00: You'll never know.
• 58:36
  SPEAKER_00: It'll all be a kind of deconstructive, you know, career or something.
• 58:41
  SPEAKER_00: I love all kinds of historical fiction.
• 58:43
  And the books I love more than any others are a series by
• 58:46
  Dorothy Dunnett,
• 58:47
  SPEAKER_00: the Limond Chronicles.
• 58:48
  SPEAKER_00: I've been reading those for 40 years.
• 58:53
  They're the only books that I'm not really capable of
• 58:55
  approaching with critical attention.
• 58:58
  SPEAKER_00: Even Middlemarch,
• 58:59
  SPEAKER_00: I can cope with lots of kinds of conversations about it,
• 59:01
  SPEAKER_00: but they are my favorite books.
• 59:03
  SPEAKER_00: Middlemarch is my favorite single book.
• 59:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's also a historical novel.
• 59:07
  SPEAKER_00: This is a very deep reading tradition for me,
• 59:10
  so I'm really keen to hear what you brought to the table
• 59:13
  because I read very
• 59:15
  SPEAKER_00: literary ones and not so literary ones.
• 59:18
  SPEAKER_03: Well,
• 59:19
  SPEAKER_03: and I actually,
• 59:19
  SPEAKER_03: because of this,
• 59:20
  SPEAKER_03: I thought we have a rut,
• 59:24
  SPEAKER_03: maybe a tradition or a rut where,
• 59:26
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 59:27
  SPEAKER_03: the guest usually shares their first pick and then Paul and then me.
• 59:30
  SPEAKER_03: And there's no reason for that.
• 59:31
  SPEAKER_03: It's not like we sat down or ever even discussed it.
• 59:35
  But I think this time it might make sense to do it in reverse
• 59:38
  because I would love
• 59:39
  SPEAKER_03: to have you batting cleanup,
• 59:40
  SPEAKER_03: essentially.
• 59:41
  Like Paul and I will give a couple and then have you come in
• 59:44
  with your suggestion.
• 59:45
  SPEAKER_03: We can kind of, you know...
• 59:48
  redirects the wrong word but but also just you know carry that
• 59:51
  on because i again
• 59:53
  and your enthusiasm for dorothy dunnett's novels is is
• 59:56
  definitely something that's
• 59:57
  made me want to read them but i haven't yet and that may also
• 1:00:00
  be a sense when when
• 1:00:02
  we talked about this um offline and you were like oh trevor
• 1:00:06
  might not be as
• 1:00:07
  enthusiastic part of it was probably guilt that i haven't read
• 1:00:09
  those yet and
• 1:00:11
  SPEAKER_03: and knew that I should have.
• 1:00:13
  SPEAKER_03: So there's that too,
• 1:00:14
  SPEAKER_03: but,
• 1:00:15
  SPEAKER_00: but,
• 1:00:15
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 1:00:15
  SPEAKER_00: they're not for everybody,
• 1:00:16
  SPEAKER_00: but,
• 1:00:17
  SPEAKER_00: but they are sheer unabashed,
• 1:00:19
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 1:00:20
  SPEAKER_00: all in storytelling,
• 1:00:22
  SPEAKER_00: character driven and,
• 1:00:24
  SPEAKER_00: and context rich kind of historical fiction,
• 1:00:27
  SPEAKER_00: you know?
• 1:00:28
  So if you like adventure and you're willing to accept a few
• 1:00:32
  wild plots that are
• 1:00:33
  SPEAKER_00: maybe not super plausible and
• 1:00:36
  SPEAKER_03: Well,
• 1:00:37
  let's see if my first choice here suggests that I'm willing to
• 1:00:40
  go there and see
• 1:00:41
  SPEAKER_03: what happens.
• 1:00:42
  I mean,
• 1:00:43
  it is,
• 1:00:43
  I think,
• 1:00:44
  a quintessential choice some people would think of.
• 1:00:49
  When I looked up historical novels,
• 1:00:51
  this one popped up all over the place.
• 1:00:53
  SPEAKER_03: It doesn't quite fit the 60 years.
• 1:00:55
  SPEAKER_03: It's more like 30 or 40 years.
• 1:00:58
  But the one that I picked to kind of kick off mine was a novel
• 1:01:01
  Paul and I have talked about
• 1:01:03
  SPEAKER_03: at times on this is The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas.
• 1:01:09
  SPEAKER_03: Again,
• 1:01:09
  SPEAKER_03: because I went back to my roots with this one,
• 1:01:11
  this is one of the first novels I can remember reading that was
• 1:01:15
  big and that I
• 1:01:17
  SPEAKER_03: could not put down,
• 1:01:19
  SPEAKER_03: just wanted to read it,
• 1:01:20
  SPEAKER_03: forget everything else,
• 1:01:22
  SPEAKER_03: just really getting sucked into it in a way that,
• 1:01:25
  SPEAKER_03: I mean,
• 1:01:26
  SPEAKER_03: I loved it.
• 1:01:27
  SPEAKER_03: And I loved it for its plot, for what it made me think about in terms of
• 1:01:33
  SPEAKER_03: the anger and the,
• 1:01:34
  SPEAKER_03: the,
• 1:01:34
  SPEAKER_03: the romance and the anger and the revenge and,
• 1:01:37
  SPEAKER_03: and what all that does to it,
• 1:01:39
  SPEAKER_03: as well as for the time that it evoked,
• 1:01:42
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:01:42
  SPEAKER_03: Napoleonic war.
• 1:01:43
  SPEAKER_03: I mean,
• 1:01:44
  SPEAKER_03: it,
• 1:01:44
  SPEAKER_03: it's very much 1815 when,
• 1:01:47
  SPEAKER_03: when things kind of happen,
• 1:01:49
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:01:50
  SPEAKER_03: Napoleon escaping Elba.
• 1:01:52
  These are main historical events that kick off some of the plot
• 1:01:57
  here and the places
• 1:01:59
  SPEAKER_03: that this happens,
• 1:02:01
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:02:01
  SPEAKER_03: evoke that history and
• 1:02:04
  But I do think that this is a story that just happens to be set
• 1:02:09
  in that time period
• 1:02:10
  SPEAKER_03: that's enriched by it,
• 1:02:11
  SPEAKER_03: but not necessarily examining it.
• 1:02:14
  SPEAKER_03: Or I was too young...
• 1:02:17
  SPEAKER_03: when I read it that I didn't catch all of the analysis of the history,
• 1:02:21
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:02:22
  SPEAKER_03: I was,
• 1:02:22
  SPEAKER_03: I was just in it for the,
• 1:02:24
  SPEAKER_03: for the fun plot and the fun characters and the fun setting,
• 1:02:29
  SPEAKER_03: which I still,
• 1:02:30
  SPEAKER_03: I absolutely love this story.
• 1:02:32
  SPEAKER_03: There's a new adaptation, a film adaptation came out in France that I,
• 1:02:38
  I am looking to maybe watch over this weekend that I've heard
• 1:02:42
  really good things about.
• 1:02:44
  SPEAKER_03: But again, I think people love it because it's just fun.
• 1:02:48
  SPEAKER_03: You know, there's a lot to discuss in a fun way.
• 1:02:53
  SPEAKER_03: And I think as a kid,
• 1:02:55
  SPEAKER_03: I felt sophisticated because I could look at,
• 1:02:58
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:02:58
  SPEAKER_03: did this destroy him?
• 1:03:00
  SPEAKER_03: You know, was it all worth it?
• 1:03:02
  SPEAKER_03: You know, what does revenge really do?
• 1:03:03
  SPEAKER_03: But really, I was just I was just having a blast with it.
• 1:03:07
  SPEAKER_03: So so that's that's where I'll kick it off.
• 1:03:09
  SPEAKER_03: And and I again,
• 1:03:11
  SPEAKER_03: I'm pretty sure that I could could could get fully enmeshed,
• 1:03:16
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:03:17
  SPEAKER_03: engrossed in the Dorothy Dunnett novels as well.
• 1:03:20
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, I don't know what I've looked when I've looked into them.
• 1:03:24
  I've just thought they just look like there's a lot of fun
• 1:03:27
  going on within them as well.
• 1:03:31
  SPEAKER_02: I love that.
• 1:03:31
  I haven't read that book in a long time,
• 1:03:33
  but I have been thinking one of these days.
• 1:03:36
  SPEAKER_02: It seems to me like a nice summer read.
• 1:03:38
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know why, but I think that would be a good one.
• 1:03:41
  SPEAKER_02: Summer read by the sea.
• 1:03:43
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, exactly.
• 1:03:44
  SPEAKER_02: No, it's just so plot driven.
• 1:03:45
  SPEAKER_02: And I mean,
• 1:03:46
  SPEAKER_02: there's a lot of other things going on,
• 1:03:47
  SPEAKER_02: but like you said,
• 1:03:49
  SPEAKER_02: you could just get swept up and just kind of,
• 1:03:51
  SPEAKER_02: it's like,
• 1:03:51
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know,
• 1:03:52
  SPEAKER_02: not by any means an airport novel,
• 1:03:54
  SPEAKER_02: but it has a lot of those kind of just where you're,
• 1:03:57
  SPEAKER_02: if you're all in,
• 1:03:57
  SPEAKER_02: you're all in kind of thing.
• 1:03:59
  SPEAKER_00: So I have never read The Count of Monte Cristo,
• 1:04:01
  SPEAKER_00: but every time I hear you talk about it,
• 1:04:02
  SPEAKER_00: Trevor,
• 1:04:03
  SPEAKER_00: I think,
• 1:04:03
  SPEAKER_00: wow,
• 1:04:04
  SPEAKER_00: that sounds like one I should read.
• 1:04:06
  SPEAKER_00: And that getting swept up in the narrative,
• 1:04:08
  SPEAKER_00: yeah,
• 1:04:09
  SPEAKER_00: for me,
• 1:04:09
  SPEAKER_00: that was my experience of reading Dunnett.
• 1:04:11
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I started reading Dunnett when I was a teenager.
• 1:04:13
  SPEAKER_00: So plot-driven books.
• 1:04:15
  SPEAKER_00: historical fiction was exactly my jam.
• 1:04:18
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't know why I never got to Dumas,
• 1:04:19
  SPEAKER_00: really,
• 1:04:20
  SPEAKER_00: because it sounds like it would have also been exactly,
• 1:04:23
  except that I had so much done it to read because they're long
• 1:04:25
  and there's six of them.
• 1:04:27
  SPEAKER_00: So there's, yeah, that really sounds delightful.
• 1:04:31
  And it's interesting what you say,
• 1:04:32
  like maybe there is more comment about history in their
• 1:04:36
  you know,
• 1:04:36
  in the interstices of the plot,
• 1:04:37
  who knows,
• 1:04:38
  but it didn't matter to you.
• 1:04:39
  SPEAKER_00: You just, you just wanted to be immersed in that story.
• 1:04:42
  SPEAKER_00: And, and that kind of immersive reading can come in any genre.
• 1:04:45
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 1:04:45
  But sometimes I feel like historical fiction is particularly
• 1:04:47
  good at that.
• 1:04:48
  SPEAKER_00: A really good writer of historical fiction,
• 1:04:50
  SPEAKER_00: because they,
• 1:04:51
  SPEAKER_00: they create like a whole set in your head.
• 1:04:53
  SPEAKER_00: It looks a certain way.
• 1:04:55
  SPEAKER_00: It kind of smells a certain way.
• 1:04:57
  SPEAKER_00: There's that tactile quality to,
• 1:04:59
  SPEAKER_00: it's like world building in science fiction and fantasy,
• 1:05:01
  SPEAKER_00: I guess,
• 1:05:02
  SPEAKER_00: except that maybe our commitment to it is quicker because it,
• 1:05:06
  you know it sounds like a real place it is a real place so i
• 1:05:09
  mean often when i'm
• 1:05:10
  reading fantasy i i don't read much of it because i find the
• 1:05:14
  world building aspects
• 1:05:16
  they seem very fake to me like you're making up these place
• 1:05:18
  names you know if you
• 1:05:19
  want it to look like venice just call it venice or whatever and
• 1:05:23
  in historical
• 1:05:23
  fiction i never have that that step back well if you do ever
• 1:05:29
  read the counter money
• 1:05:30
  SPEAKER_03: crystal i'd love to hear your hear your thoughts i think um
• 1:05:33
  SPEAKER_03: I think you would like it.
