If you’re not interested, why the hell would anyone else be?

Sometimes, in both blogging and story-writing, the words almost write themselves (such as yesterday when I happened to finish Byzantium: The Decline and Fall). At other times, writing can be much harder.

I started writing today’s blog a few times and deleted what I’d written within a few lines. Brilliantly, this actually gave me something worth writing about.

In an older, unpublished, story I wrote there are two pieces that stand out for me for very different reasons. My eyes go fuzzy if I try editing on-screen, so I always print the pages, play with highlighters and then amend the chapters afterwards. Anyway, I was reading a section where some characters were travelling towards their home country and remember being a little surprised and displeased by just how bloody dull it was.

The piece was not meant to be thrilling, there was no sudden murder or exploding eyeballs or the protagonist being transmogrified into a cabbage. It was, however, meant to be interesting, with snippets of character building and fleshing out the secondary cast members. Instead it was disappointing, and the boredom I’d felt when writing it was clear.

The second piece was the introduction of a character (perhaps my favourite). I try to make most of my characters three-dimensional, but often have one or two exceptions for comic effect, or because it’s more interesting to have a raving lunatic than someone only slightly mad. This character was sly, arrogant, vicious and overtly sadistic. I loved writing the piece and I was surprised how enjoyable reading it back was. Not sure what it reveals of my psyche that murder, torture and cannibalism interest me more than deep and meaningful conversations (it could explain why I’m single…), but the difference was plain to see.

Passion is tremendously important in writing. After all, if you’re not interested, why the hell would anyone else be?

There are other essential ingredients, (cunning plots and deep characters for a start), but if you’re not motivated and you don’t enjoy it then instead of being a labour of love writing becomes a chore.

Getting published is damned hard (even sacrificing goats to Zeus won’t help), but the average author who tries his best and persists will always have a better chance than the hugely talented author who lacks drive and ambition and stops submitting to agents/publishers even though they’ve written a great story.

Thaddeus

Book Review: Byzantium, by John Julius Norwich

This is a review of all three volumes (The Early Centuries, The Apogee, The Decline and Fall) of John Julius Norwich’s history of Byzantium. Some spoilers are unavoidable, but I’ve tried to review the books without giving away more than is necessary. As a result it’s slightly more concise than comprehensive.

Byzantium, also known as Constantinople, was an old Greek city that was adopted by the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great as the capital of the Eastern Empire. No especial knowledge of Roman or Greek history is necessary to enjoy Norwich’s work, which is replete with handy footnotes and details of concepts that need a bit of explanation (the unexpected and bizarre Byzantine love of religious quibbling being a prime example).

The history spans over a thousand years, more than 80 emperors and numerous dynasties. As with Rome, there is staggering variation between the emperors, with some fantastically intelligent and heroic, some tyrannical psychopaths or feeble weaklings and most somewhere in between.

It was impossible for me not to feel drawn emotionally into the fate of Byzantium. The book, although intelligently written, is not a slog and can be read quickly. Norwich superbly portrays the triumphs and catastrophes that the city and its people are subjected to over the centuries.

An unexpected pleasure was to read of the powers that fell and grew up around the Eastern Empire, such as the Bulgars and the Serbs. Venice and Genoa, the rival seafaring powers that feature prominently in the final book, are even better examples of this.

Despite its importance and longevity, Byzantium is not nearly as well known as Rome. Reading about the city, a strange mixture of East and West, Greek and Latin, was fascinating and surprising. For example, the emperor’s wife actually had real power, and the emperor himself was considered the Equal of the Apostles.

I think there’s an abbreviated, single volume version of the trilogy available. My firm advice would be to avoid it and instead buy the three volumes. The history is fascinating, the writing excellent and the tragedy captivating. Almost the only flaw with the history is that it has to end and it would be a grave mistake to miss out by purchasing a shorter single volume.

Thaddeus

The Dames de l'Acier

In Denland, the King’s authority is represented by the Hollow Knights and the Law Lords. The former ensure that any troublesome mages meet a swift end and the latter collect taxes (and bribes) and enforce royal law.

