Kalamazoo Medieval Congress Blog: Thursday 1:30

Yes, it's that time again! I'm blogging the sessions I attend at the annual medieval studies congress at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo. (There will also be reports on book purchases.)

Session 49: When Medievalists Fictionalize the Middle Ages

• Organizer: Rebecca Barnhouse, Youngstown State Univ.
• Presider: Sharan Newman, Independent Scholar

The Mean Streets of Medieval York: The Murder Mystery as Cultural Lens

Candace Robb, Independent Scholar

The pros and cons of writing about a real place and real people, but adding in fictitious events (like murders). Her focus is on the city of York itself (which she fell in love with). Not finding enough fiction set in that place, she decided to remedy it. Some tweaking of specific historic details to get the setting she wanted. The rich cultural context of the 14th century provides a lot of potential for interactions.

The pitfall of fictional invention is that lots of people know details about medieval York and will know when you make something up. The pitfall of using the real characters is they don’t always do what you need them to do.  But conversely, real historic events and relationships sometimes provide a perfect context or inspiration for the genre plot you need.

Another pitfall is the historically accurate repetition of the same personal names over and over and over again. What do you do when there are two very important John Montagues in your historic setting? (Handout is passed out with detailed family tree of both historic and fictional persons in the series.)

What happens when later information turns up a historic mistake in an earlier volume in a series? Do you revise? Do you shrug and move on? Do you ret-con? (Star Trek’s handling of Klingons is offered as an example.) What happens when someone else uses your fictionalizations as a “historic” source for their own fictions?

The Fantasy Space of Medieval History: The Case of Chaucer, Gower, and Bruce Holsinger’s A Burnable Book

Debra E. Best, California State Univ.–Dominguez Hills

What is the perfect mix of history in fiction? When do facts slow down the action? ABB is reviewed as an excellent portrait of medieval England, but how well does it create a fantasy space within that history? And how does this process interact with the story-internal process of the role of fiction in creating historic reality. It is a murder mystery involving a (fictitious) prophetic book, wrapped in an embroidery, combined with the words of a dying woman and several other clues.

The story centers around objects and events that are not merely fictitious with respect to the modern novel, but some turn out to be fictious creations within the context of the story itself.

Holsinger’s background as a historian drove some of his creative process, writing the book’s core prophecy originally in Middle English, based on historic prophetic examplars, and then modernizing it for the text, but similarly his characters turn out to have created the (story-internal fictitious) prophecy by modeling it on earlier (historic) writers. Thus the process of creating a fantasy of the past is echoed both within the story and in the existence of the story.

The author’s background also shows in a comfort with both the vocabulary of Middle English and the choice of non-historic vocabulary that fits the esthetic. Also: many Easter egg allusions to medieval English literature.

Worldbuilding in Rebecca Barnhouse’s The Coming of the Dragon and Peaceweaver

Patricia H. Ward, College of Charleston

The conflict between presenting a strictly “accurate” historic story, and bringing in modern sensibilites about morality, diversity, etc. in an anachronistic fashion. How do you remain faithful in depicting a historic society (even a fictionalized one, as in Beowulf here)? How do you present the facts while avoiding didacticism?

Potentially problematic topics include valorization of literacy, gender relations, slavery and class differences in general, depiction of Christianity/non-Christian practices. (The paper primarily consists of discussion and summaries of how these types of topics are handled in the books.)

Armored Knights and Winged Faeries: The English Middle Ages and the Medieval Fantasy Novel

Emily Lavin Leverett, Methodist Univ.

Addressing questions about the nature and purpose of accuracy in medieval fantasy. Is it an inherently conservative genre, or can it be used to subvert and expand the historic narrative? This paper particularly addresses the handling of gender in urban (medieval-inspired) fantasy. This work follows the trope of the fantasy-medieval heroine who rises about gender restrictions and disenfranchisement. But even the focus on “rising above” helps establish the default assumption of patriarchy and oppression.

The protagonist here begins as a 21st century American urban woman (possibly two women?) on the verge of entering an academic career. I.e., struggling within an opressive patriarchal society. [I’m not getting a clear notion of what happens in the story, but it sounds like it’s a portal-type fantasy where the modern character(s) enter an alternate medieval-inspired story but where the fantasy story is designed to eliminate some of problematic defaults in order to create an adventure story that doesn’t revolve around tired struggles. Or possibly even the modern setting is an alternate version of our world? Unclear.]