• 1:05:35
  SPEAKER_03: But,
• 1:05:35
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:05:36
  SPEAKER_03: if one thing I've also learned,
• 1:05:38
  SPEAKER_03: Rowan,
• 1:05:38
  is I don't even mind when you don't like a book that I like
• 1:05:42
  because you have always
• 1:05:43
  SPEAKER_03: got interesting things to say about why.
• 1:05:48
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it definitely sounds like my kind of thing.
• 1:05:50
  I mean,
• 1:05:50
  just,
• 1:05:51
  you know,
• 1:05:51
  I'm someone who loves a big,
• 1:05:53
  big Dickens novel,
• 1:05:54
  too.
• 1:05:54
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 1:05:54
  And it sounds like it has that kind of quality of just let's go
• 1:05:57
  with the magic of storytelling.
• 1:05:59
  SPEAKER_00: which is super appealing to me.
• 1:06:01
  When I get the sense that the author is just really invested in
• 1:06:04
  having a fantastic time,
• 1:06:05
  SPEAKER_00: then I'm in.
• 1:06:08
  SPEAKER_02: All right, Paul, what do you got?
• 1:06:10
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah,
• 1:06:11
  so this is a book I think that'll kind of explore a couple of
• 1:06:14
  the different things
• 1:06:14
  SPEAKER_02: we're talking about,
• 1:06:15
  because I think it does do the thing where we're talking about
• 1:06:19
  realizing people in
• 1:06:19
  SPEAKER_02: the past were in many ways like us,
• 1:06:21
  SPEAKER_02: but it also explores kind of what you were talking about,
• 1:06:23
  SPEAKER_02: Rowan,
• 1:06:24
  the idea of addressing some things that are still very relevant
• 1:06:27
  today and looking
• 1:06:28
  SPEAKER_02: to see have we made any progress.
• 1:06:29
  SPEAKER_02: And so it's a book I don't hear about it very often,
• 1:06:33
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think,
• 1:06:33
  SPEAKER_02: but I read it a few years ago and I thought it was excellent.
• 1:06:36
  SPEAKER_02: It's called Burial Rites by Hannah Kent.
• 1:06:38
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not sure if you guys have read that one, but yeah.
• 1:06:40
  SPEAKER_02: So it's based on historical events.
• 1:06:43
  SPEAKER_02: Like this is a real woman,
• 1:06:45
  SPEAKER_02: but obviously fictionalizing and kind of getting into,
• 1:06:48
  which is another thing I think that this can do is take a real
• 1:06:51
  person or a real
• 1:06:52
  SPEAKER_02: event and kind of have some,
• 1:06:54
  SPEAKER_02: not fun,
• 1:06:55
  SPEAKER_02: but just start exploring what might've gone on inside of their head.
• 1:06:58
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah,
• 1:06:58
  it's based on true events and the event in particular is the
• 1:07:02
  last public execution
• 1:07:03
  SPEAKER_02: to take place in Iceland.
• 1:07:05
  SPEAKER_02: So it's back in 1829 is where the execution took place.
• 1:07:09
  SPEAKER_02: So this is the year or so preceding that.
• 1:07:12
  SPEAKER_02: And it tells the story of a woman named Agnes Magnus Doter,
• 1:07:15
  SPEAKER_02: who,
• 1:07:16
  SPEAKER_02: along with two other people,
• 1:07:18
  SPEAKER_02: is accused of murdering her former master.
• 1:07:21
  SPEAKER_02: You know, she was a servant or a slave.
• 1:07:24
  SPEAKER_02: And so for her punishment,
• 1:07:26
  SPEAKER_02: kind of waiting up until the execution,
• 1:07:28
  she's sent to an isolated farm where she's just kind of having
• 1:07:31
  to help out this
• 1:07:32
  SPEAKER_02: family as she awaits the day of her execution.
• 1:07:35
  SPEAKER_02: And so a lot of the story does take place on that farm and it involves...
• 1:07:40
  her but also the family i mean you can only imagine what it
• 1:07:42
  would be like to be a
• 1:07:43
  family who have this accused murderer you know placed in the
• 1:07:47
  middle of your
• 1:07:48
  everyday life and kind of you have to integrate her and so it
• 1:07:51
  kind of fluctuates
• 1:07:52
  between a lot of first person narrative from agnes's point of
• 1:07:56
  view and then there's
• 1:07:57
  other perspectives from the family members or this priest who's
• 1:08:00
  assigned to become
• 1:08:01
  SPEAKER_02: her spiritual advisor
• 1:08:03
  SPEAKER_02: in the days leading up to her death.
• 1:08:04
  And so there's a little bit of the mystery of what actually
• 1:08:07
  happened with these murderers.
• 1:08:08
  SPEAKER_02: I mean,
• 1:08:09
  SPEAKER_02: of course,
• 1:08:09
  SPEAKER_02: if you wanted to,
• 1:08:10
  SPEAKER_02: like many of these,
• 1:08:11
  SPEAKER_02: you could probably spoil it and go see some of the facts.
• 1:08:14
  SPEAKER_02: And I am sure I did do that afterwards,
• 1:08:16
  but I always like to kind of approach these things that I don't
• 1:08:19
  know anything about
• 1:08:20
  SPEAKER_02: with as little knowledge as possible.
• 1:08:23
  But I think one of the reasons that it stuck with me outside of
• 1:08:25
  all that is it does
• 1:08:26
  SPEAKER_02: such a nice job of kind of
• 1:08:29
  SPEAKER_02: highlighting her inner turmoil as she's awaiting her execution.
• 1:08:33
  And there's a lot on the ideas of justice and when is it okay
• 1:08:38
  to murder somebody?
• 1:08:39
  SPEAKER_02: When is it not okay?
• 1:08:40
  SPEAKER_02: You know, because obviously a public execution is still a murder.
• 1:08:43
  SPEAKER_02: You know, you were taking someone's life, but in many situations,
• 1:08:47
  SPEAKER_02: societies that is considered to be justified.
• 1:08:49
  SPEAKER_02: They deserve it.
• 1:08:50
  SPEAKER_02: And so it gets a lot into that.
• 1:08:53
  SPEAKER_02: But also,
• 1:08:54
  SPEAKER_02: me,
• 1:08:54
  the beauty of the language is definitely something that I think
• 1:08:58
  has set this book
• 1:08:58
  SPEAKER_02: apart for me,
• 1:08:59
  SPEAKER_02: where a lot of books that I've read,
• 1:09:01
  SPEAKER_02: even if the plot was strong or the story was strong,
• 1:09:04
  SPEAKER_02: they may fade away.
• 1:09:05
  SPEAKER_02: But I think for me, often what makes me
• 1:09:08
  move it up to that next tier is also the beautiful writing so
• 1:09:11
  again i'll do my my
• 1:09:12
  usual just read a little bit but i do think it's just
• 1:09:15
  incredibly beautiful and
• 1:09:16
  powerful and so this is obviously from agnes's perspective and
• 1:09:20
  it says they said i
• 1:09:21
  must die they said that i stole the breath from men and now
• 1:09:25
  they must steal mine
• 1:09:27
  SPEAKER_02: I imagine,
• 1:09:27
  SPEAKER_02: then,
• 1:09:28
  SPEAKER_02: that we are all candle flames,
• 1:09:29
  SPEAKER_02: greasy bright,
• 1:09:30
  SPEAKER_02: fluttering in the darkness and the howl of the wind,
• 1:09:33
  SPEAKER_02: and in the stillness of the room I hear footsteps,
• 1:09:36
  SPEAKER_02: awful coming footsteps,
• 1:09:37
  coming to blow me out and send my life up away from me in a
• 1:09:41
  gray wreath of smoke.
• 1:09:43
  SPEAKER_02: I will vanish into the air and the night.
• 1:09:45
  SPEAKER_02: They will blow us all out,
• 1:09:47
  SPEAKER_02: one by one,
• 1:09:47
  SPEAKER_02: until it is only their own light by which they see themselves.
• 1:09:51
  SPEAKER_02: Where will I be then?
• 1:09:53
  SPEAKER_02: Sometimes I think I see it again, the farm, burning in the dark.
• 1:09:56
  SPEAKER_02: Sometimes I can feel the ache of winter in my lungs,
• 1:09:59
  SPEAKER_02: and I think I see the flames mirrored in the ocean,
• 1:10:01
  SPEAKER_02: the water so strange,
• 1:10:02
  SPEAKER_02: so flickered with light.
• 1:10:04
  SPEAKER_02: There was a moment during that night when I looked back.
• 1:10:07
  I looked back to watch the fire,
• 1:10:08
  and if I lick my skin,
• 1:10:09
  I can still taste the salt,
• 1:10:11
  the smoke.
• 1:10:12
  SPEAKER_02: It wasn't always so cold.
• 1:10:14
  SPEAKER_02: I hear footsteps.
• 1:10:16
  SPEAKER_02: And so that's obviously near the beginning,
• 1:10:17
  SPEAKER_02: and I think it just,
• 1:10:19
  SPEAKER_02: I mean,
• 1:10:19
  SPEAKER_02: it's just so well done of,
• 1:10:20
  SPEAKER_02: like I said,
• 1:10:21
  SPEAKER_02: the mystery,
• 1:10:21
  SPEAKER_02: but also just this
• 1:10:23
  SPEAKER_02: they're going to blow out the flame that is me is so powerful.
• 1:10:27
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that,
• 1:10:28
  SPEAKER_02: like we were saying,
• 1:10:30
  the idea of exploring these bigger concepts through a real
• 1:10:33
  event where you can
• 1:10:33
  actually realize that this wasn't just some date in a history
• 1:10:36
  book and some lady
• 1:10:37
  SPEAKER_02: that you can read about on Wikipedia,
• 1:10:38
  SPEAKER_02: like she lived a life and actually experienced all this stuff.
• 1:10:41
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, that's my first choice.
• 1:10:43
  SPEAKER_02: It's a book that,
• 1:10:44
  SPEAKER_02: like I said,
• 1:10:44
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know,
• 1:10:45
  SPEAKER_02: maybe it is more popular than I think it is,
• 1:10:47
  SPEAKER_02: but I don't feel like I hear about it too often,
• 1:10:48
  SPEAKER_02: but I'm kind of surprised because I think it's really well done.
• 1:10:52
  It's also a really interesting choice because it exactly
• 1:10:54
  matches what we were just
• 1:10:55
  SPEAKER_00: discussing in terms of hybrid genres,
• 1:10:57
  SPEAKER_00: right?
• 1:10:57
  I mean,
• 1:10:58
  I,
• 1:10:58
  I,
• 1:10:58
  when I read it,
• 1:10:59
  I thought of it as a historical mystery,
• 1:11:01
  right?
• 1:11:01
  SPEAKER_00: That it is a crime novel.
• 1:11:03
  It is a novel about a crime and a punishment set in the
• 1:11:06
  historical setting.
• 1:11:07
  SPEAKER_00: It was just a matter of kind of emphasis,
• 1:11:10
  SPEAKER_00: which of those two things you think more about,
• 1:11:12
  but what you were saying about the ideas of justice and how we
• 1:11:15
  implement it and
• 1:11:16
  SPEAKER_00: what values it reflects.
• 1:11:17
  SPEAKER_00: Those are questions in crime fiction.
• 1:11:19
  SPEAKER_00: And she's a criminal,
• 1:11:21
  and that's the sort of story there and what might have
• 1:11:23
  justified her crime.
• 1:11:24
  SPEAKER_00: But it is also a historical novel in a historical setting.
• 1:11:27
  SPEAKER_00: And so I guess you could just start to say, why does it matter?
• 1:11:30
  SPEAKER_00: But I think it matters for the reasons you were explaining,
• 1:11:33
  like that sense that it's using that story of her execution to
• 1:11:38
  tell us something
• 1:11:40
  SPEAKER_00: about this time,
• 1:11:40
  SPEAKER_00: this place,
• 1:11:41
  SPEAKER_00: and to imagine this person being
• 1:11:43
  SPEAKER_00: And then also, yeah, very beautifully written.
• 1:11:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I was very moved by it when I read it too.
