It's like buses. Part 3: A pondery bit...

...with some context, a list of books and a MEGA largely irrelevent, but quite interesting footnote

The thing is, I’m perpetually intrigued by what is justified in historical romance novels on the grounds of historical “authenticity” (eg. rape, abuse, swordsticks, Fabio in a Viking helmet) and what is extracted on grounds that it would put off the sensitive reader (eg. slavery, blatant racism, poor oral health, body hair). It’s not the removal of all ick. It’s selective historical sanitisation – and it’s not only in ye olde Romancelande that this takes place.

This isn’t a cry for more historical accuracy on the hygiene front in romance novels either. The way that grime can be fetishised in other genres is something I think is equally worth digging into. It’s another side of the phenomenon. But there’s not enough room to go into that here, and I wanted to write about this topic in relation to romance novels in particular.

It’s a truism that historical novels (or indeed almost any writing) reflect more about the time of writing than the time being written about. So in my view, claims of “historical authenticity” (or claims of a lack thereof) are often more of a figleaf than a valid line of argument. I’d argue that it’s more a question of, “Yes, this did or didn’t happen then, but I want to think about why this is included, but not that, and what does it say about us/our society now?”

Ashenburg discusses the modern obsession with hygiene: the way we erase all traces of our own bodily odour and try to smell “like an exotic fruit…or a cookie” (p.8) instead. She links this to a “confluence of reasons” (p.201) including: distrust of our bodies and the need to control them (p.283); the modern concern for privacy (p.282); and the connection of hygiene with morality** (p.190), civility and advancement (p.201).

(Just a bit more on theoretical background – can be skipped. In the context of historical novels, I'm also intrigued by some of the ideas brought up in studies of the relationship between colonialism and hygiene. There are quite a few recent books on this – the one that introduced me to the topic is Kristin Ross’ Fast Cars, Clean Bodies, but since it was published I’ve also come across a few others: Bashford’s Imperial Hygiene, Jennings’ Curing the Colonizers, and Anderson’s, Colonial Pathologies.)

The inherently optimistic outlook of modern romantic fiction (I'd say that most readers insist that a happy ending is a fundamental requirement of any book in this genre) means that they are often tagged as fantasies, which can be either a pejorative or a positive label depending on the position of the labeller. As fantasies, they are separated from real life and can therefore discard aspects of “real life” as required to meet the needs of the fantasy.

That said, I think this distance from reality is a mark of all writing. Writing is in part a selective process – a writer chooses to dispense with, include or exaggerate aspects of reality. Writing guides the reader’s imagination along a particular path, and to be most effective when dealing with the messiness of reality, it filters things out, just as our perception filters out much of the world around us so that our brains don’t explode. But I don't think it's just the writer in isolation doing all the choosing, all the time, either.

**Ashenburg also argues that one of the reasons for the odoriferousness that permeates European history was that in contrast to the Jewish and Muslim faiths, where sanitary laws are part of doctrine, the Christian faith has no such teaching (p.49-55).

So for medieval Christians, dirtiness was often seen as next to godliness since it meant that the dirty individual was a) above such trivial earthly matters as soap and water and prepared to suffer lice, itchiness and scabs for good of his or her immortal soul (p.58-63), and b) clearly not Jewish or Muslim (p.54, 69-72), whose sanitary laws were viewed with deep suspicion by the majority of medieval Christians (p.71-2, 103, 111).

This was also why the Inquisition took an interest in the bathing habits of any individual unfortunate enough to attract their attention. And yes, being “known to bathe” was enough to damn a person in their eyes. (p.111)

It's like buses. Part 4: A bit more pondering...

...but unfortunately, not very much concluding.

So I guess the question of hygiene in historical romance seems to come down to this messy intersection between a) empathy with the hero and heroine (h/h) which is usually seen as grounded in some level of identification with the characters, b) the conflict between the way that we view the past either in evolutionary terms or as a mirror, and c) the big pay-off of romance: the HEA. And the area of debate centres on the question of personal happiness.

