Friday, September 12, 2008

anachronism!

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I'm wondering how people feel about anachronisms in historical fiction. Last week I came across a startling instance in a new paperback reprint of a well-received historical-type fantasy (perceived level of tech maybe 2nd or 3rd century CE). This is from a very respectable publisher, lots of critical attention, etc. Yet I hurled it across the room after reading for three minutes. Why? Because on page 5 a character feels a "thrill of electricity." Electricity. In the 2nd century. In a fit of pique, I tossed it in the recycling.* And then tonight, rereading one of my all-time favourites, Mary Stewart's The Crystal Cave, I found a fish "jackknifing." It bothered me. Not enough to throw the book, but enough to pop me out of the story for a moment.

I'm working really hard while writing this novel about Hild to be rigorous with the language, probably to an excessive degree. For example, in one dreamy, other-wordly passage I wanted to talk about aconite, the poisonous purplish blue flower--but that name wasn't around until the Normans. Okay, I thought, I'll call it Monkshood. But, no, that makes no sense in a society with no monks (we're in Northumbria, pre-Paulinus, pre-Aidan; no doubt there were some Brittonic-speaking priests skulking about but I can't quite imagine monks). So, okay, how about Wolf's Bane? Good--except apparently that usage wasn't known until the tenth century. If I've done my research properly (and, as always, I welcome corrections), the Old English term for aconite was probably thung (þung), a generic term for poisonous plants. But, really, thung? Tuh. It's not poetic at all. So I compromised and called it 'the thung that people call Wolf's Bane'--and one minute later deleted it. I can't bear that level of clumsiness in fiction. So, despite all my efforts, the flower is now Wolf's Bane and I just hope all the botanists and medievalists will not fling the book at the wall.

And I haven't even begun to work out how to deal with the place name problem....

So, your thoughts? Will anyone even notice my (attempted) rigour? Am I being too fussy?

* Yes, I know, I should have recycled it via a loving home, or the library, or something, but it was a freebie (publishers send me a lot of stuff), and I suspect they sent out so many, and it's such rubbish, that soon all potential loving homes will be inundated.

Friday, September 5, 2008

scriþan

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I've come across this verb four times in Crossley-Holland's translation of Beowulf. Shrithe (scriþan). I can't quite triangulate on its meaning. I imagine something between slither and slide and slink and slip but it's irritating not being able to pin it down. I know that in most languages there are no exact equivalents of many words but, still, it's beginning to bug me. I'm not sure if it's a word from which I'm supposed to infer magnificence and/or inevitability, awe or disgust. Is it more 'slither' or 'sail majestically' or what? At etymonline.com I found this:

SHRITHE - Bruce Mitchell's "Invitation" gives this account of the word: "The [Beowulf] poet uses the verb scriþan four times -- of hellish monsters, of shadows, of Grendel, who is both a hellish monster and a sceadugenga 'shadow-goer' and of the dragon. The word seems to imply smooth and graceful movement (it is used elsewhere of the sun, clouds, and stars, of a ship skimming over the sea, and of darting salmon in a pool) and an element of mystery (other poets use it of the coming of May, of the beginning and ending of the day, and of the gradual passing of human life). In Beowulf, there is also a suggestion of menace and danger which is echoed in other poems, where the word refers to the spread through the body of a disease which could be cancer and to flames raging unchecked. Had it survived, poets would have used it as a rhyme for 'writhe' and sports writers would have turned it into a cliche applicable to footballers, cricketers and baseballers, tennis-players, and boxers."

If not for the 'darting' salmon, I'd go for something like 'steal' as in 'stealing up to the door'--a sense of stealth, and smoothness, and movement. Any better suggestions?

Monday, September 1, 2008

brave Beocat, brood-kit of Ecgthmeow

This blog has moved. My blog now lives here: http://gemaecce.com/

In honour of it being a holiday, I thought I'd post this poem by the Beowulf scop's cat, that is, Henry Beard. Illustration by, well, me. (It's an old pic; if I were doing it now I'd add a little boar, with bristles along its back, on top. Possibly some engraving on the sides.) Anyway, enjoy the poem--I'm particularly fond of "Hrodent slayer."



Grendel's Dog, from Beocat

Brave Beocat, brood-kit of Ecgthmeow,
Hearth-pet of Hrothgar in whose high halls
He mauled without mercy many fat mice,
Night did not find napping nor snack-feasting.
The wary war-cat, whiskered paw-wielder,
Bearer of the burnished neck-belt gold-braided collar band,
Feller of fleas fatal, too to ticks,
The work of wonder-smiths, woven with witches' charms,
Sat upon the throne-seat his ears like sword-points
Upraised, sharp-tipped, listening for peril-sounds,
When he heard from the moor-hill howls of the hell-hound,
Gruesome hunger-grunts of Grendel's Great Dane,
Deadly doom-mutt, dread demon-dog.
Then boasted Beocat, noble battle-kitten,
Bane of barrow-bunnies, bold seeker of nest-booty:
"If hand of man unhasped the heavy hall-door
And freed me to frolic forth to fight the fang-bearing fiend,
I would lay the whelpling low with lethal claw-blows;
Fur would fly and the foe would taste death-food.
But resounding snooze-noise, stern slumber-thunder,
Nose-music of men snoring mead-hammered in the wine-hall,
Fills me with sorrow-feeling for Fate does not see fit
To send some fingered folk to lift the firm-fastened latch
That I might go grapple with the grim ghoul-pooch."
Thus spoke the mouse-shredder, hunter of hall-pests,
Short-haired Hrodent-slayer, greatest of the pussy-Geats.

From Poetry for Cats, by Henry Beard (Villard, 1994)