• 1:11:47
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think it does have a super high profile,
• 1:11:49
  SPEAKER_00: but I guess it probably,
• 1:11:50
  SPEAKER_00: as with everything,
• 1:11:51
  SPEAKER_00: it kind of depends on,
• 1:11:52
  I think I read it initially because I think Sam Sachs gave it a
• 1:11:55
  really good review,
• 1:11:56
  SPEAKER_00: although back in the,
• 1:11:58
  SPEAKER_00: when it first came out and I always kind of trust
• 1:12:01
  SPEAKER_00: Sam, but I might be misremembering that.
• 1:12:03
  But that's,
• 1:12:04
  yeah,
• 1:12:04
  that question of genre,
• 1:12:05
  that's so interesting in that specific case.
• 1:12:08
  One thing I did think about with the books I was choosing is
• 1:12:11
  that by and large,
• 1:12:13
  SPEAKER_00: they do not have what I would call beautiful prose.
• 1:12:16
  SPEAKER_00: They have
• 1:12:16
  SPEAKER_00: workmanlike prose.
• 1:12:18
  And I think to go back to our little bit of prejudice against a
• 1:12:22
  certain kind of
• 1:12:23
  SPEAKER_00: historical fiction,
• 1:12:24
  SPEAKER_00: it might rest in that,
• 1:12:25
  that it doesn't prioritize or exemplify the kind of literarily
• 1:12:31
  beautiful writing
• 1:12:32
  SPEAKER_00: that we all really take so much pleasure in.
• 1:12:35
  SPEAKER_00: But even so, I think it can be better or worse, right?
• 1:12:37
  SPEAKER_00: It can be working the mic in such a way that you don't object to it.
• 1:12:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's just carrying you along.
• 1:12:42
  SPEAKER_00: Or it can seem clunky and wooden.
• 1:12:43
  SPEAKER_00: And then any book that's clunky and wooden,
• 1:12:45
  SPEAKER_00: historical or otherwise,
• 1:12:47
  there's no reason why we should assume there's more of that in
• 1:12:49
  any one genre than
• 1:12:51
  SPEAKER_00: than the other.
• 1:12:53
  SPEAKER_00: So that's an interesting question.
• 1:12:56
  Something else about we were thinking what can historical
• 1:12:58
  fiction before do that
• 1:12:59
  you made me think about is that for a long time historical
• 1:13:04
  writing tended to be
• 1:13:05
  about the big important people and one thing that historical
• 1:13:08
  fiction enabled and
• 1:13:09
  SPEAKER_00: Middlemarch is a great example of this
• 1:13:11
  SPEAKER_00: is to come in and tell the stories of the unhistoric lives, right?
• 1:13:14
  SPEAKER_00: That's part of the whole explicit rhetoric of Middlemarch.
• 1:13:16
  SPEAKER_00: These are the people you don't ordinarily hear about,
• 1:13:18
  SPEAKER_00: but they make up the vast majority of people.
• 1:13:21
  SPEAKER_00: And what do you do when you don't have so many records or
• 1:13:26
  SPEAKER_00: kind of memorials or stories of their lives,
• 1:13:29
  SPEAKER_00: well,
• 1:13:29
  SPEAKER_00: you can make it up,
• 1:13:30
  but you can try to be as realistic or as accurate as possible
• 1:13:34
  in your sympathetic imagining.
• 1:13:35
  SPEAKER_00: History has changed.
• 1:13:37
  Now we have a whole field of social history that attempts to do
• 1:13:41
  that kind of thing.
• 1:13:42
  But what you were saying about telling the story of somebody
• 1:13:45
  that we don't actually
• 1:13:46
  SPEAKER_00: know anything about,
• 1:13:47
  SPEAKER_00: it's hard for historians to do that.
• 1:13:49
  But novelists have a kind of license to make it up for us in a
• 1:13:53
  way that feels believable.
• 1:13:55
  SPEAKER_00: I know we're all backlisted listeners,
• 1:13:56
  and one thing they've been saying a lot about their biographies
• 1:13:59
  that they've been
• 1:14:00
  SPEAKER_00: discussing is,
• 1:14:01
  SPEAKER_00: is it true and does it matter?
• 1:14:03
  And I feel like those are also really good questions for
• 1:14:05
  thinking about historical fiction.
• 1:14:08
  SPEAKER_00: How anxious are we about whether we're getting the true story?
• 1:14:12
  SPEAKER_00: right, of that woman.
• 1:14:13
  SPEAKER_00: Is there a true story?
• 1:14:15
  SPEAKER_00: Does it matter if this is the true story?
• 1:14:18
  SPEAKER_00: And does it matter more in some cases than in other cases?
• 1:14:21
  You know,
• 1:14:21
  are there people whose lives you feel we should not make stuff
• 1:14:24
  up about?
• 1:14:25
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 1:14:26
  SPEAKER_00: Hilary Mantel has been getting,
• 1:14:27
  SPEAKER_00: it's been a little bit of press recently,
• 1:14:29
  SPEAKER_00: again,
• 1:14:29
  SPEAKER_00: a little buzz of people saying,
• 1:14:30
  SPEAKER_00: well,
• 1:14:31
  SPEAKER_00: she misrepresented Cromwell in this way and that way.
• 1:14:34
  SPEAKER_00: Is it true what she said?
• 1:14:37
  SPEAKER_00: Does it matter?
• 1:14:37
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:14:39
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I like that a lot.
• 1:14:40
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I do too.
• 1:14:43
  SPEAKER_03: All right, Rowan.
• 1:14:43
  SPEAKER_03: I'd love to hear what your first choice is.
• 1:14:48
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 1:14:48
  Well,
• 1:14:48
  unfortunately,
• 1:14:49
  your listeners will not be able to see this elegant book with it.
• 1:14:53
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's called Foxing, and it's tattered front page.
• 1:14:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's missing its cover.
• 1:14:59
  This is a book called The Young Mary Queen of Scots,
• 1:15:02
  and the author is Jean Plady.
• 1:15:05
  And actually,
• 1:15:05
  the book that I'm officially discussing is her book,
• 1:15:08
  Murder,
• 1:15:08
  Most Royal.
• 1:15:10
  But this book,
• 1:15:10
  The Young Mary Queen of Scots,
• 1:15:12
  may be the most influential book in my life.
• 1:15:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm really happy I still have it.
• 1:15:16
  SPEAKER_00: So I was reading it in first grade.
• 1:15:18
  SPEAKER_00: So that's how long I have had it.
• 1:15:22
  SPEAKER_00: And Jean Plady,
• 1:15:23
  SPEAKER_00: I was looking her up because,
• 1:15:24
  SPEAKER_00: of course,
• 1:15:25
  SPEAKER_00: I took her completely for granted in my youth.
• 1:15:27
  SPEAKER_00: But I had a whole shelf of her novels.
• 1:15:30
  SPEAKER_00: She wrote a Tudor series,
• 1:15:32
  SPEAKER_00: a Georgian series,
• 1:15:33
  SPEAKER_00: a series about Ferdinand and Isabella that I loved,
• 1:15:36
  SPEAKER_00: a series about William the Conqueror that I loved.
• 1:15:40
  SPEAKER_00: She just wrote and wrote and wrote.
• 1:15:42
  SPEAKER_00: And I didn't read all of them.
• 1:15:44
  SPEAKER_00: It didn't even occur to me at the time to,
• 1:15:46
  I don't know how you would have looked up who an author was or
• 1:15:48
  what their back
• 1:15:49
  SPEAKER_00: catalog was.
• 1:15:50
  SPEAKER_00: It was the early 1970s.
• 1:15:52
  SPEAKER_00: We didn't have computers, right?
• 1:15:55
  But it turns out that Jean Pleidy was the pseudonym for a
• 1:15:58
  writer named Eleanor Hibbert,
• 1:15:59
  SPEAKER_00: who lived from 1906 to 1993.
• 1:16:02
  SPEAKER_00: So she had a long writing career.
• 1:16:04
  And I did know that she also wrote under the pseudonyms
• 1:16:06
  Victoria Holt and Philippa Carr.
• 1:16:08
  SPEAKER_00: And she wrote romantic suspense and I think just straight up romance.
• 1:16:13
  SPEAKER_00: So she wrote a vast, vast number of books.
• 1:16:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I read them and read them and read them.
• 1:16:19
  And the reason I only have a very few left is mostly because
• 1:16:22
  they fell apart.
• 1:16:24
  I had a very odd experience when I was a PhD student and I was
• 1:16:28
  writing on 19th
• 1:16:30
  SPEAKER_00: century historical narratives,
• 1:16:31
  SPEAKER_00: which is why I have some of this stuff still in my head.
• 1:16:35
  I was reading a series called The Lives of the Queens of
• 1:16:38
  England by Agnes and
• 1:16:39
  SPEAKER_00: Elizabeth Strickland that was published between 1840 and 1848,
• 1:16:43
  a rare example of a very successful series of historical
• 1:16:46
  biographies by women historians,
• 1:16:48
  SPEAKER_00: which was a very small niche group.
• 1:16:50
  And as I was reading the Strickland's histories,
• 1:16:52
  I kept thinking,
• 1:16:53
  wow,
• 1:16:54
  I know all these stories.
• 1:16:55
  SPEAKER_00: I know all this.
• 1:16:56
  I've read all these stories about Elizabeth when she was a
• 1:16:59
  young princess or Catherine Parr or
• 1:17:02
  And I discovered when I went back to my Jean Plady novels that
• 1:17:05
  the first source she
• 1:17:07
  cites at the end of her books is Agnes Strickland's Lives of
• 1:17:09
  the Queens of England
• 1:17:11
  SPEAKER_00: from the 1840s.
• 1:17:12
  SPEAKER_00: So I found that really an amazing story.
• 1:17:15
  SPEAKER_00: evidence of the longevity of that 19th century work,
• 1:17:18
  SPEAKER_00: which is otherwise completely lost,
• 1:17:21
  having set the tone and the standard for so much historical
• 1:17:25
  fiction that came after.
• 1:17:27
  SPEAKER_00: Word for word,
• 1:17:28
  some of the anecdotes turn out to come right from the
• 1:17:30
  documentary sources that the
• 1:17:31
  SPEAKER_00: Stricklands were using.
• 1:17:33
  So it's one of those moments when you realize that your whole
• 1:17:36
  life has been
• 1:17:37
  SPEAKER_00: preparing you for something you didn't see coming,
• 1:17:40
  which was the work I was doing on the difference between
• 1:17:43
  historical writing and
• 1:17:45
  as you know historical writing and fiction and and what what
• 1:17:50
  you could and couldn't
• 1:17:50
  do in one form and in the other but i read especially the tudor
• 1:17:55
  volumes and i read
• 1:17:56
  them over and over so murder most royal is the one that i
• 1:17:58
  brought it is the story
• 1:18:00
  of anne boleyn and katherine howard who were cousins so i they
• 1:18:04
  had such dramatic i
• 1:18:05
  SPEAKER_00: mean the horrible cover again the kind of 1970s sketch artist thing um
• 1:18:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I think,
• 1:18:12
  SPEAKER_00: again,
• 1:18:13
  it was the sense of drama that these were young women caught up
• 1:18:17
  in a world that now
• 1:18:18
  I wouldn't have been able to articulate this reading it as a
• 1:18:21
  teenager in the 70s
• 1:18:22
  SPEAKER_00: and 80s,
• 1:18:22
  SPEAKER_00: but that the structures,
• 1:18:24
  the kind of patriarchal structures around them were constantly
• 1:18:27
  putting them at such
• 1:18:28
  SPEAKER_00: a disadvantage.
• 1:18:29
  They were being sort of hawked between different men struggling
• 1:18:32
  for power and
• 1:18:34
  And thinking they had the advantage in their beauty or their
• 1:18:36
  use to attract the king,
• 1:18:37
  SPEAKER_00: for instance,
• 1:18:39
  and rise to the very top only to be toppled and in these cases
• 1:18:44
  executed so rootlessly.
• 1:18:47
  SPEAKER_00: And that whole,
• 1:18:49
  SPEAKER_00: the arc of that narrative was so compelling to me just for its drama,
• 1:18:52
  SPEAKER_00: just for the sense of that chilling moment of confronting the block.
