Hunterian Associates Keynote Event, Wednesday 5 November.

On Wednesday 5th November, we Hunterian Associates 2013-14 will present our projects at the Keynote Event, in the Hunterian Art Gallery in Glasgow, Scotland, 5.30-7.30pm. To get an idea what my presentation will involve, here is the Hunterian Keynote Event Handout which I have prepared especially for the event.

There will be a lovely aria at the end, from George Frideric Handel’s opera Rinaldo, inspired by Torquato Tasso’s epic, sung by Hunterian Associate Brianna Robertson – Kirkland. Hopefully, I will be able to upload and post a video of the event soon after Wednesday. If you are in Glasgow or thereabouts, remember, remember / the fifth of November, and not only for the fireworks!

Jerusalem, Object of Desire

The Christian army is marching toward the object of desire, Jerusalem. They arrive there when the sun is high in the sky, and the splendid sight appears in front of their eyes:

A soldier kneels in front of the splendid sight of Jerusalem. By Sebastien Leclerc (1637-1714). © The Hunterian, University of Glasgow 2014

behold! afar Jerusalem gleams, discreet;

behold! Jerusalem is glimpsed, is seen;

behold! from all one great salute rings out:

‘Jerusalem!’ a thousand voices shout.

(Canto Three, st.3)

The effect the sight of the holy city has on the Crusaders is more complex than mere satisfaction at having arrived at the threshold of the final stage in their plan:

The immense delight that this first glimpse imparts

now sweetens every breast, but soon gives way

to deep contrition, and in all their hearts

stirs awe mingled with reverence, till they

scarce dare to lift their eyes by fits and starts

toward that city where Christ chose to live,

where He died and was buried, and where He

rose from the dead in glorious majesty.’ (st.5)

Their delight is mingled with awe and wonder: after all, this is not just any coveted city, but the place which lies at the heart of their faith. They react to it in a way rather difficult for a modern person to understand, at least in the context of religious experience:

Half-stifled words, unspoken vows, and heaves

of broken sobs and sudden tear-choked sighs

from a people that at once exults and grieves

all through the air make a deep murmur rise….

Barefooted each man treads the hard wayside

(the chiefs by their example more the rest),

silk trim or golden each man casts aside,

plucks from his head his plume or glorious crest,

while from his heart he tears the cloak of pride,

eyes hot with tears, devotion in his breast.

As though his way were barred unless he weeps,

each man his self-accusing counsel keeps. (st. 6 & 8)

One of the hardest thing for a writer of historical fiction, particularly when it is set in such distant times, is to empathise with and hence portray convincingly the very different mentality of the people back then. The passion and devotion with which the Crusaders threw themselves into their enterprise and the flame which moved them from within are incomprehensible and alien for most of us. In Justin Cartwright’s fascinating novel, Lion Heart (Bloomsbury, 2013) the protagonist Richard Cathar [1] wonders:

 What is it that inspired such devotion? What was it that caused Richard the Lionheart to take the cross and sail for Acre? Why was Robert the Bruce so passionate that his heart should be taken to the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem after his death? His last testament read: I will that as soone as I am trespassed out of this worlde that ye take my harte out of my body and embawme it and present my harte to the Holy Sepulchre where Our Lord laye, seying my body can not come there. In fact his heart – embalmed – only got as far as Moorish Granada, where Sir James Douglas, the Black Douglas, bearing the heart, was killed. The heart was returned to Scotland.

Richard Cathar then goes on to make a glib statement about religion, which doesn’t even begin to justify such a passion (read the novel if you want to find out more). Greed, imperialism, and a love of adventure might account for the Crusades, but what could explain the last wish and testament of a man who had nothing more to gain on that score?

Cartwright’s novel, like many recent historical novels, is written on two temporal planes, the present, with all its packed action in the Middle East – the very place of the Crusades – and the twelfth century. Perhaps this is the most honest way to write a historical novel about the Crusades today, when author and audience are so far removed from their world that one foot must be firmly kept in ours. Torquato Tasso, on the other hand, still belonged to that era and ambience in which the sight of a holy  relic, image, or city brought hardened soldiers to ecstatic joy and tearful contrition, and so he could be eloquent and persuasive about it.

