Robespierre's Nose

 I remembered that I was going to do a short post on a lecture from Cardiff University on Physionotrace portraits. 

It's a technique developed in France in the 1780s for drawing a silhouette created by a machine in a frame, which could then be used to produce multiple copies. Robespierre comes into it as there is a portrait of him using this method, which reveals his characteristic tip tilted nose. Apart from enabling greater availability of likenesses before photography, portraits done this way were closer to a true portrayal of the subject and can be used to test the accuracy of subsequent art work, some produced well after the death of the original subject.  Famous people could circulate copies for publicity purposes and they were also used for medical records. 

Apparently Robespierre was considered very good looking and had fan girls - just like a contemporary pop star - who packed the public gallery when he was speaking. Certainly many of the portraits were very dashing. The lecturer  - unfortunately I can't find a note of her name, but I think it was Dr MM Gilchrist - showed how an original could be manipulated to produce other portraits - reversed, given different style clothes and/or tinted with pastels for numerous variations. The further they got from the original  the less distinct the likeness became. 

It was an interesting evening. I always like to learn things about art. You never know what might be fuel for a new idea. Will I ever use this in a book? At the moment I don't think so, but who knows what the subconscious might throw up in the future. 

The power of a name

 This week I have taken the first steps on a new book. This is scary, exciting, satisfying. At present there are some words on paper and a lot of assembling ducks in rows. Bit like jigsaw puzzles. I'm not particularly good at those, but I do like to puzzle out a new plot. Besides that, and a cast list and a genealogy - it's going to be one of those books again that have family history going back to the war, so I need to get births and deaths and age at key dates sorted out - there is the business of names. 

Names operate in mysterious ways. Sometimes the characters arrive with them already in place. Sometimes they have a name, but it doesn't feel right and the book doesn't jell until they get a new one. Sometimes naming a character means resorting to baby name books and lists on the internet. 

The characters in this book seem to have been rather shy over divulging names. A few have to be Welsh, so that involved the list option, but I have them now. Naming the hero seemed to be especially difficult this time. As I said, I have done a bit of writing and it was time for him to make his entrance - except he couldn't do that until he had a name! I've been mentally throwing options around - he almost seemed as if he was going to be Rafe, but that didn't quite fit. Yesterday morning though, he settled - his name is Nathan. I think now that is right.

So - Eleri and Nathan are ready for their journey. It's a complicated one - when are they not, when I get my hands on them - three interlocking mysteries. Hope I can cope with that. I also have an ancient solicitor for whom I have unexpectedly fallen rather hard who seems to have set himself up as a kind of narrator, plus a story line that goes back to the War and the 1950s. The quotation that opens Romeo and Juliet keeps running through my mind,  

Two households, both alike in dignity, In fair Verona, where we lay our scene, From ancient grudge break to new mutiny, Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean. From forth the fatal loins of these two foes A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life;

The book isn't set in Verona - although I think Lake Como may be making a guest appearance, but it does have two families and star crossed lovers. 

At the moment I'm figuring out the connection between my hero and a local serial killer - as you do. It will putter along for a bit, as the edits for Masquerade on the Riviera will be back soon, but at the moment I am having fun.

Selective memory?

 

Who else makes a habit of listening to Carols from Kings at 3 pm on Christmas eve? Many people say that is when Christmas officially  begins for them 

One of my favourite parts of Christmas is hearing carols sung. It used to be singing them too, I still like that, although my voice now has a disturbing 'old lady' quaver in it. I can hear my grandmother - which is disconcerting.  

I used to sing in the school choir - we gave public concerts in one of the local churches at Christmas. I also sang with the youth group of the church - we did a 'book' at Christmas and Easter - a selection of lessons and music for the occasion. I sang duets with a friend - two fragile blondes in our best coats/dresses looking as if butter would not melt on our song sheets. The old ladies loved it. We've both changed a bit since then. 