• 1:18:56
  The first time I ever went to the Tower of London and saw the
• 1:19:00
  sight of the scaffold,
• 1:19:01
  SPEAKER_00: it was really a chilling moment for me,
• 1:19:03
  SPEAKER_00: that sense of reality again.
• 1:19:05
  SPEAKER_00: These were not just stories.
• 1:19:07
  These were very young people walking on a sunny day to kneel
• 1:19:12
  down and have their
• 1:19:15
  SPEAKER_00: lives ended in such a brutal way.
• 1:19:17
  SPEAKER_00: So very influential for me again in these strange stories.
• 1:19:20
  SPEAKER_00: Strange ways that... I mean, I love opera too, right?
• 1:19:23
  SPEAKER_00: Melodrama.
• 1:19:24
  SPEAKER_00: I love Dickens.
• 1:19:25
  SPEAKER_00: Melodrama.
• 1:19:26
  SPEAKER_00: Turns out I have a weak spot for that.
• 1:19:30
  But it's been interesting to kind of first grow up with these
• 1:19:34
  stories as just a big
• 1:19:35
  SPEAKER_00: part of my reading life and then kind of grow into them as problems,
• 1:19:40
  SPEAKER_00: as things to think about.
• 1:19:41
  SPEAKER_00: How do we think about...
• 1:19:44
  these women in the situation and I did not become a historian
• 1:19:47
  and I'm not an expert
• 1:19:48
  on Tudor history and I don't even know what the current story
• 1:19:51
  is about Anne Boleyn
• 1:19:51
  and what degree of power she had or didn't have or you know was
• 1:19:55
  she guilty of
• 1:19:55
  adultery or not um I don't know is this book true does it
• 1:19:59
  matter I know that in the
• 1:20:01
  historical sources I have looked at things like her final words
• 1:20:04
  on the scaffold are
• 1:20:05
  SPEAKER_00: exactly what I met when I read it for the first time
• 1:20:08
  SPEAKER_00: reading Jean Plady.
• 1:20:09
  So I really have to give her a shout out as having just been so
• 1:20:12
  influential on my
• 1:20:14
  SPEAKER_00: life in that way that I was talking about Carlisle saying about Scott,
• 1:20:17
  SPEAKER_00: that these were not abstractions.
• 1:20:19
  SPEAKER_00: These were not theories about people.
• 1:20:21
  These were living,
• 1:20:22
  breathing people in moments,
• 1:20:24
  often a very high crisis,
• 1:20:25
  right?
• 1:20:26
  SPEAKER_00: Because that's what the books would be about.
• 1:20:27
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you can see in the background behind me, actually,
• 1:20:31
  SPEAKER_00: That is an embroidery of Catherine Howard.
• 1:20:35
  SPEAKER_00: And Anne Boleyn is on the other wall over here.
• 1:20:37
  So one of the other things in my life is that once I happened
• 1:20:40
  across these patterns,
• 1:20:42
  SPEAKER_00: cross stitch series of Henry VIII and his wives,
• 1:20:44
  SPEAKER_00: and I've done four of them.
• 1:20:47
  SPEAKER_00: in 30 years.
• 1:20:48
  SPEAKER_00: They take a really long time.
• 1:20:50
  Maybe if my eyesight doesn't go first,
• 1:20:52
  I will eventually finish the series.
• 1:20:53
  SPEAKER_00: But I have four of them on the walls around me.
• 1:20:56
  SPEAKER_00: So that's how influential this kind of novel has been in my life.
• 1:21:00
  SPEAKER_00: So I felt like it was fair not to go straight to Hilary Mantel,
• 1:21:03
  SPEAKER_00: who has taken over our sense of what Tudor fiction can be like.
• 1:21:06
  And I think it's probably safe to say that Wolf Hall and the
• 1:21:09
  sequels are better
• 1:21:10
  SPEAKER_00: novels than this.
• 1:21:12
  SPEAKER_00: but will they,
• 1:21:13
  SPEAKER_00: will they mean to somebody what these books meant to me,
• 1:21:16
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 1:21:16
  SPEAKER_00: because these books were so accessible?
• 1:21:18
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 1:21:19
  SPEAKER_00: So that's a lot about Jean Plady, but I feel like I owe it.
• 1:21:22
  SPEAKER_03: You bring up a really good point that,
• 1:21:25
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:21:26
  SPEAKER_03: a question that I might would have that I was saving for the end is like,
• 1:21:31
  SPEAKER_03: which periods of history do you,
• 1:21:33
  SPEAKER_03: do you find yourself most attracted to?
• 1:21:36
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm, I'm curious if,
• 1:21:38
  SPEAKER_03: do you,
• 1:21:39
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:21:39
  SPEAKER_03: chicken and an egg situation,
• 1:21:41
  do you think it was these books that got you so fascinated
• 1:21:43
  about Tudor England,
• 1:21:45
  or do you think it was Tudor England and these books just made
• 1:21:48
  it accessible for
• 1:21:49
  SPEAKER_03: you and therefore you love them?
• 1:21:50
  SPEAKER_03: You know,
• 1:21:51
  SPEAKER_03: it's kind of an interesting thing,
• 1:21:52
  but I can see it going both ways where you're reading something
• 1:21:56
  that just speaks to you.
• 1:21:58
  SPEAKER_03: And then that time period can kind of,
• 1:22:02
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:22:02
  SPEAKER_03: take root in your imagination and always fascinate you.
• 1:22:07
  SPEAKER_03: Um,
• 1:22:09
  SPEAKER_03: it's just a kind of a fun, a fun thing because I think you're right.
• 1:22:12
  SPEAKER_03: You know,
• 1:22:12
  SPEAKER_03: the,
• 1:22:13
  SPEAKER_03: the Hillary Mantell books,
• 1:22:14
  SPEAKER_03: which I still have not read every,
• 1:22:17
  SPEAKER_03: every,
• 1:22:18
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:22:18
  SPEAKER_03: few months I say now it's time,
• 1:22:20
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:22:20
  SPEAKER_03: but I,
• 1:22:21
  SPEAKER_03: I love Tudor England and,
• 1:22:23
  SPEAKER_03: but I,
• 1:22:24
  SPEAKER_03: I honestly think that part of it is that I,
• 1:22:26
  SPEAKER_03: I sometimes like the drama.
• 1:22:28
  SPEAKER_03: I like the, the, I like it on, you know, I like, I like it clear and,
• 1:22:35
  and accessible so that I can really just enjoy being in that
• 1:22:39
  place sometimes,
• 1:22:40
  SPEAKER_03: um,
• 1:22:41
  SPEAKER_03: regardless of the,
• 1:22:42
  SPEAKER_03: the literary aspects of Mantell's novels and what I,
• 1:22:45
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:22:46
  SPEAKER_03: I have read the first one,
• 1:22:47
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:22:47
  SPEAKER_03: like two or 300 pages of it and,
• 1:22:49
  SPEAKER_03: and enjoyed it,
• 1:22:51
  SPEAKER_03: um,
• 1:22:51
  SPEAKER_03: immensely,
• 1:22:52
  SPEAKER_03: but I don't think I would have stopped reading a book like that one,
• 1:22:56
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:22:57
  SPEAKER_03: more,
• 1:22:57
  SPEAKER_03: what was it called?
• 1:22:58
  SPEAKER_03: Murder?
• 1:22:59
  SPEAKER_00: Murder Most Royal.
• 1:23:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:23:01
  SPEAKER_00: And it's,
• 1:23:02
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 1:23:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to read it because it would take too long,
• 1:23:05
  SPEAKER_00: but the part that I thought I might read if I felt like I would,
• 1:23:09
  SPEAKER_00: was the scene of Anne Boleyn going to the scaffold because,
• 1:23:11
  SPEAKER_00: again,
• 1:23:12
  SPEAKER_00: it's very kind of,
• 1:23:14
  SPEAKER_00: of workmanlike prose is just kind of moving us along.
• 1:23:16
  And I do now know that a lot of the vocabulary is exactly what
• 1:23:19
  they recorded about her.
• 1:23:20
  SPEAKER_00: So it is quite accurate about her.
• 1:23:22
  SPEAKER_00: The scene in the Mantell novel,
• 1:23:25
  SPEAKER_00: A Van Point of the Scaffold,
• 1:23:26
  SPEAKER_00: is some of the best writing I think I've ever read.
• 1:23:29
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I had chills.
• 1:23:30
  It's just an astonishing scene,
• 1:23:31
  even though I know exactly what's going to happen.
• 1:23:34
  SPEAKER_00: So Mantell is an extraordinary, I think, stylist and writer.
• 1:23:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:23:40
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, the chicken and egg thing, I don't know.
• 1:23:42
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you see how tattered my little book is.
• 1:23:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I did, you know, I was a very avid reader from a very young age.
• 1:23:49
  SPEAKER_00: And this is what I think we now call a chapter book,
• 1:23:52
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 1:23:52
  SPEAKER_00: so I'm reading this in first grade,
• 1:23:54
  SPEAKER_00: because I didn't know I was too young to read it.
• 1:23:56
  SPEAKER_00: And looking at it now,
• 1:23:58
  I know that my children's teachers would have forbidden them
• 1:24:02
  these books and said
• 1:24:03
  SPEAKER_00: they were too hard for them.
• 1:24:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm sure there are many words in this I didn't understand.
• 1:24:06
  SPEAKER_00: Like just flipping through it today, I came across like impertinent.
• 1:24:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm wondering if at six, I would have known what impertinent meant.
• 1:24:12
  But I would have wanted to because it was- It would have been
• 1:24:14
  magical still.
• 1:24:15
  Yeah,
• 1:24:17
  but I was too young,
• 1:24:19
  I think,
• 1:24:20
  for me to already have any other idea of the Tudor period.
• 1:24:23
  SPEAKER_00: So I do think that this is the chicken and my interest is the egg.
• 1:24:27
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 1:24:27
  SPEAKER_00: That when I was too young to know any better,
• 1:24:30
  SPEAKER_00: I got this picture,
• 1:24:31
  SPEAKER_00: for better or for worse,
• 1:24:32
  SPEAKER_00: of Mary Queen of Scots as this,
• 1:24:35
  SPEAKER_00: this book just deals with her time in France.
• 1:24:37
  SPEAKER_00: And then there's an adult-length sequel called...
• 1:24:41
  SPEAKER_00: I think it was called Royal Road to Fotheringay or something,
• 1:24:44
  which is about Mary after she goes back to Scotland and then up
• 1:24:47
  to the point where
• 1:24:47
  SPEAKER_00: she ends up being imprisoned by Elizabeth I.
• 1:24:52
  So I just had this sense that this was a time when really
• 1:24:55
  exciting things were happening,
• 1:24:56
  SPEAKER_00: especially to...
• 1:24:58
  SPEAKER_00: young girls and young women.
• 1:25:00
  SPEAKER_00: And for better or for worse,
• 1:25:01
  SPEAKER_00: this is the stuff that my mom,
• 1:25:03
  SPEAKER_00: who always bought my books,
• 1:25:04
  SPEAKER_00: of course,
• 1:25:05
  SPEAKER_00: she also bought my first Dorothy Dunnett for me,
• 1:25:07
  SPEAKER_00: that she thought I would like.
• 1:25:08
  So maybe she thought I would like it because she thought I
• 1:25:11
  liked history already.
• 1:25:12
  SPEAKER_00: I should ask her.
• 1:25:15
  SPEAKER_00: But that certainly stuck with me.
• 1:25:17
  um and you know i had no interest gene flady wrote some books
• 1:25:20
  about queen victoria
• 1:25:21
  and i'm not even sure if i read them so the period where i now
• 1:25:24
  work as a literary
• 1:25:25
  scholar has never particularly interested me as a historian so
• 1:25:29
  that i don't know
• 1:25:29
  what that what that says interesting but it was definitely like
• 1:25:33
  like we were saying
• 1:25:33
  SPEAKER_00: it was the drama of it that
• 1:25:35
  the extremity of it,
• 1:25:37
  that the end of that road for Mary,
• 1:25:38
  Queen of Scots,
• 1:25:39
  again,
• 1:25:39
  is the block.
• 1:25:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm still,
• 1:25:42
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 1:25:42
  SPEAKER_00: now I have the same feeling I have about opera,
• 1:25:44
  SPEAKER_00: that you look at it a little bit and you raise your eyebrows and say,
• 1:25:46
  SPEAKER_00: well,
• 1:25:46
  SPEAKER_00: that's a very melodramatic plot.