[1] I know, I know …

From Fact to Fiction

Historical fiction is generally based on historical facts, and the author will certainly have delved into sources, usually chronicles, history books, or studies about the time and the events of her or his temporal setting. I’ve mentioned before that Torquato Tasso’s source on the First Crusade was William of Tyre. This is an episode in Book One of William’s chronicle:

There was a certain infidel living in the city [Jerusalem], a treacherous and wicked man, who persecuted our people with insatiable hatred. This man was determined to devise some scheme that would bring about their destruction. One day, he stealthily threw the carcass of a dog into the temple court, a place which the custodian – and indeed the whole city as well – were most careful to keep scrupulously clean. Worshippers who came to the temple to pray the next morning found the mouldering body of the unclean animal. Almost frantic, they at once roused the whole city with their cries. The populace quickly ran to the temple, and all agreed that without question the Christians were responsible for the act. Need more be said? Death was decreed for all Christians, since it was judged that by death alone could they atone for such an act of sacrilege. The faithful, in full assurance of their innocence, prepared to suffer death for Christ’s sake. As their executioners, with swords unscathed, were about to carry out their orders, however, a young man, filled with the spirit, came forward and offered himself as the sacrifice. (William of Tyre, A History of Deeds Done Beyond the Sea, transl. and annotated by Emily Atwater Babcock and A.C. Krey, New York: Columbia University Press, 1943, vol. 1, p. 68)

William Hunter owned an Italian translation of William of Tyre’s chronicle. Interestingly, the translator Giuseppe Horologgi dedicates his translation to the then Duke of Lorraine, descendant of Godfrey. These pages contain the episode which inspired Canto Two in Tasso’s epic. Sp Coll Hunterian l.6.17, Special Collections, University of Glasgow Library.

There follows an exchange between the unnamed young man and the Christian community: he explains that it is better for a man to die than a whole people, and the Christians promise to offer his family the honour of “carrying the olive which signifies our Lord Jesus Christ” in solemn procession of Palm Sunday. William of Tyre concludes this episode thus:

“The young man then gave himself up to the chief men of Jerusalem and declared that he was the criminal. In this way he established the innocence of the other Christians, for, when the judges heard his story, they absolved the rest and put him to the sword. Thus he laid down his life for the brethren and, with pious resignation, met death, that most blessed sleep, confident that he had acquired grace in the sight of the Lord. (ibid., p.69)

This narrative is clearly the basis of the story in Canto Two. It is equally obvious that Torquato Tasso, inspired by this historical episode, took many liberties with it. He embellishes the truth, as he declared he would do in his introduction. He elaborates on causality and agents: the sacrilege is devised, planned and perpetrated by evil sorcerer Ismen (the ‘certain infidel’, ‘treacherous and wicked man’ of William of Tyre’s historical narrative) and wicked king Aladdin (another fictional creation) in order to exterminate the Christians of Jerusalem. He changes the object of sacrilege from a foul, rotting dog-carcass to an elevated, holy statue of the Virgin, thus providing another connection with classical epic[2]. He changes the martyr figure from a young man to the much more pathetic and attractive one of a young, beautiful virgin – but he keeps the young man character as a lover, inserting the element of romance into a typical narrative motif of Christian sacrifice. He changes the execution plan from a beheading to a burning (perhaps because his sixteenth century audience would be more familiar with it?) And he provides a happy ending to the episode, with the intervention of the fictional character of Clorinda, thus introducing one of the main characters of his epic into the story.

A historical fiction writer of today moves along those lines, more or less, in dealing with facts and transforming them into fiction. Nothing is lost, everything is put to good use for the narrative purposes, and history is transformed into something much more intriguing and satisfying.

 

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[1] William of Tyre, A History of Deeds Done Beyond the Sea, Volume One, translated and annotated by Emily Atwater Babcock and A.C. Krey (New York: Columbia University Press, 1943), pp. 68-9.

[2] The statue of a holy figure is a motif borrowed from classical epic: in the siege of Troy, Odysseus and Diomedes enter the city by stealth to recover the powerful wooden statue of Pallas Athene, which would guarantee protection to its owners. See Torquato Tasso, The Liberation of Jerusalem (Gerusalemme Liberata), translated by Max Wickert, with an Introduction and Notes by Mark Davie (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), p. 407.