After all, how can h/h be happy if they live in what seems like uncomfortable, unsanitary conditions? The argument goes: a modern reader (this means me) would find it harder to empathise, because they personally wouldn’t be comfortable in these conditions. And readers have to believe the HEA, or the satisfaction they get from the book is diminished.

So the h/h must face a clean and hygienic future for the HEA to be believed because:

• Cleanliness = healthiness. Readers need to believe that h/h won’t be struck down by cholera or galloping typhus immediately after the book finishes, or the HEA doesn't pack enough punch.

• Cleanliness = morality. H/H are good people. Disease, dirt and bad breath only happens to deserving villains or ex-partners (possibly tragically if its backstory, possibly because they are villains).

• Cleanliness = civility, and in the modern world, personal cleanliness is a mark of personal status. These days, instead of finding more expensive ways to smell awful (Ashenburg’s book has some great stuff about this, btw), rich, cultured people don’t smell of anything unless they choose to.

• Cleanliness = wealth. Wealthy, or even well-to-do people can afford to be clean, and wealth itself, while not guaranteeing happiness, probably helps – at least in the mind.

• Cleanliness = comfort. Dirt isn’t glamorous, it’s itchy.

• Cleanliness = neutral. Dirt is a distraction – if it’s mentioned, people think about it, so it distracts from the story unless it’s part of it.

And I could just leave it at that, and go away whistling songs from South Pacific except it doesn’t really deal with one question, and one thorny issue. The question is simply this: how do I know unless I've tried it? After all, I can accept all manner of grubbiness in other genres, so why not romance? And wouldn't a reaaally good writer be able to make it work?

The thorny issue is more worrying to me, though, and it seems to take me right back to my starting point. Although historical dirt only shows up in ye olde Romancelande in controlled conditions, if at all; all manner of other historickiness* is either selectively included in, or selectively removed from the landscape. And what does this say about readers/perceptions of readers? But this is probably a post (or six) for another day.

*thanks (probably should be apologies) to Stephen Colbert for the inspiration.

ETA: Hey, cool. I forgot I could do bullets.

SpiegelimspiegellegeipsmilegeipS

Might be better to pretend that I published this about two days ago - it will be easier all round, and make me appear organised and consistent. Ahem

The Athenian Murders - Jose Carlos Somoza

I find it hard to believe that I have never unleashed the chains on my abiding and unspeakable desire for this book here before. But that's what the mighty power of the search engine shows. Shock. Horror. Smothered yawn. Be afraid. However, I re-read it recently, which makes it count in this mini festival of bookstravaganzic delights, allowing it (the mini-fest, that is) to live another day.

But enough of this introductory flimflam, I hear my inner monkey editor cry, speak more of this unspeakable love. For yes, this book contains innumerable shades of the love that dare not speak its name. Inter-textual love. Academic twistiness and japery of the driest kind. Philosophical shadow puppetry. Flagrant abuse of literary meta-jiggery. Tricksiness a go-go. I love it all with the unholy passion of a thousand geeky monkeys. The ones that are otherwise busily making rude shadow animals, sun-bathing and short-sheeting the Platonic bed.

For verily, these are Ancient Greeks of whom I write, or rather of whom the author writes and from whom I steal jokes. Smart koulourakia to a man, right down to their dusty ankles (except the one in the bath).

Well, actually, it is more that these are Ancient Greeks upon whom the author uses the character of the Translator to write or comment. Or their ideas. Except these might be copies of the original copy of the ideal first idea. And anyhow, what about those lions? See what I mean? This is book which defies anyone, least of all a lowly blogger armed only with the dubious merits of the English relative clause to shove its translated-from-the-original-Spanish-self into a halfway decent summary. It's a tricksy book about Ideas, lightly glazed with a few corpses, a sinister subplot (or is it?) and finished off with an anti-sleuth. I think the Salon article explained it best, and the Guardian review is more entertaining, which leaves me to only do my worst.

Basically it features:
Death
Murder
Poison
Bodies
Wolves (or lions)
Greeks (ancient)
Academics (ancient and modern)
Philosophy (mostly Greek and ancient)
Ideas-with-a-big-I. Bigger I. No, a really big I.
Texts. (not the SMS kind)
Budding insanity
Reality. (Jim)
Footnotes. Le sigh. Les bambi eyes. Le sigh.