• 1:25:49
  SPEAKER_00: Most people were not living lives of this high drama.
• 1:25:52
  SPEAKER_00: But when I go to the Victoria and Albert and they have a display,
• 1:25:55
  SPEAKER_00: as they do,
• 1:25:55
  of some of the embroidery that Mary did while she was in prison
• 1:25:59
  in England,
• 1:26:00
  SPEAKER_00: it still gives me chills.
• 1:26:02
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, that's...
• 1:26:04
  that's hers yeah so it's a very naive you know maybe almost
• 1:26:10
  childlike approach to
• 1:26:11
  history right to just have that sense of of connection but i
• 1:26:16
  think also it's sort
• 1:26:17
  of important because if we don't think about yeah if we don't
• 1:26:20
  think about people as
• 1:26:22
  SPEAKER_00: being real people we were really forgetting what's most important
• 1:26:26
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, to lose that, I think, is a shame.
• 1:26:29
  And I've had periods in my life where I go up and down where I
• 1:26:33
  may have lost that
• 1:26:33
  SPEAKER_03: sense of wonder.
• 1:26:35
  Regaining it are moments that I absolutely treasure because,
• 1:26:40
  again,
• 1:26:40
  it's enriching,
• 1:26:42
  enlivening.
• 1:26:43
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:26:43
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 1:26:44
  SPEAKER_00: one of the scenes in Murder Most Royal that was imprinted,
• 1:26:47
  SPEAKER_00: and I haven't reread this book in decades,
• 1:26:49
  and yet I still vividly remember the scene in which Catherine
• 1:26:51
  Howard is being held
• 1:26:53
  because they've decided that she's guilty of adultery and she's
• 1:26:56
  going to be sent to
• 1:26:57
  SPEAKER_00: the tower.
• 1:26:58
  SPEAKER_00: And they're at Hampton Court,
• 1:26:59
  SPEAKER_00: and Henry is in the chapel down the hall,
• 1:27:01
  and she breaks away from her captors and runs down the hall
• 1:27:04
  thinking if she reaches Henry,
• 1:27:05
  SPEAKER_00: she can ask him for forgiveness.
• 1:27:07
  And they catch her before she gets there and drag her screaming
• 1:27:09
  back to her room.
• 1:27:11
  SPEAKER_00: And when I went to Hampton Court and I stood in that hallway,
• 1:27:13
  SPEAKER_00: again,
• 1:27:13
  SPEAKER_00: you just,
• 1:27:14
  SPEAKER_00: it's just,
• 1:27:15
  SPEAKER_00: it's just sort of mind blowing.
• 1:27:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I realized again, that this all sounds very adolescent.
• 1:27:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I guess I'm,
• 1:27:21
  SPEAKER_00: same as when we had our Victorian episode and I said,
• 1:27:24
  SPEAKER_00: I'm okay with the sentimentality of it.
• 1:27:27
  SPEAKER_00: I'm okay.
• 1:27:27
  SPEAKER_00: And it definitely made me an avid reader, right?
• 1:27:30
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 1:27:30
  I couldn't wait to read more and looking at the latest
• 1:27:33
  statistics on how reading is
• 1:27:34
  SPEAKER_00: for pleasure is declining.
• 1:27:36
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe that again is something to embrace.
• 1:27:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:27:40
  Even if I couldn't find a single paragraph to read out loud or
• 1:27:42
  I would say,
• 1:27:42
  SPEAKER_00: wow,
• 1:27:43
  SPEAKER_00: isn't that great writing?
• 1:27:46
  SPEAKER_03: Well, I have a suggestion.
• 1:27:47
  I think I'll share both of my next ones and kind of see why I
• 1:27:52
  picked them both.
• 1:27:53
  And then,
• 1:27:54
  you know,
• 1:27:54
  Paul,
• 1:27:54
  maybe you want to if you want to do the same and then.
• 1:27:57
  you know,
• 1:27:58
  turn it over for,
• 1:27:59
  to you Rowan at the,
• 1:28:00
  for,
• 1:28:00
  for the,
• 1:28:03
  about my other ones.
• 1:28:03
  SPEAKER_00: I promise.
• 1:28:04
  SPEAKER_03: You're fine.
• 1:28:05
  SPEAKER_03: No, I loved that.
• 1:28:06
  That whole conversation about the,
• 1:28:07
  the joy,
• 1:28:08
  you know,
• 1:28:08
  bringing you into it.
• 1:28:10
  SPEAKER_03: Invaluable.
• 1:28:11
  SPEAKER_03: Absolutely.
• 1:28:13
  My first one's going to keep us in Tudor,
• 1:28:14
  England,
• 1:28:15
  but a very different corner of it.
• 1:28:17
  I chose the or it's not the it's Year of Wonders by Geraldine
• 1:28:22
  Brooks from 2001 when
• 1:28:25
  SPEAKER_03: she wrote it.
• 1:28:25
  SPEAKER_03: But it takes place.
• 1:28:27
  SPEAKER_03: It starts in the spring of 1665.
• 1:28:31
  And it's told from the perspective of a young widow named Anna
• 1:28:34
  Firth or Frith,
• 1:28:35
  I think.
• 1:28:36
  SPEAKER_03: And she is unwittingly,
• 1:28:41
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:28:41
  SPEAKER_03: no one knew this was happening,
• 1:28:42
  but she's suddenly going to find herself in the center of a
• 1:28:47
  bubonic plague outbreak
• 1:28:49
  in this little village that decides to quarantine for the good
• 1:28:54
  of people around them.
• 1:28:55
  This is a real event,
• 1:28:58
  a real place,
• 1:28:58
  a real thing that happened in the 1660s.
• 1:29:01
  SPEAKER_03: And
• 1:29:06
  SPEAKER_03: This book is horrific in so many ways.
• 1:29:09
  SPEAKER_03: It's beautifully poetic.
• 1:29:12
  But one of the things that I absolutely adored about it is its
• 1:29:18
  exploration of these
• 1:29:19
  SPEAKER_03: various characters and how I really think,
• 1:29:22
  SPEAKER_03: again,
• 1:29:22
  SPEAKER_03: I don't know,
• 1:29:23
  SPEAKER_03: I wasn't there,
• 1:29:23
  but how I really think they might have approached this as a
• 1:29:27
  potential curse from
• 1:29:28
  SPEAKER_03: God or God's indifference,
• 1:29:31
  SPEAKER_03: where they are religious,
• 1:29:32
  SPEAKER_03: where they do see things in that kind of scale.
• 1:29:36
  And,
• 1:29:37
  oh,
• 1:29:37
  if only we then start to do this,
• 1:29:40
  we will please God and he'll take it away.
• 1:29:43
  SPEAKER_03: Or,
• 1:29:44
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:29:45
  SPEAKER_03: in its horrific moments,
• 1:29:47
  SPEAKER_03: if we can only rid ourselves of the people who are sinning,
• 1:29:52
  SPEAKER_03: then we will be back on track in our little village.
• 1:29:56
  SPEAKER_03: It's not all about that.
• 1:29:58
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, it is a big exploration of human contact.
• 1:30:02
  SPEAKER_03: You know,
• 1:30:02
  SPEAKER_03: that was,
• 1:30:03
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:30:04
  SPEAKER_03: I read it after COVID and it was like,
• 1:30:06
  SPEAKER_03: wow,
• 1:30:06
  SPEAKER_03: that's that's pretty poignant.
• 1:30:08
  SPEAKER_03: But,
• 1:30:08
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:30:09
  SPEAKER_03: that lack of contact with the outside world,
• 1:30:11
  SPEAKER_03: but also lack of trust and contact with those even within your community.
• 1:30:16
  It is a tremendous book about this very specific event that she
• 1:30:24
  did a lot of research in.
• 1:30:25
  SPEAKER_03: And and I think it comes out.
• 1:30:29
  SPEAKER_03: and it is, it is one of these that's much more lyrically written.
• 1:30:32
  SPEAKER_03: I didn't pull any quotes to, to read from it.
• 1:30:35
  SPEAKER_03: Um,
• 1:30:36
  SPEAKER_03: but just,
• 1:30:38
  SPEAKER_03: I think it fits in with what you were saying Rowan about,
• 1:30:41
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:30:42
  SPEAKER_03: going back to that time period and seeing it,
• 1:30:46
  SPEAKER_03: exploring that historical context in a way that,
• 1:30:50
  SPEAKER_03: that we can recognize,
• 1:30:51
  SPEAKER_03: but it's also,
• 1:30:52
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:30:53
  SPEAKER_03: a bit different from where we stand today.
• 1:30:55
  SPEAKER_03: And I really enjoyed it.
• 1:30:58
  SPEAKER_03: Um,
• 1:30:59
  SPEAKER_03: And,
• 1:31:00
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:31:00
  SPEAKER_03: again,
• 1:31:00
  SPEAKER_03: reading it 20 years after it was published for the first time,
• 1:31:04
  SPEAKER_03: but still finding relevance in how we see the world today.
• 1:31:09
  SPEAKER_03: My next one that I'll talk about is,
• 1:31:12
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:31:13
  SPEAKER_03: from a trilogy of historical novels written by J.G.
• 1:31:16
  SPEAKER_03: Farrell.
• 1:31:17
  SPEAKER_03: His first one, I believe, in that maybe it's not his first one, actually.
• 1:31:22
  SPEAKER_03: Sorry.
• 1:31:23
  SPEAKER_03: I probably am wrong there.
• 1:31:24
  SPEAKER_03: But The Siege of Krishnapore.
• 1:31:25
  SPEAKER_03: I know I've already talked about troubles on the podcast at another time.
• 1:31:30
  SPEAKER_03: Um, but this is part of a trilogy of novels.
• 1:31:32
  I think it's called his empire trilogy where he is examining
• 1:31:35
  moments in the British
• 1:31:37
  SPEAKER_03: empire's history and its cracks and its problems.
• 1:31:41
  SPEAKER_03: You know,
• 1:31:42
  SPEAKER_03: you got the troubles,
• 1:31:43
  SPEAKER_03: which is,
• 1:31:43
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:31:44
  SPEAKER_03: kind of an Irish,
• 1:31:45
  SPEAKER_03: uh,
• 1:31:46
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:31:46
  SPEAKER_03: early,
• 1:31:46
  SPEAKER_03: early 20th century,
• 1:31:48
  SPEAKER_03: um,
• 1:31:49
  SPEAKER_03: setting.
• 1:31:50
  SPEAKER_03: This one takes place at a very specific siege in Krishnepur in 1857.
• 1:31:54
  SPEAKER_03: Um,
• 1:31:57
  SPEAKER_03: And a lot of great characters.
• 1:32:00
  It's definitely a book you can read without caring about
• 1:32:03
  history and still really enjoy.
• 1:32:07
  SPEAKER_03: But it is a book about the ideas of civilization and colonialism and of
• 1:32:14
  SPEAKER_03: quote-unquote progress from a Victorian perspective.
• 1:32:19
  You have these people trying to talk about why they see things
• 1:32:23
  the way they do.
• 1:32:24
  SPEAKER_03: There's a quote that I pulled from my
• 1:32:26
  SPEAKER_03: From my review, when a soldier dies, this is a speech that is given.
• 1:32:32
  SPEAKER_03: It says,
• 1:32:32
  Providence has denied his country the privilege of decking his
• 1:32:36
  youthful brow with
• 1:32:37
  SPEAKER_03: the chaplets which belong to the sons of victory and of fame,
• 1:32:41
  SPEAKER_03: but his deeds can never die.
• 1:32:43
  SPEAKER_03: The pages of history will record and rehearse them far and wide,
• 1:32:47
  SPEAKER_03: and every Englishman,
• 1:32:48
  SPEAKER_03: whether in his island home or a wanderer on some foreign shore,
• 1:32:52
  will relate with admiration what George Foxlet Cutter did at
• 1:32:56
  the siege of Krishnepur.
• 1:32:58
  SPEAKER_03: And I love how it sounds like Henry V's speech, St.
• 1:33:03
  Crispin's Day speech,
• 1:33:05
  and George Foxlet Cutter,
• 1:33:07
  who no one knows about anymore.