 

Fair and Brave Maidens, Part Two

Previously on The Liberation of Jerusalem: The armies of Christendom have been gathered at Tortosa (Tarsus in ancient Syria) to conquer and liberate the Holy Land from the Muslims. God appoints Godfrey of Bouillon as their leader; under his guidance they shall conquer Jerusalem. King Aladdin of Jerusalem has hatched a plot to kill all Christians in the city by blaming them for stealing a statue of the Virgin Mary and placing in in his mosque. The beautiful and pious virgin Sophronia confesses (falsely) to the sacrilegious act, so she is led to the execution place when…

Olindo, the man desperately in love with Sophronia, hurtles himself through the crowd and shouts: “Not she, my  lord, stole it, but I.” He begs to take Sophronia’s place in the fire and die instead of her. King Aladdin, “incensed with rage and shame,” (for he knows very well they are both innocent, as he committed the sacrilege himself following the advice of evil sorcerer Ismen) orders that they both die.  The crowd, “heathens” and “faithful” alike, are shedding tears for the hapless youths about to be consumed by fire.

Sophronia and Olindo are about to be executed, when warrior-maiden Clorinda intervenes. By Sebastien Leclerc (1637-17140© The Hunterian, University of Glasgow 2014

But this is not the end:

While peril thus engulfs, them, see! A knight

(for such he seemed) appears, noble in guise,

towering in shape, so armed and strangely dight [=clothed, equipped]

that clearly from a distant land he hies.

Atop his crest, a tigress burnished bright

attracts the eyes of all, famous device,

device known as Clorinda’s badge of war.

This is no knight, but the fair and brave warrior-maiden Clorinda or Persia, who “all womanly / observances and skill she has desprized / since her unripest years.” Think of Clorinda as a combination of brave and honourable Brienne of Tarth, proud and fierce Arya Stark, and beautiful, wise, and clement Danaerys Targaryen. Clorinda is one of the very few women in this epic, and she is the best of them all. In Canto One, it has been mentioned that one of the Christian leaders, Tancred, is madly in love with her.

Clorinda is moved by the plight of the two young innocents; by just one good look at them she knows they can’t be guilty. It was surely the work of supernatural forces, she says. (She has also heard the stories about necromancer Ismen’s role in the affair). She offers her services to King Aladdin in exchange for their lives. The king is glad to oblige: Clorinda’s fame is great, and he makes her the commander of his whole garrison.

Now that your sword is joined to mine, I stand

consoled for troubles and afraid of none.

If a vast army joined me now, my hope

of victory would have no surer scope. (Canto Two, st.47)

Need we say more? Sophronia and Olindo are freed, and now finally Sophronia relents and accepts to marry Olindo, after all. A happy ending for this episode, but the troubles and tribulation of the population have only just begun.

 

Fair and Brave Maidens, Part One

In Canto Two, the old, wicked king of Jerusalem, Aladdin* wants to find a way to destroy the Christian population of the city, so that they don’t cooperate with the invaders and bring him down. An evil sorcerer and necromancer by the name of Ismen advises him to steal a sacred statue of the Virgin Mary from a Christian church and place it in his mosque, then accuse Christians for the sacrilege. The evil plan is duly carried out, and the following morning all the Christians in Jerusalem are trembling with fear, expecting certain death.
But a fair and saintly virgin, Sophronia, comes forth and confesses to the crime, seeking to become a martyr for the Christian faith. Sophronia wants to give up her life to God, although there is a man, Olindo, who is madly in love with her and has asked her to marry him several times, but in vain.
King Aladdin is filled with desire for the beautiful maiden and is amazed by her courage; he is also furious because her act has thwarted his plans, and so he condemns Sophronia to death at the stake.  But as she is about to be led to the public execution place, something unexpected happens … (to be continued)

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* Aladdin is an invented name, obviously much more attractive for a western audience – and more easily pronounceable – than Iftikhar ad-Daula, who was the historical ruler of Jerusalem at the time of the First Crusade.

