Late evenings
Oct. 28th, 2010 10:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
altivoTwo in a row every week is hard to take. Wednesday is my fault, as usual, due to working until the library closes. Thursday now is Gary's day due to a class that doesn't get out until 8:45 and then he has to drive home from Dekalb. At least I kept myself organized enough to have dinner ready the minute he arrived, as he does for me on Wednesday.
Searching for my various reference books on the Angevin and Plantagenet kings, so far only found about half of them. Some were in storage out in the barns, which is always tricky. I seem to have misplaced Norah Lofts' novel, The Lute Player, which is of course fictional but contains a lot of relevant material just the same. Guess I'd better find a cheap used copy somewhere. Shouldn't be hard, it was a best seller and book club selection back in the early 1950s.
I need to check my portable word processing machines and make sure I have one in working order with new batteries before Monday. Right now I'm pondering characters and what species to assign them. I'm inclined to make wolves of the German and Austrian nobility, and felines of the British royals. They ought to be lions by tradition and heraldry, but I don't know that Britain or France ever actually had lions in historic times. Was there any native large cat in Britain? Or is the house cat the biggest that was ever there? The French king, being a cousin to the English/Norman, ought to be feline as well, though I'd rather like to make him into a fox. On the other paw, fox seems right for Saladin and the Turks as they were called. Maybe they should be fennec foxes while the French are red foxes?
I've just about decided to use familiar diminutives for all of them, so Richard will become Ricky, Eleanor will be Ellie, John will be Johnny, and the the Holy Roman Emperor Henry will be Hank. ;p This is going to be full of anachronisms and utter nonsense anyway, and is intended to be just silly and fun rather than anything serious. I expect to make bilingual puns and quote from authors who won't be born for centuries. We'll probably throw in ideas and scenery from Malory to Cervantes to Shakespeare. I expect Richard to be visited by at least one ghost, probably one of his ancestors, though wouldn't it be twisted to send his great-great-grand nephew Edward II to warn him of something?
Don't mind me, I'm just pondering possibilities. The book will need an introduction from the author in which I twist around the usual disclaimers. Something like "The characters in this work of fiction may in fact resemble real historical characters, and if they do so it is entirely intentional. However, there is not a word of truth in any of the events or situations that are depicted. It's all in fun, and intended to be taken that way. The author, being himself a distant descendant of several of the major figures, believes that he is entitled to make fun of them. If he is not offended, why should you be?"
Temperature is hovering just above freezing outside at the moment. I fully expect it to get well below that before the night's out. Probably the catalpa trees will finally let go of their leaves. It's usually rather like someone pulled a rip cord. Catalpa leaves are very large, and when they all fall from a large tree at once, the pile of leaves can be waist deep until the wind starts moving them away.
Searching for my various reference books on the Angevin and Plantagenet kings, so far only found about half of them. Some were in storage out in the barns, which is always tricky. I seem to have misplaced Norah Lofts' novel, The Lute Player, which is of course fictional but contains a lot of relevant material just the same. Guess I'd better find a cheap used copy somewhere. Shouldn't be hard, it was a best seller and book club selection back in the early 1950s.
I need to check my portable word processing machines and make sure I have one in working order with new batteries before Monday. Right now I'm pondering characters and what species to assign them. I'm inclined to make wolves of the German and Austrian nobility, and felines of the British royals. They ought to be lions by tradition and heraldry, but I don't know that Britain or France ever actually had lions in historic times. Was there any native large cat in Britain? Or is the house cat the biggest that was ever there? The French king, being a cousin to the English/Norman, ought to be feline as well, though I'd rather like to make him into a fox. On the other paw, fox seems right for Saladin and the Turks as they were called. Maybe they should be fennec foxes while the French are red foxes?
I've just about decided to use familiar diminutives for all of them, so Richard will become Ricky, Eleanor will be Ellie, John will be Johnny, and the the Holy Roman Emperor Henry will be Hank. ;p This is going to be full of anachronisms and utter nonsense anyway, and is intended to be just silly and fun rather than anything serious. I expect to make bilingual puns and quote from authors who won't be born for centuries. We'll probably throw in ideas and scenery from Malory to Cervantes to Shakespeare. I expect Richard to be visited by at least one ghost, probably one of his ancestors, though wouldn't it be twisted to send his great-great-grand nephew Edward II to warn him of something?
Don't mind me, I'm just pondering possibilities. The book will need an introduction from the author in which I twist around the usual disclaimers. Something like "The characters in this work of fiction may in fact resemble real historical characters, and if they do so it is entirely intentional. However, there is not a word of truth in any of the events or situations that are depicted. It's all in fun, and intended to be taken that way. The author, being himself a distant descendant of several of the major figures, believes that he is entitled to make fun of them. If he is not offended, why should you be?"
Temperature is hovering just above freezing outside at the moment. I fully expect it to get well below that before the night's out. Probably the catalpa trees will finally let go of their leaves. It's usually rather like someone pulled a rip cord. Catalpa leaves are very large, and when they all fall from a large tree at once, the pile of leaves can be waist deep until the wind starts moving them away.
Mandolin
Date: 2010-10-29 11:28 pm (UTC)Re: Mandolin
Date: 2010-10-30 01:06 am (UTC)I imagine the thing to do is bring it to him and get an estimate on the cost of repairs.
Lofts' reference to Blondel de Nesle as a "lute player" is anacronistic, I think. Richard I died in 1199 and Blondel himself (if he was the historic character we think he was) died in 1202. I don't believe the lute as the instrument we recognize (eleven strings in five pairs and a single, rounded back and short wide neck) was created until quite a bit later than that, in the Renaissance or late Baroque. Various middle eastern plucked instruments could have been ancestors to the Renaissance lute, though, and it's certainly likely that the Crusaders brought some of them back to Europe.