• 1:33:09
  This siege,
• 1:33:11
  which is so important in this moment of victory,
• 1:33:14
  is basically forgotten.
• 1:33:18
  SPEAKER_03: And,
• 1:33:19
  SPEAKER_03: um,
• 1:33:19
  SPEAKER_03: I love that Feral is,
• 1:33:21
  SPEAKER_03: is exploring all of that,
• 1:33:24
  SPEAKER_03: um,
• 1:33:25
  SPEAKER_03: in this really,
• 1:33:26
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:33:27
  SPEAKER_03: pretty tremendous,
• 1:33:28
  SPEAKER_03: uh,
• 1:33:29
  SPEAKER_03: novel that I,
• 1:33:29
  SPEAKER_03: I,
• 1:33:30
  SPEAKER_03: I really,
• 1:33:31
  SPEAKER_03: really enjoyed.
• 1:33:32
  SPEAKER_03: NYRB classics has published all three of them.
• 1:33:34
  SPEAKER_03: Singapore grip is the other one, which I've not read yet.
• 1:33:37
  SPEAKER_03: It's long.
• 1:33:38
  SPEAKER_03: And, um,
• 1:33:39
  SPEAKER_03: And I don't have it still.
• 1:33:40
  SPEAKER_03: I need to buy it and finally dig into it.
• 1:33:42
  SPEAKER_03: But I loved these.
• 1:33:44
  SPEAKER_03: And this is where I started to realize,
• 1:33:46
  SPEAKER_03: Rowan,
• 1:33:47
  SPEAKER_03: when I was going through these,
• 1:33:48
  that there's so many of these historical fiction books that I
• 1:33:53
  have read and loved.
• 1:33:55
  SPEAKER_00: And they are very much... And you get a tag on the genre label.
• 1:33:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:33:59
  SPEAKER_03: And I think they fit snugly within.
• 1:34:01
  SPEAKER_03: I wasn't on the borders.
• 1:34:02
  SPEAKER_03: I wasn't like, oh, this could be considered historical fiction.
• 1:34:05
  SPEAKER_03: No, it is.
• 1:34:06
  SPEAKER_03: It just is.
• 1:34:07
  SPEAKER_03: And that's, you know, and I love that.
• 1:34:08
  So many astonishing practitioners,
• 1:34:10
  you know,
• 1:34:10
  in the last 100 years and the last 10 years.
• 1:34:14
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 1:34:14
  SPEAKER_00: Pharoah was really near the top of my list of perspectives.
• 1:34:18
  SPEAKER_00: literary slash contemporary writers doing,
• 1:34:20
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 1:34:21
  along with Sarah Moss and Sarah Waters and Emma Donoghue and
• 1:34:24
  Maggie O'Farrell and
• 1:34:25
  SPEAKER_00: Andrew Miller.
• 1:34:26
  SPEAKER_00: And you're just like, wow, there's just, yeah.
• 1:34:29
  SPEAKER_00: What a treasure house of material.
• 1:34:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:34:32
  SPEAKER_03: I loved Hamnet.
• 1:34:35
  Going back through a lot of like your TLS reviews,
• 1:34:39
  I'm like,
• 1:34:39
  oh,
• 1:34:39
  I've loved all of these books.
• 1:34:40
  SPEAKER_03: And so many of them, I think you loved too, because
• 1:34:44
  SPEAKER_03: that they fit this part for you.
• 1:34:49
  SPEAKER_02: Anyway, Paul, what have you got for us?
• 1:34:51
  Yeah,
• 1:34:51
  so I was thinking about,
• 1:34:53
  like I said,
• 1:34:54
  exploring my relationship with historical fiction.
• 1:34:57
  And one of the realizations I came to was a lot of the books
• 1:35:01
  that I've read that
• 1:35:02
  SPEAKER_02: could fit into this category would probably be called war books,
• 1:35:05
  SPEAKER_02: books about war,
• 1:35:06
  even though I don't really think of myself necessarily as
• 1:35:08
  somebody who reads war books.
• 1:35:10
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know if that's true because I was like,
• 1:35:12
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 1:35:13
  SPEAKER_02: the Horatio Hornblower series or A Long,
• 1:35:15
  SPEAKER_02: Long Way by Sebastian Barry,
• 1:35:17
  SPEAKER_02: Tree of Smoke by Dennis Johnson,
• 1:35:19
  SPEAKER_02: Birdsong by Sebastian Falk.
• 1:35:21
  SPEAKER_02: Like all those,
• 1:35:21
  SPEAKER_02: I was like,
• 1:35:23
  SPEAKER_02: over the years,
• 1:35:23
  SPEAKER_02: if I start looking,
• 1:35:24
  SPEAKER_02: even though I don't think of myself as reading these types of books,
• 1:35:27
  SPEAKER_02: I do all the time.
• 1:35:28
  And one of the best examples that I think I've read that I
• 1:35:32
  think falls very
• 1:35:34
  SPEAKER_02: securely within the historical fiction,
• 1:35:37
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 1:35:38
  SPEAKER_02: description is The Killer Angels by Michael.
• 1:35:41
  SPEAKER_02: I think it's Shara.
• 1:35:42
  SPEAKER_02: Is that how you say his name, Shara, I believe?
• 1:35:43
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:35:44
  SPEAKER_02: And it won the Pulitzer Prize.
• 1:35:46
  SPEAKER_03: This was in consideration for me.
• 1:35:47
  SPEAKER_02: Was it?
• 1:35:48
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, good.
• 1:35:49
  SPEAKER_02: So you can weigh in too.
• 1:35:49
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah,
• 1:35:50
  it won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction back in 1975 and was also
• 1:35:54
  the basis for the
• 1:35:54
  SPEAKER_02: movie Gettysburg.
• 1:35:56
  SPEAKER_02: So obviously it focuses on that stretch of time right there in
• 1:36:00
  SPEAKER_02: late June and early July of 1863,
• 1:36:02
  SPEAKER_02: kind of leading up to the Battle of Gettysburg,
• 1:36:06
  SPEAKER_02: as well as the events of the battle itself.
• 1:36:09
  SPEAKER_02: And it's really interesting because it follows some historical figures,
• 1:36:13
  SPEAKER_02: Robert E.
• 1:36:13
  SPEAKER_02: Lee,
• 1:36:14
  SPEAKER_02: James Longstreet,
• 1:36:15
  SPEAKER_02: John Buford,
• 1:36:15
  SPEAKER_02: and Josh Chamberlain are kind of the main four.
• 1:36:19
  SPEAKER_02: But it does kind of give you just,
• 1:36:22
  SPEAKER_02: again,
• 1:36:22
  SPEAKER_02: like we keep saying,
• 1:36:23
  SPEAKER_02: you have these ideas in your head and you hear about them in school and
• 1:36:26
  SPEAKER_02: And you kind of maybe have these ideas of how it plays out.
• 1:36:29
  SPEAKER_02: But this,
• 1:36:29
  I think this book does one of the best jobs I've ever read of
• 1:36:31
  just trying to
• 1:36:34
  SPEAKER_02: describe the environment of what led up to it,
• 1:36:38
  SPEAKER_02: especially in the days leading up to it,
• 1:36:39
  SPEAKER_02: but even,
• 1:36:40
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 1:36:40
  SPEAKER_02: obviously some more historical context beyond that.
• 1:36:43
  SPEAKER_02: But also what it does so well is takes a stab,
• 1:36:47
  and I think a very successful one at putting you into the shoes
• 1:36:50
  of these people
• 1:36:50
  that could just be a name in a history book that your eyes kind
• 1:36:53
  of glosses over.
• 1:36:54
  SPEAKER_02: But in this book,
• 1:36:55
  you really are in their mind and kind of realizing what they
• 1:36:59
  actually had to go through,
• 1:37:00
  whether it's some general or somebody who is like leading the
• 1:37:04
  army and truly has to
• 1:37:06
  SPEAKER_02: make these decisions that are life and death.
• 1:37:08
  SPEAKER_02: Or if you're just somebody like,
• 1:37:10
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 1:37:10
  in the red badge of courage where you're kind of swept up in
• 1:37:13
  all this and you have
• 1:37:14
  SPEAKER_02: some vague idea of what's going on.
• 1:37:16
  SPEAKER_02: But really, you're just a kid who's kind of caught in the meat cleaver.
• 1:37:20
  SPEAKER_02: And I think this book is just absolutely amazing at that.
• 1:37:23
  SPEAKER_02: And yes, it does have some wonderfully beautiful writing as well.
• 1:37:29
  SPEAKER_02: You know,
• 1:37:30
  SPEAKER_02: I know that we're a little tight on time,
• 1:37:31
  SPEAKER_02: but I was just going to like,
• 1:37:33
  SPEAKER_02: I'll read just a couple sentences.
• 1:37:34
  SPEAKER_02: This is from one of the middle of the battle scenes.
• 1:37:38
  SPEAKER_02: And it says, Chamberlain closed his eyes and saw it again.
• 1:37:41
  SPEAKER_02: It was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.
• 1:37:43
  SPEAKER_02: No book or music would have that beauty.
• 1:37:45
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:37:46
  SPEAKER_02: He did not understand it.
• 1:37:47
  SPEAKER_02: A mile of men flowing slowly,
• 1:37:50
  SPEAKER_02: steadily,
• 1:37:50
  SPEAKER_02: inevitably up the long green ground,
• 1:37:53
  SPEAKER_02: dying all the while,
• 1:37:54
  SPEAKER_02: coming to kill you,
• 1:37:56
  SPEAKER_02: and the shell bursts appearing above them like instant white flowers,
• 1:37:59
  SPEAKER_02: and the flags all tipping and fluttering,
• 1:38:02
  SPEAKER_02: and dimly you could hear the music and the drums,
• 1:38:04
  SPEAKER_02: and then you could hear the officers screaming,
• 1:38:06
  and yet even above your own fear came the sensation of
• 1:38:09
  unspeakable beauty,
• 1:38:11
  SPEAKER_02: And it goes on from there.
• 1:38:12
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, that's just one example.
• 1:38:13
  SPEAKER_02: I had quite a few that I could just read from this novel all day because,
• 1:38:17
  SPEAKER_02: again,
• 1:38:17
  this is where I had to battle with my own potential prejudices
• 1:38:22
  because I hear
• 1:38:23
  SPEAKER_02: historical fiction.
• 1:38:24
  SPEAKER_02: I have my reaction, whatever it might be.
• 1:38:26
  And then I start thinking about these books that are very much
• 1:38:29
  within that genre.
• 1:38:31
  SPEAKER_02: And they were some of the most profound books I've read in my life.
• 1:38:34
  SPEAKER_02: So there's another scene later on where...
• 1:38:38
  It's General Lee is just talking about the gravity of these
• 1:38:41
  decisions he has to make.
• 1:38:43
  And one of his men is kind of following along as they're riding
• 1:38:45
  on their horses.
• 1:38:47
  SPEAKER_02: And I thought it was just absolutely so moving.
• 1:38:51
  SPEAKER_02: He's talking about how,
• 1:38:52
  SPEAKER_02: as a general,
• 1:38:53
  SPEAKER_02: you realize what you're doing to some degree,
• 1:38:54
  SPEAKER_02: but in order to do your job and to make these things happen,
• 1:38:57
  SPEAKER_02: you have to commit yourself totally to these acts you're doing.
• 1:39:01
  SPEAKER_02: And there's just a line at the very end where he says,
• 1:39:03
  SPEAKER_02: and yet if they all die,
• 1:39:04
  SPEAKER_02: a man must ask himself,
• 1:39:06
  SPEAKER_02: will it have been worth it?
• 1:39:08
  SPEAKER_02: And,
• 1:39:08
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 1:39:08
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know,
• 1:39:10
  SPEAKER_02: just like when you start thinking about,
• 1:39:12
  SPEAKER_02: like I said,
• 1:39:12
  it's so easy to think of these events as just a little line in
• 1:39:16
  a history book.
• 1:39:17
  SPEAKER_02: But then you start thinking about the decisions that were actually made.
• 1:39:20
  SPEAKER_02: So that's one.
• 1:39:21
  And then I will just touch on one more that I think fits into
• 1:39:25
  something that you
• 1:39:25
  SPEAKER_02: and I talk a lot about,
• 1:39:26
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor.