‘A Turkish Mosque lighted after the Mahometan manner where Aladine the Emperor is seated on a Throne surrounded by his Divan 1759.’ Jane Elizabeth Collins. This information is © The Hunterian Museum and Art Gallery, University of Glasgow, 2014

 

Heroes, Historical and Fictional and In-between (Part Two)

Godfrey and the Christian armies, Jerusalem in the background. Sebastien Leclerc (1637-1714).
© The Hunterian, University of Glasgow 2014

In Canto One of Jerusalem Delivered, one by one the leaders of the First Crusade pass in front of the reader’s eyes like a true military parade, while Torquato Tasso offers a running commentary on their country of origin, their families, and the strength of each one’s army. We have seen Godfrey of Bouillon, the central character and leader, and now along with him we see Robert of Normandy, Raymond of Toulouse, William, bishop of Orange, Ademar, bishop of Le Puy, Baldwin and Eustace, the younger brothers of Godfrey, Stephen of Blois, Tancred of Calabria, and many other lords with their armies from all over Europe, from Norway to Sicily, from Ireland and Scotland to Greece. Most of them were actually historical figures who really participated in the Crusade; their names can be found in many chronicles of the First Crusade, contemporary or later (Tasso used William of Tyre, who wrote in the late twelfth century, as his main historical source[1]). Some of them were mythical or semi-mythical, like Arthur and his knights.

But above these, see young Rinaldo, mid

the whole parade the champion absolute,

sweetly ferocious, darting looks that bid

a king’s worship: him all eyes here salute.

Age he outran, and hope, and scarcely did

his flowers bud when he grew ripe with fruit.

You’d think, when cased in glistening carapace,

he’s Mars. (He’s Cupid when he bares his face).

Rinaldo on the Bank of the Enchanted River. Elizabeth Collins, 1759.
© The Hunterian, University of Glasgow 2014

Rinaldo is the other great hero of Jerusalem Delivered. He is a fictional character, based not on any historical figure[2] but on another epic hero, Achilles from The Iliad. Rinaldo is very young, very handsome, and very brave (the perfect super-hero), but just like Achilles, his anger and conflict with Godfrey bring serious trouble to the Christian camp. He then leaves his companions in order to seek glory for himself: his adventures on this quest provide one of the main romantic episodes in the epic.

When Tasso wrote Jerusalem in the late sixteenth century, the Renaissance movement had been propagating a return to classical Antiquity and its ideals (as interpreted by the  Western European culture of the time). Tasso was a serious theorist on the modern epic and pleaded for its return to the classical sources, Homer and Virgil; this was also partly a renunciation of the chivalric romance of the times, with its numerous episodes with no apparent beginning or end, its plethora of plots and characters, and its endless digressions (to fans of Game of Thrones: does this ring any bells?). But as chivalric romance was wildly popular – especially Ludovico Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso –  it would be fatal for an author to ignore it completely, or steer too far away from it. As Daniel Javitch put it:

“[Tasso] could not afford the risk of losing his readership by not incorporating in his epic poem some of the more pleasurable ingredients of Ariostean romance, in particular its marvelous and erotic dimensions, and the episodic digressions they entailed.”[3]

Enchanted rivers, magical forests, islands with exotic nymphs, and the formidable, beautiful witch Armida will offer plenty of the marvelous and the erotic element sought by readers (then and now), and will more than compensate the romantically-inclined for all those longs lists of warriors and serious discourses on war and religion that the more austere, classicist side of Torquato Tasso deemed indispensable to the “new” epic.

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[1] Interestingly, William Hunter owned a copy of William of Tyre’s chronicle on the First Crusade; there will be a separate post about it all soon.

[2] Tasso gives Rinaldo a genealogy, making Este his homeplace. That was the birthplace of the Este family, of whom Alfonso II d’ Este was Tasso’s patron. Patronage was extremely important for writers at a time when it would have been impossible to live on book royalties (the majority of the population was illiterate), Creative Writing teaching posts had not yet been invented, and selling film/TV rights was not an option either. Tasso was mindful of always singing the praise of his patron, even in broad hints, as when he describes how Rinaldo fled his home to follow the Crusade: “Noblest of flights! a worthy precedent for / deeds that await his great-souled progeny!” (Canto One, stanza 60)

[3] Daniel Javitch, ‘Tasso’s Critique and Incorporation of Chivalric Romance: His Transformation of Achilles in the Gerusalemme Liberata,’ International Journal of the Classical Tradition, 13:4 (Spring 2007), p.517.