A quick scan of the Amazon and Salon reviews, which are proper reviews with plot synopses and everything a prospective reader could desire, indicates that this book is of the love-it-or-hate-it Marmite type. I'd agree, although I'd add to my review overview that despite the inclusion of footnotes and such it's closer to Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next (not Nursery Crimes) books than Terry Pratchett, but not at all as cheerfully bonkers and far more menacing and introverted. Thursday Next's rather disturbing great-uncle professor who lost tenure under the darkest of clouds as written by Borges (he comes back later), perhaps.

A scan of the the reviews of the "urrggh, Marmite, blech"-type shows that this isn't the book for readers who just can't abide Umberto Eco and writers of his ilk. But I think that if it's just Eco's prose style that puts you off, rather than his content, it's worth looking at this book, purely on the grounds that Eco can leave the unwary reader feeling trapped in the coils of his rococco prose. Somoza's style (and oh, how I long to write Samosa's style) is less elaborated than Eco's and more lucid. The disorientating, clever twistiness remains, but I didn't feel as if I were also being showered with the shredded contents of a gilded thesaurus by a million pudgy putti.

The other thing to add to the review overview is that I wouldn't read this book looking for the next historical whodunnit à la grecque. Thither lies disappointment. There's a murder, but that's not really the whole point, and the ending isn't exactly Christie.

On the other hand if deep-down, you secretly rather enjoy following digs and snide asides as academics wrangle over obscure points and interpretations via cross-references and footnotes, even though you know this means you are turning into your father (hairy ears and all) you will probably enjoy this. Besides, it's a book about books, playing with other books.* If you like it when an author constantly pulls the rug out from under your feet, even if it's technically cheating (or at least, making up the rules as he goes along) read on.

For me, the best part of the book is sitting back, relaxing and letting the the author, or narrator, or translator or whoever mess with my mind. He or she or it or whoever might make things up. He might even take the piss a few times. But even though I've read it a few times now, this book invariably leaves me with the oddest combination of two very distinct, and yet long-winded feelings:

1.I get the buzz that normally happens when the stars align and somehow I'm able to work out a series of clues for a cryptic crossword.
2.But at the same time, it leaves me genuinely unsettled. Not in the the "AAa! Whatwasthatnoise? AAAaa!" way, though. Instead, it's in the "But what if I go to sleep and it turns out that this life is really something/one dreaming and then who/whatever is dreaming wakes up while I'm asleep and what happens then????aaaahhhh!!! No wait! What about what we see in the mirrors!!! aaah!!!!" kind of way.

Best to put it like this - it's one of the few books that actually made me think it might be a good idea to read some more Borges. One of these days. As long as there's enough coffee.

*Except they didn't really have books in those days. Or novels, as Salon points out. Probably they didn't have philosopher-detectives too, but at least there were libraries and monkeys. There were no monk-how do you know? you were too busy contemplating the exercise non-outfits of those ancient greek athletes. I WAS NO-- And anyhow, My mind was SO COMPLETELY on higher thin- do you know what people think when you stick a footnote like this at the end of this kind of review? Especially one where you name-drop Borges, TWICE. I'll tell you what they think. They think, "What a pretentious tw--"

Away an bile yer heid

Oh, thank heavens... no way was I going to be able to edit down my week's mixed back of rants into anything digestible or even coherent. Luckily, the Wandering Scotsman sent me this, and it's made me feel all teary-eyed and nostalgic. Sniff.

Anyhow, this is dedicated to Mrs.B and D'Eath who between them and their ancestral roots taught me how to strip the willow, eat "proper" chips, read Irvine Welsh and most importantly, the correct way to incapacitate innocent bystanders with a cannily-flung shoe while reeling. And here's to Maili (hope all's well with you).

In a typically pathetic effort to shoehorn this into the blog while maintaining a purely fraudulent sense of an overall thematic arc here's a bit of blurb. (You may want to skip this and just go to the bit at the bottom.)