As a result of all this, I have a pretty comprehensive repertoire of hymn and especially carol lyrics. With some notable exceptions. Some I only have the chorus - that was when there was a soloist and the main choir only came in for that. Sometimes I can still remember the descant that the choir sang over general singing from the congregation. I've learned all the words to Good King Wenceslas now, but for a long time I only knew the king - which was the part I sang duetting with Denise. One very frustrating mystery is We Three Kings - I clearly sang the last king, Balthazar, with his gift of Myrrh, the creepy sinister one, with the gruesome lyrics. Was this where the dark side began or early typecasting? I think Denise was the first king with the gift of gold - but who sang the middle one? I have no memory of that. Lost now in the mists of time. 

The trigger that prompted this post was  Kings singing Adam Lay ybounden  which usually accompanies a reading from Genesis. It's is a favourite, but I can sing only half of it. What happened to the other half? I must have known it all once. Perhaps the first half stuck because the language is more unusual and had to be learned more carefully?

Overall the carol concert provokes memories. Happy times, and a few tears. 

Let Christmas commence ...

 The first round of edits for Masquerade on the Riviera have finally left the building. Won't be seeing them again now until January. Hurrah!

Hope I'll soon have a cover to share. Really looking forward to that. 

Happy Christmas.

Into the light

 Today is the winter solstice. You have probably seen a few posts and reports of celebrations at Stonehenge and other ancient places to greet the dawn. There is one in Ireland - and I can't remember the name - that is oriented towards the rising sun on the shortest day. The idea that thousands of years ago there were people who could built something monumental and calibrate it that finely is a source of fascination for me. 

Midwinter Day is a bittersweet occasion for those of us who hate the dark. The day that has the least light, but the point when the long slow journey back into the light begins. By January there will already be a marked difference. I'm looking forward to that, and to the new year. New year, new plans. I already have an idea for a new book nipping at my ankles, which is good, because I haven't done a lot of writing lately. Currently trying to work out a complicated family tree for two interlocking families - which is keeping me amused. We'll have to see where that goes. 

I know it's a bit strange that I like to write dark stuff, but don't actually respond well to winter. Mind you, the cold has something to do with that! Not really a winter person. The solstice is one celebration, and of course Christmas, which has become mixed in with the old celebration of Yule is on the way. By the time I post again it will be over! I don't know where the year has gone, it seems to have slid by very fast. Here's to whatever the next one will hold. And happy Christmas. 

Very brief

 This is only a quick post. At the moment I am struggling to complete the edits, and to get an engineer to fix radiators that are not working. Very cold. Engineer was a no show today. Been promised a visit tomorrow. Fingers crossed.

I know I made promises too about Robespierre's nose. The lecture was good, but my notes are buried behind the furniture I moved in preparation for the engineer who didn't arrive. (Is this beginning to sound like the song 'There's a Hole in my Bucket?)

I did get a surprise package from my publisher. I've already eaten one chocolate reindeer - and very nice he was too. 

I'll get to the nose eventually. Maybe next week when the edits really do need to be finished!!!!

With friends

 One of the truisms about being a writer is that work mostly happens when you are alone - give or take a four footed 'assistant' or two. People do write on trains, in cafes, in libraries, but even then you are kind of alone - in your own head, in a world you have created. Which makes meetings with fellow authors festive events - the chance to swop stories of horror and triumph with people who 'get it' which sometimes even close family members don't, however much they try/want to. 

Thanks to Sue for use of the photo -
and our long suffering waitress for taking it!

Christmas celebrations are doubly festive - so I had fun yesterday with members of the Romantic Novelists' Association Cariad Chapter at The Cosy Club in Cardiff having an extended lunch. We were a depleted group - several had succumbed to the various December bugs and others were constrained by the day job, but six of us enjoyed gossip and grub - good food and good company.  

Today I have two gentlemen fitting flooring in the bathroom, at long last, and I need to get back to the edits. They are progressing, but still slow. I have also begun a little research for the next book - but that is heavily under wraps at the moment until I get my plans clearer. I also have an on-line lecture tonight from Cardiff University on Robespierre's nose. I might tell you more about that, next week!