Heroes, historical and fictional, Part One

Seventeenth century artist Giambattista Piazzetta depicted Godfrey, Duke of Lotharingia, in a classical mode: his dress, helmet and demeanour – and semi-nakedness- link him to the Greco-Roman epic heroes and gods. But his gesture of pointing to the heavens is specifically Christian, and so is the winged angel who brought God’s decision of making him the leader of the Christian army. Tasso wanted to write a great Christian epic to equal the pagan ones of antiquity, and he did it using many of the classical conventions. Sp Coll Hunterian Cd.2.1., Special Collections, University of Glasgow Library

Who is the hero in this story? He is introduced to us in Canto One (think of a Canto as a chapter in a novel), in accordance with epic etiquette. Godfrey, Duke of Lotharingia (1060-1099) was a historical figure. He was one of the leaders of the First Crusade: he led a large contingent, along with other nobles, most notably his brother Baldwin, Hugh of France, Robert of Normandy, Robert of Flanders (many Roberts, which is perhaps what inspired Walter Scott’s novel on the First Crusade, Count Robert of Paris – but more of that later), and many others, from the Rhineland to Hungary, then through the Balkans to Thrace and Constantinople, where he met with other contingents and more leaders. Uniting outside Constantinople the “pilgrims”, as they called themselves (the terms Crusade and Crusader were invented much later, in the sixteenth century), crossed the Golden Horn, passed on to Anatolia, and from there moved towards Jerusalem,  their ultimate destination.

Was Godfrey a hero in history? It depends. He was certainly brave in terms of the values system of his time: an aristocratic warrior who led armies to war, being the first among them to plunge into battle. It would also seem that he was honestly religious in his purpose to liberate the Holy Sepulchre  from Muslim rule (which was the Crusaders’ professed aim), rather than motivated solely by ambition and greed, like many others who participated in that enterprise. Perhaps this was the reason why Godfrey was unanimously elected by the other leaders of the First Crusade to become the first King of Jerusalem. It is interesting that Godfrey did not accept the title of King, postulating that there was only one King in Jerusalem and that was Jesus Christ, so he took the humbler title Defender of the Holy Sepulchre instead. But he died within less than a year, and his brother Baldwin, who had no such scruples, became Baldwin I, first official Latin King of Jerusalem. Tasso will play upon this difference of character, offsetting the one brother, the pure Christian hero, against the other, the grasping and worldly lord (not quite a villain though – this type will be reserved for “infidels” only, and to a lesser degree, for Greeks).

In Jerusalem Delivered history is stretched a little to make for a more compelling narrative. The action begins in Canto One, stanza 7, when “the Eternal Father downwards cast his eyes” and sees that the Crusaders are not doing as well as it was hoped. They need a leader, so God who examines all hearts decides that Godfrey is the one. In a scene which has striking similarities to rhapsody α of The Odyssey combined with the Christian story of the Annunciation, God sends Gabriel (the Christian counterpart of Hermes, the winged messenger) down to earth, to apprise Godfrey of his decision. Godfrey summons the leaders and in a rousing speech urges them into action: Jerusalem must be delivered. Peter the Hermit (another historical figure, “who first preached the crusade and led it out”), representing spiritual authority and inspired by God, convinces the assembled nobles to make Godfrey their leader:

“Make one sole head lend them its light and force;

to one sole man sceptre and power bring:

grant him the place and image of a king.”

Thus fact is embellished by fiction in Tasso’s epic. Narrative reality has its own rules in epic poetry: the random and even pointless character of historical facts would be very badly received by an audience that expects a certain unity and determinate structure. Therefore Godfrey the “single charismatic leader” is infinite preferable to “the fragmented, conflicting leadership of reality.” The latter is material for historians; the former is the prerogative of the poet.

 

Fact and Fiction: Tasso’s statement of intent

A fictional work based on a famous (or notorious) historical event has to negotiate between the factual and the fictional: it cannot contain facts or it would be plain historiography, and it cannot ignore facts completely since there will be certain expectations of historical truth from readers. This is one of the problems every writer of historical fiction has to deal with. How much adherence to truth? How many embellishments? In Canto One (for canto read chapter) of Jerusalem Delivered , Torquato Tasso, addressing himself to the Muse, friend and companion of all epic poets, apologises in advance for “embroidering” the truth. He then hastens to explain why:

In Greek mythology, the Nine Muses, daughters of Zeus and Mmenosyne (which means Memory: make a note of this for later!), protected the Arts and Sciences, including epic poetry and history. In this 1745 illustration of Jerusalem Delivered by Giambatista Piazzetta, the Muses are depicted on Mt Helicon, their residence, while two winged figures (top right) are carrying a cameo with Torquato Tasso’s portrait, thus glorifying him and his epic achievement.
Sp Coll Hunterian Cd.2.1., Special Collections, University of Glasgow Library.