Some might note that the list below doesn't exactly evoke the same image of Scotland as say, Christophe(r) Lambert (a Frenchman - snerk) in a skirt, Mel Gibson (an Australian) in blue paint, Liam Neeson (an Irishman) in a swarm of midges, or Sean Connery in anything, but especially a pair of "Mr. Universe" bathing trunks. To say nothing of those millions o' Hieland lairds frolickin' bare-chested amang t'rannoch an t'yowes.

Brief rant: I wish popular Scottish history of this type delved a bit more into the very strong historical Scottish-French connections and political machinations within the Scottish royalty in general. Not only is it damned interesting, but I think it gives a greater sense of genuine history than the trope of a rabid pack of weedy and effeminate Sassenaches laying waste to mystic and ancient tribes of barely-dressed tamed calendar models.

Actually, I think this sort of silliness denigrates vast tracts of Scottish history and gives the English way too much credit. I mean, take the Scottish Enlightenment - it played a critical part in the development of modern western thought: all that lovely stuff on political economy, history, humanism, philosophy, scientific method and dancing frogs. Ideas that changed the world, she shouts, waving an invisible hand or two. And then a few hundred years later there's the whole take on Burns as a Soviet literary icon. Aarrrghhh. Must. Stop. Ranting. No. Time.

Anyhow, one of these days, I swear I'm going to write an essay on approaches to Scotland in popular culture. With a splash of amnesiac Orientalism and a post-modern secret baby.

All of which is a roundabout way of saying that just like the above examples, the list below represents facets of "a" Scotland(s) rather than "the" Scotland. Neither is more "right" than the other (regardless of accuracy), but trying to believe in the absolute truth of one vision feels to me like being in a mental straitjacket. Besides, since everyone has their own vision of a place, one way to wander through that person's head (dammit, I just knew that Zadie Smith thing was going to make its presence felt) is to try to see a place as they do.

In the case of Scotland, after versions like the ones given above, or even below, it's lovely to have a dose of Alexander MacCall Smith. Or go down the gritty 'tec route via Ian Rankin to end up in darker places of the Iain Banks type. Or maybe others (open to carefully-worded suggestions at this point).

But I think this nonsense about spending evenings spent studying is showing neon-yellow at the seams. I'll try and do some rhythmic breathing at the weekend to see if I calm down a bit. Or maybe I'll dig oot the poem I posted on SB's once, for the sake of posterity. Onwards.

You know you are a true Scot if...........
1. Ye can properly pronounce McConnochie, Ecclefechan, Milngavie,Sauchiehall St, St Enoch, Auchtermuchty and Aufurfuksake.
2. Ye actually like deep fried battered pizza fae the chippie.
3. Yer used tae four seasons in wan day.
4. Ye canna pass a chip/kebab shop withoot sleverin when yer blootert.
5. Ye kin fall about pished withoot spilling yer drink.
6. Ye see people wearin shell suits with burberry accessories pure class!
7. Ye measure distance in minutes.
8. Ye kin understaun Rab C Nesbitt and know characters just like him, inyer ain family.
9. Ye go tae North Berwick cos ye think it is like gaun tae the ocean.
10. Ye kin make hael sentences jist wae sweer wurds.
11. Ye know whit haggis is made ae and stull like eating it.
12. Somedy ye know his used a fitba schedule tae plan thur wedding daydate.
13. You've been at a wedding and fitba scores are announced in theChurch/Chapel.
14. Ye urny surprised tae find curries, pizzas, kebabs, fish n chips,irn-bru, fags and nappies all in the wan shop.
15. Yer holiday home at the seaside has calor gas under it.
16. Ye know irn-bru is a hangover cure.
17. Ye learnt tae sweer afore ye learnt tae dae sums.
18. Ye actually understand this and yurr gonnae send it tae yer pals .
19. Finally, ye are 100% Scot if ye ha' e'er said/heard these words;
How's it hingin
Clatty
Boggin
Cludgie
Pished
Get it up ye
Wee beasties
Erse bandit
Amurny
Away an bile yer heid
Peely-wally
Humphey backit
Ba'-heid
Baw bag
Dubble nugget