• 1:39:27
  SPEAKER_02: And this will shock no one.
• 1:39:28
  SPEAKER_02: You've already mentioned this book, Lonesome Dove.
• 1:39:30
  SPEAKER_02: I'm going to poke at that a little bit by Larry McMurtry, just because
• 1:39:35
  For one thing,
• 1:39:35
  I couldn't talk about historical books without mentioning this one.
• 1:39:40
  SPEAKER_02: But this one,
• 1:39:41
  SPEAKER_02: like another one that I talk about all the time,
• 1:39:43
  SPEAKER_02: which is Train Dreams by Dennis Johnson.
• 1:39:44
  I think one of the things that I love about historical novels
• 1:39:47
  is that retrospective
• 1:39:49
  SPEAKER_02: look at the dying of one era as it starts to blend over into another one,
• 1:39:54
  SPEAKER_02: where sometimes to some degree when you're living through it,
• 1:39:56
  SPEAKER_02: you might be aware a little bit that it's happening.
• 1:39:59
  SPEAKER_02: But then with...
• 1:40:01
  SPEAKER_02: the ability to look back on it,
• 1:40:02
  SPEAKER_02: we have this perspective and realize truly what is happening there.
• 1:40:06
  SPEAKER_02: And another thing that I think about Lonesome Dove that somebody,
• 1:40:09
  one of you mentioned earlier in this episode was the idea of
• 1:40:12
  kind of poking at
• 1:40:14
  SPEAKER_02: archetypes
• 1:40:15
  and it might've even been in reference when we were talking
• 1:40:17
  about Lonesome Dub earlier,
• 1:40:18
  SPEAKER_02: but this book I think does a masterful dub of that too,
• 1:40:20
  where we have the Louis L'Amour and the Zane Grey books that
• 1:40:26
  maybe are kind of like
• 1:40:27
  SPEAKER_02: you were talking about Rowan,
• 1:40:28
  SPEAKER_02: the more stereotypical idea of kind of a little bit of a genre novel,
• 1:40:32
  SPEAKER_02: Although I'm sure I haven't read those.
• 1:40:33
  SPEAKER_02: So maybe there's more to them.
• 1:40:34
  SPEAKER_02: I'm sure there is than what I'm thinking, but this takes that.
• 1:40:38
  SPEAKER_02: And in my opinion,
• 1:40:39
  SPEAKER_02: expands it more because he really is poking at these ideas of,
• 1:40:42
  SPEAKER_02: of,
• 1:40:43
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 1:40:43
  SPEAKER_02: the cowboys and the old,
• 1:40:45
  SPEAKER_02: the dying of the old West and the hooker with the heart of gold.
• 1:40:47
  SPEAKER_02: And like,
• 1:40:48
  SPEAKER_02: he,
• 1:40:48
  he takes all these ideas that are kind of in the stereotypes of
• 1:40:52
  the spaghetti
• 1:40:52
  SPEAKER_02: Westerns and the other things,
• 1:40:54
  SPEAKER_02: but then he's kind of exploring them further.
• 1:40:56
  SPEAKER_02: So, you know, yeah.
• 1:40:58
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:40:59
  this book i have a hard time talking about we always talk about
• 1:41:01
  it's harder to talk
• 1:41:02
  about the books you love than maybe the ones you don't but i
• 1:41:05
  think it does all of
• 1:41:06
  that but then it also is a lot of things you were describing
• 1:41:10
  rowan where it's truly
• 1:41:11
  just great storytelling you could read this like the count of
• 1:41:14
  monte cristo and just
• 1:41:15
  be swept along by just that part of it but then the
• 1:41:18
  relationships of the men their
• 1:41:20
  SPEAKER_02: friendships all these other things that are happening um yeah i think
• 1:41:25
  I'm not the only one I know because so many people I hear start
• 1:41:28
  to talk about this
• 1:41:29
  SPEAKER_02: book and they have an idea and then they read it and they're like,
• 1:41:31
  SPEAKER_02: no,
• 1:41:32
  SPEAKER_02: wait.
• 1:41:33
  SPEAKER_02: I take back everything I said.
• 1:41:34
  SPEAKER_02: This is so different.
• 1:41:34
  And I think that that is just one of the things that's so fun
• 1:41:38
  about this book is
• 1:41:39
  SPEAKER_02: whatever you think it is,
• 1:41:40
  SPEAKER_02: if you haven't read it,
• 1:41:41
  SPEAKER_02: I think it's so much more than that.
• 1:41:43
  So again,
• 1:41:43
  I think that that kind of does expand this idea of what
• 1:41:47
  historical novels can be.
• 1:41:48
  Don't let your assumptions keep you from trying some of these
• 1:41:52
  books because many of
• 1:41:53
  SPEAKER_02: them will blow you away in a variety of different ways.
• 1:41:56
  SPEAKER_00: And what you say about,
• 1:41:57
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 1:41:57
  SPEAKER_00: Lonesome Dove,
• 1:41:58
  SPEAKER_00: absolutely one of the great reading experiences of my past few years,
• 1:42:00
  SPEAKER_00: too,
• 1:42:01
  SPEAKER_00: and surprising in so many ways.
• 1:42:02
  SPEAKER_00: But what you say about that sense of like an old way,
• 1:42:05
  sort of yielding to a new way that we're never really at the
• 1:42:10
  end of a process.
• 1:42:10
  SPEAKER_00: We're always in the middle of a process.
• 1:42:12
  SPEAKER_00: It goes,
• 1:42:13
  SPEAKER_00: at the very least,
• 1:42:14
  SPEAKER_00: right back to Waverly,
• 1:42:14
  which is exactly about the sort of giving up of that Highland
• 1:42:18
  way of life and warning,
• 1:42:20
  SPEAKER_00: I think,
• 1:42:20
  SPEAKER_00: against the romance of nostalgia,
• 1:42:22
  SPEAKER_00: which is counterproductive.
• 1:42:25
  SPEAKER_00: counter-progressive, if that makes sense.
• 1:42:27
  That is,
• 1:42:27
  nostalgia really risks becoming an attempt to cling to something.
• 1:42:32
  And I feel like we are really living in an era where people are
• 1:42:35
  trying to do this,
• 1:42:36
  right?
• 1:42:36
  SPEAKER_00: They have an idea about the past that is,
• 1:42:38
  SPEAKER_00: first of all,
• 1:42:39
  SPEAKER_00: not true,
• 1:42:39
  SPEAKER_00: but also you cannot bring the past back.
• 1:42:42
  It would have to be incredibly violent to do that because
• 1:42:44
  you're fighting against...
• 1:42:46
  SPEAKER_00: change and history is change.
• 1:42:48
  SPEAKER_00: And,
• 1:42:49
  SPEAKER_00: and yeah,
• 1:42:49
  SPEAKER_00: I think that that sense that you can recognize what you're losing,
• 1:42:53
  SPEAKER_00: but you also need to recognize that things have changed and,
• 1:42:56
  SPEAKER_00: and absolutely in that kind of big grand sweep of narrative,
• 1:43:00
  SPEAKER_00: you can get that sense.
• 1:43:02
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I can be very quick about my other two books.
• 1:43:04
  SPEAKER_00: I think if I should just put them on the table,
• 1:43:06
  SPEAKER_00: one of them,
• 1:43:07
  SPEAKER_00: I can move past very quickly because it's another Tudor novel.
• 1:43:09
  SPEAKER_00: And really, I'm just giving a shout out to it.
• 1:43:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's in the same vein as Jean Plady.
• 1:43:13
  SPEAKER_00: And now I, I really just wanted to
• 1:43:16
  to mention,
• 1:43:16
  it's by Margaret Campbell Barnes,
• 1:43:17
  who is another early 20th century woman writer.
• 1:43:20
  SPEAKER_00: And this one is about Anne of Cleves, who was Henry's fourth wife.
• 1:43:24
  And I have a great fondness for this novel because it imagines
• 1:43:27
  a romance pretty
• 1:43:29
  much never fulfilled between Anne of Cleves and the great
• 1:43:31
  portrait painter Hans Holbein,
• 1:43:33
  who painted the picture of her that won Henry's heart and threw
• 1:43:37
  her into the tumult
• 1:43:38
  SPEAKER_00: that then followed because she did not live up to the picture.
• 1:43:42
  SPEAKER_00: So I think this is actually a very intelligent
• 1:43:46
  SPEAKER_00: novel of the let's imagine, you know, what might have gone behind that.
• 1:43:52
  SPEAKER_00: And as I looked at these titles,
• 1:43:53
  I'm thinking how much I was probably influenced in this early
• 1:43:57
  reading because it
• 1:43:57
  SPEAKER_00: was the 70s and maybe my mother had something to do with this,
• 1:44:00
  SPEAKER_00: right?
• 1:44:00
  SPEAKER_00: It was an era of
• 1:44:02
  SPEAKER_00: of looking for women who had been forgotten by history.
• 1:44:05
  SPEAKER_00: So both of my books that I brought by the writer Pauline Gedge,
• 1:44:09
  SPEAKER_00: who is a Canadian historical novelist,
• 1:44:11
  SPEAKER_00: probably not known to hardly anybody at this point.
• 1:44:17
  SPEAKER_00: This one, sorry, I'm holding it up as if your listeners can see it.
• 1:44:20
  SPEAKER_00: The first one I read by her is called Child of the Morning.
• 1:44:23
  SPEAKER_00: It was her first novel.
• 1:44:24
  SPEAKER_00: It won one of these first novel prizes back in the 1970s.
• 1:44:28
  And it's the story of Hatshepsut,
• 1:44:29
  who was the only woman pharaoh in Egypt.
• 1:44:32
  SPEAKER_00: So it's one of those recreation stories,
• 1:44:35
  SPEAKER_00: very evocative,
• 1:44:37
  SPEAKER_00: for me anyway,
• 1:44:37
  SPEAKER_00: of ancient Egypt and another of my great...
• 1:44:41
  SPEAKER_00: imaginary passions.
• 1:44:44
  SPEAKER_00: I think I'll probably never see the pyramids,
• 1:44:47
  SPEAKER_00: but if I ever do,
• 1:44:48
  SPEAKER_00: it would be because of reading this book.
• 1:44:50
  SPEAKER_00: And then another one by her called The Eagle and the Raven,
• 1:44:53
  which is a story about the ancient British tribes in their
• 1:44:59
  resistance to the Roman Empire.
• 1:45:00
  And it culminates in the rebellion that was led by Queen
• 1:45:03
  Boudica against the Romans,
• 1:45:06
  SPEAKER_00: which ended with her death.
• 1:45:08
  SPEAKER_00: And again,
• 1:45:10
  SPEAKER_00: And storytelling on a kind of epic scale,
• 1:45:15
  SPEAKER_00: scene setting,
• 1:45:15
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 1:45:16
  SPEAKER_00: very evocative,
• 1:45:16
  SPEAKER_00: that tactility of the past,
• 1:45:18
  SPEAKER_00: which also,
• 1:45:19
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 1:45:19
  SPEAKER_00: Mantell in her own way is,
• 1:45:20
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 1:45:20
  SPEAKER_00: is a genius at that.
• 1:45:21
  SPEAKER_00: And writers like Maggie O'Farrell do that with that very light touch.
• 1:45:25
  SPEAKER_00: just every detail very perfectly chosen.
• 1:45:27
  SPEAKER_00: But these were novels,
• 1:45:28
  SPEAKER_00: again,
• 1:45:28
  that just filled me with excitement about the past being full
• 1:45:32
  of stories I didn't
• 1:45:32
  SPEAKER_00: know anything about.
• 1:45:33
  SPEAKER_00: Who knew that before England was England, it was this wild place.
• 1:45:39
  SPEAKER_00: And what the Romans,
• 1:45:41
  we get this picture of the Roman Empire as being this great
• 1:45:44
  spread of civilization.
• 1:45:45
  You're like,
• 1:45:45
  yeah,
• 1:45:45
  but if you're on the other side of that empire,
• 1:45:47
  it doesn't feel so welcome.
• 1:45:49
  SPEAKER_00: And so these stories of resistance and of these women who
• 1:45:53
  SPEAKER_00: again,
• 1:45:53
  SPEAKER_00: it feels very 1970s to me now as I'm talking about it,
• 1:45:56
  but these women who exceeded all expectations to take the reins
• 1:45:59
  of power and lead
• 1:46:00
  SPEAKER_00: armies and drive chariots and do all these exciting things.
