Compiling History
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Hello
Compiling History
Latest Blog Post
The Queen and the Mistress - Paperback
Hello
A wintery welcome from me in England. After a very mild Autumn, the chill finally hit and we even had a brief bit of snow. The afternoons are dark - perfect to curl up with a book (or, in my case, write one). With my book deadline rapidly approaching, I’ve been thinking about what it is to compile a history book.
Compiling History
I always remember one particular seminar I had early on in my Masters - it was one of those existential ones that makes you question why you even write history in the first place. It was about the construction of history, and how bias is so intrinsic in everything we do that we can never get to an objective truth. We all know about bias - it’s something you’re taught early on at school in your history lessons: this person wrote this source, but they were friends with the king so they would say that, and so on. But far less are we taught about our own bias as historians. Bias isn’t necessarily bad. I am a woman, interested in women’s history, and want to write more of it to represent all those who have been ignored by historians for centuries. I have my own spin on things from my own perspective that is unique to me. But it does shape everything that we do.
What also struck me was the seminar’s explanation that even the way we construct history - that is, put the pieces in order and choose what we do and don’t include - completely changes the story you are portraying. If you were writing a history of the Hundred Years’ War and ended with the stunning victory of Agincourt, and Henry V’s deal with France to make him the next king, you would come away thinking of the glory of the English. If you instead finished that history several decades later, with an infirm Henry VI, much of England’s territories in France lost, and a civil war, you would come away with a much different picture.
So much happens in a year, that you can never tell a complete history of anything or anyone. You can’t write about every single battle that happened in the Second World War, every single piece of legislation Elizabeth I enacted, every thing that happened to everyone at court that in the endless cogs of life influenced wider events. So, as historians, the bits that we do choose to include changes the narrative we are giving.
These thoughts have been circulating in my mind recently as I finished reading another biography of Richard II to complement the ones I’ve already read. Each book is telling a tale of the same man, and includes many of the same events. But each historian went into different depths, put emphasis on different events, brought in small details the other didn’t. After finishing each biography, I came away with a different impression of the man than I did the last. When my own book comes out, it will be another perspective again.
It certainly makes interesting the now-common cry “you can’t just rewrite history”. Rewriting history is all any historian does.
Latest Blog Post
I really enjoyed this month’s blog post, as it looked at a part of history I rarely feature on my blog: the Second World War. I spoke to author Victoria Panton Bacon who just this month released her first children’s history book about the war, and it was fascinating to hear how one goes about writing about such a traumatic, tragic topic for kids. If you haven’t read it yet, make sure to catch up with it now!
The Queen and the Mistress - Paperback
In other news, I’m excited to announce that at long last, The Queen and the Mistress will be getting a paperback version! I’ve been busy the last few weeks re-reading it in anticipation of the new edition, seeing if any edits or updates need making, and I have been really enjoying it if I do say so myself. Re-acquainting myself with Philippa of Hainault and Alice Perrers has been a joy. It won’t be out until February, so will just miss the Christmas rush - but don’t let that stop you buying it as a gift for others! It’s currently 25% off on Amazon…
Thank you as always for reading, and let me know in the comments your thoughts on how we write history!
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