NaNoWriMo 2011

A little bird is hinting that they might just do a month of NaNoWriMoing in late summer as well.. check it out at http://www.nanowrimo.org/ .

Win a Copy of Purdy's Latest Tudor Novel

Naughty Tabby isn't going to make it easy this time, to enter this contest you must guess how many toys she has in this picture (see it at Purdy's blog). Whoever guesses the closest will win a signed copy of my upcoming novel The Tudor Throne by Brandy Purdy. Contest ends June 10th, the winner's book will be shipped just as soon as Purdy receives her copies from the publisher. Just post your guess also in the comments on Purdy's blog and be sure to include contact info. Contest open to U.S. residents only, sorry but I can't ship outside the USA.

Good luck to you all!

How English Were the English Kings?




Richard II : green Flemish, purple French and blue Spanish.

 
I got to thinking recently about just how English the Kings of England really were, or are. I thought I'd take a look. Bearing in mind that for simplicity's sake I am assigning national heritage to parents that matches their national origin as well, here's the math.

William I (Noran) and Matilda of Flanders (Flemish)

Willian II Rufus - 1/2 Norman 1/2 Flemish - no issue

Henry I - 1/2 Norman 1/2 Flemish

Stephen - 12 French, 1/4 Norman, 1/4 Flemish

Matilda - 1/2 Scots, 1/4 Norman, 1/4 Flemish

Henry II - 1/2 French, 1/4Scots, 1/8Norman, 1/8Flemish,

Richard I and John - 5/8 French, 1/16 Norman, 1/16 Flemish, 1/8 Scots

Henry III - 13/16 French, 1/16 Scots, 1/32 Norman, 1/32 Flemish

Edward I - 29/32 French, 1/32 Scots, 1/64 Norman, 1/64 Flemish

Edward II - 1/2 Spanish, 29/64 French, 1/64 Scots, 1/128 Norman, 1/128 Flemish

Edward III - 93/128 French, 1/4 Spanish, 1/128 Scots, 1/256 Norman, 1/256 Flemish

Richard II - 1/2 and a smidgen Fllemish, 93/256 French, 1/8 Spanish, 1/256 Scots, smidgin Norman

What mathematical or genetic genius wants to take it from there?

Women of the Crusade of 1101

NEWS!  Beloved Pilgrim is now available in both print and on Kindle at Amazon.xom and in print and on Kindle at Amazon.co.uk!

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Women of the Crusade of 1101

Researching the Crusade of 1101 for my novel, Beloved Pilgrim, I asked the wuestion, "Were women involved at all in the crusade?"  My protagonist, after all, was a woman who disguised herself as a man in order to fight as a knight.  I put together  a short essay on the topic for Christopher Gortner's Historical Boys blog called "Women Fighters in the Crusades".

The vast majority of women who went on crusade were peasant women and women from religious orders.  Some of them fought, though not as part of the formal military.  Nevertheless three noblewomen stand out for their connections to this devastating event in history.

Ida of Formbach-Ratelnberg, Margravine of Austria

Little is known about the Austrian Margravine Ida, born Ida of Formbach-Ratelnberg. She was born in 1055 the daughter of Rapoto IV of Cham, also known as Itha, and married to Leopold II, Margrave of Austria. Their son, Leopold III, was a deeply religious man who gave a great deal to the Church and was later canonized a saint. Ida was reputed to be the most beautiful woman in Europe in her youth. She was in her mid-forties when she decided to travel with Duke Welf of Bavaria’s contingent in the Crusade of 1101. In the Turkish ambush of this party at Heraclea in September 1101 Ida was either killed or captured. Nothing is known of her fate other than a rumor that she became part of a harem and was the mother of the great Turkish leader Zengi. This is, however, not possible as Zengi was born before the Margravine even came to Turkey.