• 1:46:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
• 1:46:06
  SPEAKER_00: but as we keep talking,
• 1:46:07
  SPEAKER_00: right,
• 1:46:07
  SPEAKER_00: I just keep thinking,
• 1:46:08
  SPEAKER_00: how many great novelists,
• 1:46:10
  SPEAKER_00: in fact,
• 1:46:10
  SPEAKER_00: do we
• 1:46:12
  read without labeling them as historical novelists and that
• 1:46:16
  even though that is in
• 1:46:17
  a way what they're doing and that is so interesting just to
• 1:46:19
  bring us back to that
• 1:46:20
  question of genre why would we be reluctant i think you do ian
• 1:46:24
  rankin used to say
• 1:46:25
  that he would move his first novel from the mystery section to
• 1:46:27
  the literature
• 1:46:28
  section because he didn't intend it to be read as a mystery
• 1:46:31
  novel even though it
• 1:46:32
  has a crime and a police detective and all the rest of it so
• 1:46:35
  people are very you
• 1:46:37
  SPEAKER_00: know it's a very
• 1:46:39
  SPEAKER_00: vexed or fraught or maybe trivial issue at all at the same time.
• 1:46:44
  SPEAKER_00: What kind of book is it?
• 1:46:44
  SPEAKER_02: I love just hearing your passion about this.
• 1:46:48
  SPEAKER_02: When you said, is it real and does it matter?
• 1:46:50
  SPEAKER_02: I think that that's interesting in a variety of ways.
• 1:46:52
  SPEAKER_02: We've talked about that with Ben Hameen Labatooth's books,
• 1:46:54
  SPEAKER_02: for example,
• 1:46:55
  SPEAKER_02: and there's this argument now more and more of like,
• 1:46:58
  SPEAKER_02: nonfiction versus fiction and more experimentation with blending them.
• 1:47:04
  But one of the other things that as you're reading it,
• 1:47:06
  is it real and does it matter?
• 1:47:07
  SPEAKER_02: I think what you were saying about the 70s,
• 1:47:11
  maybe there was a certain trope or type of thing that was being
• 1:47:15
  done then.
• 1:47:16
  maybe some of the times it was true,
• 1:47:18
  maybe it was a little bit glorified,
• 1:47:19
  but does it matter?
• 1:47:20
  Because listen to what an influence it's had on you or you as a
• 1:47:23
  young girl,
• 1:47:25
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 1:47:26
  SPEAKER_02: how many,
• 1:47:26
  SPEAKER_02: I mean,
• 1:47:27
  SPEAKER_02: in some ways it launched a career,
• 1:47:28
  SPEAKER_02: it created a passion for your entire life.
• 1:47:31
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, so I think not only does it matter from like a,
• 1:47:35
  a true art or literature point of view,
• 1:47:37
  but does it matter in the lives of people?
• 1:47:39
  Because it's providing joy,
• 1:47:40
  it's providing passion,
• 1:47:41
  it's providing curiosity.
• 1:47:43
  SPEAKER_02: And many of the things that you've learned through this process are true.
• 1:47:47
  SPEAKER_02: And it's created this spark and this joy for you that...
• 1:47:51
  SPEAKER_02: has led you to learn all these things about history.
• 1:47:53
  SPEAKER_02: And if there's anything that our world needs right now,
• 1:47:55
  I think it's probably some more of that curiosity about the
• 1:47:59
  past and learning from
• 1:48:00
  SPEAKER_02: the past and the passion to actually care about people.
• 1:48:04
  SPEAKER_02: So as you were talking,
• 1:48:06
  I was just thinking that is it true and does it matter could
• 1:48:09
  actually be expanded
• 1:48:09
  SPEAKER_02: even into our own
• 1:48:11
  And that's such a fundamental set of questions from my other
• 1:48:13
  historical passion
• 1:48:14
  SPEAKER_00: besides the Tudors,
• 1:48:15
  SPEAKER_00: which was the group that came right before the Tudors,
• 1:48:18
  SPEAKER_00: the Plantagenets,
• 1:48:19
  SPEAKER_00: because one of my first crusades that I was ever on as a,
• 1:48:22
  SPEAKER_00: again,
• 1:48:23
  very young intellectual was I was the youngest member ever of
• 1:48:26
  the Richard III
• 1:48:26
  SPEAKER_00: Society of Canada,
• 1:48:28
  SPEAKER_00: and I became a passionate Ricardian scholar.
• 1:48:30
  and read every historical novel I could find about Richard III,
• 1:48:33
  much maligned by Shakespeare.
• 1:48:35
  SPEAKER_00: I was very upset about this.
• 1:48:37
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, I've become more sophisticated about that as I grew up.
• 1:48:40
  And sadly,
• 1:48:41
  I think he probably was responsible for the death of the
• 1:48:43
  princes in the tower.
• 1:48:44
  SPEAKER_00: That's the whole mystery.
• 1:48:45
  SPEAKER_00: But that idea that history gets rewritten by the victors,
• 1:48:48
  SPEAKER_00: that there's alternative narratives,
• 1:48:50
  SPEAKER_00: that we're always competing to tell different stories of the past,
• 1:48:52
  SPEAKER_00: that also is such an important idea.
• 1:48:54
  SPEAKER_00: And to me, that emerged out of this fiction that was attempting to
• 1:48:58
  SPEAKER_00: change the narrative that was routinely told,
• 1:49:01
  SPEAKER_00: sometimes in really,
• 1:49:02
  SPEAKER_00: again,
• 1:49:02
  SPEAKER_00: sentimental and melodramatic ways,
• 1:49:03
  SPEAKER_00: sometimes in very scholarly ways.
• 1:49:06
  But that was a lesson that I learned early on is there isn't
• 1:49:10
  one true story.
• 1:49:11
  There's a narrative and it's getting written and it has gaps
• 1:49:15
  and silences and
• 1:49:16
  SPEAKER_00: people are deliberately excluded from it.
• 1:49:19
  People have agendas and goals and masters that they serve or
• 1:49:23
  markets that they serve.
• 1:49:24
  And the more naive our idea about history,
• 1:49:27
  the more trouble we're in,
• 1:49:28
  I think.
• 1:49:29
  And historical fiction can be good for that,
• 1:49:32
  but it can also be bad for that.
• 1:49:34
  SPEAKER_00: I think it does matter if you...
• 1:49:36
  SPEAKER_00: if all people know is a false narrative, right?
• 1:49:39
  So I know if all people know about the murder of JFK is a
• 1:49:46
  conspiracy theory that
• 1:49:47
  SPEAKER_00: they saw in a movie,
• 1:49:48
  SPEAKER_00: that's probably not ideal,
• 1:49:50
  SPEAKER_00: right?
• 1:49:50
  So I feel like I back off a little bit from the sense that it
• 1:49:54
  doesn't matter if it's true.
• 1:49:57
  SPEAKER_00: There are things that do matter.
• 1:49:58
  SPEAKER_00: We need to be right about some things.
• 1:50:01
  SPEAKER_02: That's an important point.
• 1:50:03
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I'm glad you said that.
• 1:50:04
  SPEAKER_03: That's very true.
• 1:50:06
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I love it.
• 1:50:07
  SPEAKER_03: I love that place to kind of bring this together too.
• 1:50:12
  SPEAKER_03: I think we need to challenge you today, Paul.
• 1:50:15
  SPEAKER_03: You're going to the bookstore.
• 1:50:17
  SPEAKER_03: You got to hand sell a historical fiction novel.
• 1:50:21
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 1:50:22
  SPEAKER_02: I'll do my very best.
• 1:50:23
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 1:50:24
  SPEAKER_02: I'll report back.
• 1:50:25
  SPEAKER_02: See if I'm successful.
• 1:50:26
  SPEAKER_03: Even if you have to buy it for him and say, here, put it in your bag.
• 1:50:29
  SPEAKER_03: I had to do this today.
• 1:50:30
  SPEAKER_03: It's free.
• 1:50:30
  SPEAKER_03: I love that.
• 1:50:32
  SPEAKER_03: All right.
• 1:50:32
  SPEAKER_03: Well, Rowan, thank you so much for joining us.
• 1:50:34
  I wish we had more time to keep on exploring it and to explore
• 1:50:38
  more of the books
• 1:50:39
  SPEAKER_03: that I know you'd bring.
• 1:50:40
  SPEAKER_03: Like I'm tempted to be like,
• 1:50:41
  SPEAKER_03: hey,
• 1:50:42
  SPEAKER_03: come back and you just tell us your top 100,
• 1:50:46
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:50:47
  SPEAKER_03: kind of thing.
• 1:50:47
  SPEAKER_03: I think we'd have a great time with that, but it has made me.
• 1:50:51
  SPEAKER_00: It'll be a syncratic list,
• 1:50:52
  SPEAKER_00: but,
• 1:50:52
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 1:50:52
  I'll come back anytime to talk about any topic that you put in
• 1:50:56
  front of me because
• 1:50:56
  SPEAKER_00: it's such a pleasure always to talk to you and to listen to you.
• 1:51:00
  signing up for your Patreon is sort of the only thing I can do
• 1:51:02
  because I can't show
• 1:51:03
  SPEAKER_00: up in person and take you out for a drink.
• 1:51:05
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's the equivalent.
• 1:51:08
  SPEAKER_03: Very much appreciated.
• 1:51:10
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:51:10
  SPEAKER_03: Thanks for being a part of this in general.
• 1:51:12
  SPEAKER_03: I mean,
• 1:51:13
  SPEAKER_03: again,
• 1:51:13
  we've known you before we started this and it's just so nice to
• 1:51:16
  be able to sit down
• 1:51:17
  SPEAKER_03: and chat with you because we've always been,
• 1:51:19
  SPEAKER_03: uh,
• 1:51:20
  SPEAKER_03: someone who inspires me both by what you read,
• 1:51:22
  but also how you engage with what you read and how you engage
• 1:51:25
  with other people who
• 1:51:26
  SPEAKER_03: are reading as well.
• 1:51:27
  SPEAKER_03: So thanks for that.
• 1:51:29
  SPEAKER_03: And listeners will be back here in a couple of weeks.
• 1:51:31
  SPEAKER_03: Don't forget you have an opportunity for,
• 1:51:33
  SPEAKER_03: to win a book from our giveaway of last week,
• 1:51:36
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:51:36
  SPEAKER_03: the kind of,
• 1:51:37
  SPEAKER_03: uh,
• 1:51:37
  SPEAKER_03: the quiz,
• 1:51:38
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 1:51:38
  SPEAKER_03: Valley girl thing.
• 1:51:39
  SPEAKER_03: We've got some fun, um, uh, entries to that, but, uh,
• 1:51:44
  SPEAKER_03: The hat is not overflowing.
• 1:51:48
  SPEAKER_03: So if you were thinking,
• 1:51:49
  SPEAKER_03: oh,
• 1:51:49
  SPEAKER_03: I better not enter because there's going to be too many people,
• 1:51:52
  SPEAKER_03: you might have a good shot.
• 1:51:53
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, there are several, but the odds are you might win.
• 1:51:57
  SPEAKER_03: Odds are good at this point while we're getting this thing kicked off.
• 1:52:03
  SPEAKER_03: All right.
• 1:52:03
  SPEAKER_03: Thanks, everybody.
• 1:52:04
  SPEAKER_03: We'll talk to you soon.
• 1:52:06
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 1:52:06
  SPEAKER_03: See you.
• 1:52:12
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you for listening to the Mooks and the Gripes podcast.
• 1:52:16
  If you enjoyed the bookish banter,
• 1:52:18
  we have more than 100 past episodes for you to dive into.
• 1:52:23
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• 1:52:27
  And be sure to follow us on Blue Sky and Instagram at MOOCs and
• 1:52:32
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• 1:52:34
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• 1:52:37
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• 1:52:38
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• 1:52:38
  or a hot take on what we discussed,
• 1:52:41
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• 1:52:42
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• 1:52:50
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• 1:53:04
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• 1:53:06
  and we're so grateful for every listener who tunes in.
• 1:53:10
  SPEAKER_03: May you keep exploring great books until next time.