However, the Felarian King relies solely upon the Dames de l’Acier. These soulless harridans are one of the few things that unite the diverse city of Highford. Everybody loathes them.

The merchants must pay royal taxes to the Dames, who are utterly impossible to tempt with corruption due to their desire for earthly pleasures being destroyed the moment their souls are ripped from their bodies. The mages despise the over-bearing and vicious steel maidens, and the Comte dislikes the presence of an armed force answerable to the King rather than himself.

For reasons that are hotly contested, it is easier to remove a woman’s soul and have her survive than it is to do likewise to a man. In Denland, they simply kill more men to produce the required number of Hollow Knights, whereas the Felarians opt for female warriors. The process is dangerous and the slightest error is inevitably fatal. Should it prove successful, the person becomes a husk, a hollowed out shell bereft of passion, lust, greed and all other vices and virtues that make a man, or woman, truly human.

It is an empty way of life, but for their sacrifice the Hollow Knight or Dame de l’Acier secures substantial wealth for their families.

As all know, sorcery is the gift of the Divine. The talents which are bred rather than taught do not affect another person directly, it is only when spells or glyphs are used that magic affects a mortal. Thankfully, mages tend to be reclusive sorts who rarely leave their towers. Those who do and inflict harm on their fellows can be a powerful menace, which is why the Dames were created.

By parting the body from the soul, they become immune to arcane assault.

“Trying to kill a Dame de l’Acier with magic is like trying to drown a fish,” as a certain miscreant named Thaddeus rather aptly put it one day.

And so, the Dames are much like barber surgeons. Unpleasant, but necessary.

Frère Jacques, scribe of Highford

Why medieval England?

I’m English and, even better, a Yorkshireman. I like living in a country with castles and monarchy and a splendid history. However, I do wonder why almost the default setting for fantasy is medieval England.

Feudal monarchies are pretty well-known. The King’s the top chap, then there are a range of powerful nobles, and beneath them the peasantry (possibly with a set of guilds, yeomanry and merchants in between). The familiarity helps ease readers into the world, and means the author doesn’t have quite so much explaining to do.

That’s well and good (and I can’t complain too much because 2/3 of the countries involved in my future eBook are themselves broadly similar). But why not use some other ancient civilisations as the framework for a fantasy country?

Greek city-states had a number of governing styles, with Athens (democracy) and Sparta (diarchy, with some elements of aristocracy and democracy) the best known. Athens had some fun rules, such as wealthy chaps being liable for outfitting a trireme (which was bloody expensive). However, a wealthy fellow could avoid this if someone else had more money but wasn’t paying for a ship. They proved this by offering, publicly, to swap everything they owned with the richer man, and if he did not accept the offer he had to pay for the trireme himself.

Republican Rome had a system that was similar to Sparta. Two consuls (elected annually rather than a pair of kings), a Senate rather than ephors and public ratification of certain measures (such as treaties). To be a Roman politician you had to first serve for years in the army, which was mandatory if you were a citizen anyway.

In Byzantium, the emperor was known as the basileus, and was traditionally selected by the army’s will (although quite often coups and hereditary factors were more important). However, the interesting part of the Byzantine system was that the wife of the emperor had her own palace and substantial authority in her own right. A bit like if the American First Lady got a department to run.

For those interested in this sort of thing, Polybius and Machiavelli both have interesting thoughts on governing nations. There are essentially three good systems, according to them (monarchy, aristocracy and democracy), with three corresponding bad versions (tyranny, oligarchy and anarchy). Given the relative rarity of monarchy in the world today, I wonder what most people would make of the idea that aristocracy or monarchy could be valid and good systems, instead of just democracy.

The third nation referred to in my eBook places more emphasis on a ruler’s obligations to the people, rather than on their servitude to him. This is somewhat similar to the system in Macedon, where the King was not a dictator and the army could and did make its voice heard. Alexander the Great turned back not because he wanted to, but because the army demanded it.

Hmm, that got a bit rambly, but hopefully it didn’t veer off of the Path of Interestingness and tumble down into the Crevice of Woe.

Thaddeus