Anna Komnena, Byzantine Princess and Historian

One of the first female historians in the West, Anna Komnena was born on December 1, 1083, to Byzantine Emperor Alexios I and his wife, Irene Doukaina. She was the author of an account of her father’s life, The Alexiad. She was extraordinarily highly educated in history, mathematics, science and Greek philosophy, and, although against her parents’ strict instructions, also in the lusty folktales and legends of her people. Her books are full of anecdotes about the famous people of her time, full of her personal observations of such men as Bohemond of Taranto, whom she called “a habitual rogue”, and Raymond de St. Gilles, whom she liked. She was married at 14 to Nikephoros Bryennios, a fellow scholar and historian, with whom she had a long – 40 years -- and fruitful marriage.

Anna believed she was the rightful heir to her father’s throne, being the firstborn, crowned at her birth, and having her mother’s strong support for herself and her husband. Legend has it that her younger brother John took the imperial ring when he came to bid his dying father goodbye. The Church declared him Emperor John II. Anna and her husband twice attempted to overthrow John and were possibly part of the attempted murder plot against him at his coronation. They were unsuccessful. After her husband’s death, Anna retired to the convent of Kecharitomene, founded by her mother, where she lived until her own death in about 1153.

Anna’s unique contribution to the history of the Crusades comes not from eyewitness accounts but from her relationship with members of her own family who fought in the First Crusade and her ability to record the Byzantine concerns over the excesses of the crusaders whom they feared would overrun the empire.

Adela of Normandy, Countess of Blois

Adela was the daughter, sister and mother of four kings of England, William the Conqueror and Matilda of Flanders being her parents. Her brothers, William I Rufus and Henry I were not the only other kings, as her son, Stephen of Blois, seized the crown before Henry’s daughter, Matilda, could be crowned.

Her only role in the Crusade of 1101 is her reputed insistence that her husband, Henry-Stephen of Blois, one of the riches men in Europe, return to the Holy Land after failing to fulfill his oath to pray at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. Some have claimed he had shown cowardice at the Siege of Antioch, but this is not certain. He did however abandon the mass of the pilgrims during the Battle of Merzifon in 1101. He subsequently was killed at the Battle of Ramleh in 1102.

During her husband’s long absences and after his death Adela acted as an able regent. She died on March 8, 1137, at the convent where she had retired. Her son Stephen, King of England, was not her most accomplished progeny, as Henry of Blois, Bishop of Winchester, was one of the m most acute statesmen and patron of architecture and more of his time.

Elisabeth von Winterkirche and Maliha may be fictitonal, but you can read their story and see one theory of what happened to Margravine Ida in Beloved Pilgrim, by Nan Hawthorne, now available in print and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk and as an ebook on Smashwords.

The 5 Stages of Getting Published

1.  Denial

"This is going to be a best-seller!  I will be rich and famous.  All I have to do is get my book to the right publisher.  First I'll get an agent.  Well, actually, first I'll finish the book."

2.  Anger

"Those idiots!  They wouldn't know a great piece of literature if it bit them on the ass.  That's what you get when you cast pearls before swine. Philistines. "

3.  Bargaining

"Well, OK, so my book has been turned down by a dozen agents and even more publishing houses.  I can rewrite the book.  I could change it around a bit, give it more sex and violence.  No problem, I can do that.  I can try another publisher, another agent."

4.  Depression

"It's no use.  I can't write.  I'm a failure.  No one will ever publish this book.  I might as well stop fooling myself."

5.  Acceptance

"A POD?  What's that?  Oh, publish on demand.  But isn't that a vanity press?  Wait a minute!  Look at the control I have!  Look how much more I'll make on each copy!  Hey, people are buying my book!  Wow!  I should have done this in the first place."

Deep Discount On "The Confession of Piers Gaveston" by Brandy Purdy

Now you can download the ebook of Brandy Purdy's provocative and controversial yet loving portrait of the infamous lover of King Edward II of England.

"One of the best uses of first person narrative I have seen."  Nan Hawthorne

Just visit Smashwords and, when you go to checkout, enter the code for a 50% discount off the "cover" price.

LC69J

Coupon is good through May 31, 2011.

See the book trailer at http://youtu.be/ynh8eMa-KYM

THE TRUTH BEHIND THE CONFESSION OF PIERS GAVESTON

From the author's web site, http://www.brandypurdy.com

To those who know his name, Piers Gaveston is the dark power lurking behind the throne of the weak-willed and pliant king, Edward II, whispering in his ear, goading him on to further extravagance, an arrogant, avaricious Gascon, a commoner raised to glory, too high and too fast, like "a night-growing mushroom," a parasite feasting, like a leech, on the royal treasury. To others of a more romantic bent, he is one half of a pair of star-crossed lovers centuries ahead of their time, born into a world where homosexual love was a crime punishable by castration or burning at the stake. To yet others, Edward II and Piers Gaveston were devoted friends, who symbolically swore an oath of blood-brotherhood that has, from their own lifetime to the current day, been misunderstood and slandered with the base charge of sodomy. So what is the correct answer, who was Piers Gaveston really, and what was the true nature of his relationship with Edward II? To put it bluntly, we don’t know. The answers to those questions are lost in the mists of time.

Here is what we do know:

Piers Gaveston was presumably close to Edward II in age; therefore, he must have been born around 1284. We know his father was Sir Arnaud de Gaveston, a prosperous Gascon knight who served Edward I faithfully and even offered himself as a hostage on the King's behalf on more than one occasion. Thus, Piers was not the lowborn commoner of popular imagination. His mother was also well-born, Claremunda of Marcia or Marsan, spellings vary. Legend has it that she died a condemned witch, burned at the stake, a scenario too intriguing for many novelists, myself included, to resist. Whether factual or fantasy, the story was widely circulated, and an aura of witchcraft has always enshrouded Piers Gaveston. To quote one of the medieval chroniclers: "The King loved an evil male sorcerer more than he did his wife."

Piers Gaveston first appears on the pages of history when he joined the army of King Edward I in 1297. He made such a good impression upon the King that he was chosen to become a companion of the heir to the throne, Prince Edward (later King Edward II). Gaveston was handsome and vivacious, as proud as a peacock, and as splendid as one when it came to matters of dress. But he was much more than just a pretty boy, he was intelligent and skilled in the arts of war, and, when given the opportunity, displayed an admirable knowledge of military tactics. He had a quick and wicked wit, which he either could not or would not curtail, especially when it came to mocking those who considered themselves his betters. He assigned nicknames to the most powerful men in the land and apparently struck a nerve; it was an insult they would never forgive or forget.

In 1300 Gaveston joined Prince Edward's household. Of that first meeting, we know only this, from a medieval chronicler: "When the King's son saw him, he fell so much in love that he entered upon an enduring compact with him, and chose and determined to knit an indissoluble bond with him, before all other mortals."

But apparently in choosing Gaveston to be the Prince’s companion, the King got more than he bargained for. He soon became alarmed by the closeness that had developed between the two, and Gaveston was sent away, to France, with a pension from the King and a ship full of gifts from the Prince. But their separation was short-lived. When the old King died in 1307, the new King's first act was to recall his beloved “Perrot.” As one chronicler put it: "And so he had home his love, Piers Gaveston, and did him great reverence, and worshipped and made him great and rich. Of this doing fell villainy to the lover, evil speech and backbiting to the love, slander to the people, harm and damage to the realm."

Before he even set foot back on English soil, Gaveston was made Earl of Cornwall, an unprecedented and highly lucrative honor for one not of royal blood, and was betrothed to Edward's niece, Margaret de Clare. Whether Gaveston had any prior knowledge of these and the other honors about to be heaped on him we do not know.

Soon Gaveston was seen to have a stranglehold on royal patronage as a seemingly endless flow of titles, sinecures, jewels, manors, and all manner of costly gifts, were showered on him. The established nobility, with Gaveston's chief enemies the Earls of Lancaster, Warwick, Pembroke, and Lincoln, at the helm, greatly resented this but “the more virulently people attacked Gaveston, the more keenly the King loved him.” Gaveston's personality did nothing to salve the situation, as he paraded an insufferable pride and poked fun at his enemies.

When Edward crossed the channel to marry Princess Isabelle of France, he further enraged the nobility by leaving Gaveston to rule as regent, when the honor should have gone to a man of greater years and experience. And when the royal bride and groom returned, as soon as the ship docked, Edward ran down the gangplank and flung himself into Gaveston's arms, and then proceeded to forget all about his bride, he even gave her wedding jewels to Gaveston. At Edward's coronation that followed shortly afterwards, Gaveston appeared in royal purple encrusted with pearls instead of cloth-of-gold as befitted an earl. And at the banquet that followed, Edward had eyes and ears only for Gaveston. Soon Isabelle was writing home to her father that her husband was a stranger to their marriage bed, and for this she blamed Piers Gaveston.

Pressure was brought to bear on Edward, and Gaveston was banished, but not in disgrace. He was sent to Ireland as Lord Lieutenant or Governor, where he more than amply demonstrated his intellect and prowess as a military commander. But Edward was "lovesick for his minion" to quote the famous play by Christopher Marlowe, from which this story is probably best known, and soon Gaveston was back in England. Things went on much the same as always.

Eventually, the earls joined forces as the Lords Ordainers and sought to reform the land and, with such reforms, diminish Edward's power as king. After a campaign in Scotland failed, Gaveston was again banished, this time perpetually from the realm. But he did not stay away for long, he soon returned to England, some historians think to be present for the birth of his first and only legitimate child, Joan, born in 1312. (Controversy surrounds a possible bastard daughter known as Amy Gaveston.) This was, to use a more modern phrase, the straw that broke the camel's back, and soon the earls were amassing an army and civil war was a serious threat. Edward and Gaveston fled to Newcastle, and afterwards to Scarborough Castle, where Edward left Gaveston to go and try to raise an army of his own.

On May 19, 1312 Gaveston surrendered his person into the custody of the Earl of Pembroke, who, being the most honorable and less self-interested of Edward's nobles, swore an oath on all his lands, titles, and goods, that no harm would come to Gaveston while in his keeping. But Pembroke was not infallible. In the mistaken belief that Gaveston would be safe there, he decided to leave him at the rectory in the little village of Deddington while he went on to nearby Bampton to spend the night with his wife, who was in residence there. One night was all Warwick and Lancaster needed. They swept in, taking everyone unawares, and Gaveston, barefooted and wearing only his shirt, was forced to walk in chains and humiliation, to Warwick Castle, where he was thrown into the dungeon.

After a brief trial, where the verdict was a bygone conclusion, Gaveston was taken in the wee hours of June 19, 1312 to the top of Blacklow Hill where he was first stabbed in the heart and then beheaded. So ended the life, but not the legend, of Piers Gaveston.

But what of Piers Gaveston the human being? All the chroniclers speak of Edward's "mad folly" and "immoderate love" for him, but on the subject of Gaveston's own feelings they are conspicuously silent. Nor do any letters or diaries exist to enlighten us. Not one scrap of evidence exists to tell us what the royal favorite thought or felt for his king and benefactor and the position of power he occupied. A biography of Piers Gaveston reads more like an outline of historical events and an inventory of honors and gifts than a warts and all biography. We don't even know what he looked like—beyond that he was considered handsome—the color of his eyes, or whether he was tall or short, dark or fair.

As a novelist, some have taken issue with the way I have chosen to portray Piers Gaveston, his background, and relationship with Edward II. I have been accused of writing a historically inaccurate book and criticized for telling a story that goes against the grain of popular belief. It was my intention to try to show that, as Gaveston says in my novel, "there are two sides to every coin," and it is possible to interpret the "facts" in a different way, especially when there are great gaps in our existing knowledge and the unknowns far outnumber the knowns.

Another goal I hoped to achieve with my portrayal of Gaveston was to create an unreliable narrator, one who would make readers wonder how much of his version of the truth is actually true. Whenever someone sits down to write their autobiography they want to show themselves in the best possible light, sometimes they even lie outright or twist and tweak the truth, or leave out pertinent details. They may even contribute to their own legend. And when looking back on failed relationships it is sometimes hard to keep the anger and bitterness at bay. In the pages of my novel, Edward II does not emerge as a very likeable, much less lovable man, some have even called him caricaturish or stereotypical, but one must remember that Gaveston is writing his account of their relationship from the threshold of death; he is remembering a man whose love has helped make him notorious and "the most hated man in England." Under the circumstances, I think it is understandable if their affair doesn't emerge as one of the great romances of history. Had my novel been written from Edward II's viewpoint, it would have been a different story.

But, in the end, it is for readers to decide whether they like my book, and if I have accomplished what I set out to do.

* Purchase a print copy of The Confession of Piers Gaveston by Brandy Purdy.

"There Was a Time Once, Remember, When We Were Not Slaves"

“There was a time once, remember, when we were not slaves…”

"Or if not, invent..." That is, at least as I remember it, a quote from author Monique Wittig that really reached into my gut and twisted them up for good. I ran across it when I was doing the research for my first book, a nonfiction work about women, sexuality, and body image called Loving the Goddess Within: Sex Magick for Women (1991.) I wanted to look at how sex in general and women's part in it became a taboo. However it did, it has had a devastating impact on all our lives who live in patriarchal cultures, and that's just about everyone.

One thing we lack, as both women and men, is a culture and in particular a literature that offers the widest possible range of ways to look at who we are as people with both gender and sexuality. Just the other day one of the news programs did a story about how men in films have far more lines than women. In 2011, this is still true. That saddens me, if it does not exactly surprise me. One reason I wrote Beloved Pilgrim was to write as real a woman as I could portray based on my own sense of myself. It is not a perfect portrayal.. there is no perfect woman or man. But after a life of writing men characters I admired, it was time I wrote a woman. I have as much trouble finding examples as the rest of the world.

The burden laid on all our shoulders by this paucity of well rounded characters hurts women, of course, but it hurts men, particularly straight men, as well. Reading Anel Viz's P'tit Cadeau I was struck by a scene where one man breaks down and sobs on the chest of another. That is not a scene you will find very often with straight men. You will find it with two women, a woman sobbing on a man's chest, and a gay man on another gay man's or perhaps his father's. You will rarely if ever see a straight man sobbing on the chest of a woman. It offends our sensibilities. What a terrible thing to dump on a gender of real, breathing, feeling human beings. I realized with that scene I had one more clue to why I so enjoy novels about gay men. Straight men are just too repressed.

Now I am reading Catherine M. Wilson's The Warrior's Path which is Book I from her "When Women Were Warriors" series. It strikes me that a book as well done as this helps provide an opportunity for both men and women to see a world that presents another paradigm about gender and sexuality. We all need new stories about us and our pasts, our heritage, our identities. Books like Wilson's are a start, and of course there are others. But how much better if we can do something better? For one, stories from a perhaps speculative place and time when the "archy" is neither matri- nor patri-. Better yet, if we can write actual historical fiction, not just speculative, where men and women are drawn as they really must have been at heart, clinging not to our notions of male and female but as they coped everyday with the need to survive in often dangerous situations.

I am going to give this more thought, wonder how I might take a character like my Elisabeth and make her even more a person, neither male nor female in her approach to her life and others in it. It is so tragic that women, who make up more than half the world, just do not find mirrors in our culture and literature. yes, we are there. Lots and lots of us... but is that really who we are? Ay, there's the rub.