You know how, where Parnassus most proffers

its flattering sweets, the world flocks in delight,

yet how, by charming in mellifluous verse,

Truth has disposed the most depraved to right – 

as sometimes, to a feverish child, the nurse

holds out a glass with sugared rim. Her sleigh

tricks him to drain the bitter draught. So stealth

restores him, and delusion gives him health.

Tasso, like many authors of historical fiction, clearly believes that facts must be sweetened by fiction to become more palatable, just like medicine: it is necessary and, I might add, expected. Why else would someone chose to read a historical novel and not a straight historical narrative? Of course it is these “embroideries” that made historians scoff at epic poets (or historical novelists), rejecting their accounts as false and invented. But in recent years things have become more complicated in this relationship between historical fact and fiction: from theorist Hayden White’s assertion that historical narratives, too, are verbal fictions, to historian Simon Schama’s use of fiction as a tool for reconstructing historical facts in Dead Certainties (1991), it is obvious that historiography and historical fiction are not as clear-cut, separate categories as one would like to think.

 

Epic Inspirations

The opening lines of Jerusalem Delivered. Sp Coll Hunterian Cd.2.1., Special Collections, University of Glasgow Library

“I sing of war, of holy war, and him / Captain who freed the Sepulchre of Christ.”1 The opening lines of Jerusalem Delivered have a familiar ring to them: epic poets don’t mince their words and go straight to the point, stating plainly what this is all about. Virgil does this in the Aeneid (“Arms, and the man I sing…”2); so does Ludovico Ariosto in Orlando Furioso (“Of loves and Ladies, Knights and Arms, I sing, of courtesies, and many a daring feat.”3). Homer, the archetype of them all, sums up the content and introduces his heroes Achilles and Odysseus within the first two lines of his many-thousand-lined Iliad and Odyssey respectively. Life was too short back then – no time for elaborate Prologues and Prefaces!

1. Unless otherwise stated, I am using the Oxford World’s Classics edition of Torquato Tasso’s The Liberation of Jerusalem (Gerusalemme Liberata), translated by Max Wickert, with an Introduction and Notes by Mark Davie (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2. The Aeneid, classics.mit.edu/Virgil/aeneid.1.i.html
3. Orlando Furioso, The Online Medieval & Classical Library, omacl.org/Orlando/1-2canto.html

Welcome to First Crusade Fictions

 

 

The poet of Jerusalem Deliveredwearing his crown of laurels. © The Hunterian, University of Glasgow 2014

 

Frontispiece of Jerusalem Delivered. © The Hunterian, University of Glasgow 2014. Torquato Tasso began composing his monumental epic in the early 1570s. Parts of the work as well as pirated complete editions of it were in circulation before its first authorized edition in 1581. This illustration is possibly from an eighteenth century edition: the Hunterian Collection in the Special Collections at the University of Glasgow includes a two -volume edition (Foulis: Glasgow, 1763; Sp Coll Hunterian Cz.3.25-26, vols 1-2), which contains the same illustrations by Sebastien LeClerc.

Writers and fans of historical fiction would agree: Torquato Tasso was the George R.R. Martin of his time. Tasso’s epic fantasy, Jerusalem Delivered, based on the First Crusade, is populated with knights and fights, male and female warriors and witches, castles and dragons, forests and quests. The illustrations in two different editions, housed  in the Hunterian Art Gallery collection and in the Special Collections of the Glasgow University Library,  capture the exotic and magical appeal of this heroic world.
Factual sources, of course, tell a rather different story: chroniclers and historians, geographers and travel-writers depict the extraordinary event of the First Crusade and the world that created it from the point of view of reality. Maps and photographs of the Holy Land reveal a world completely different to the one created by the poet’s flights of fancy.
Realist or fantasy, historical fiction is ever inspired by known facts, then fills in the gaps with its own inventions, enhancing our experience and enjoyment of the past.
In this blog I will present some of the illustrations inspired by the great Renaissance poet’s epic fantasy, as well as factual information on the First Crusade, and then look at how historical reality, fiction, and fantasy interweave to create inspiring, unforgettable works like Jerusalem Delivered.The challenge of creating a plausible, recognisable world which uses historical reality but is not tied down by it is of great personal interest to me as a writer (and avid reader) of historical fiction and fantasy: it will be great if other reader/writers will eventually participate in these discussions and will be inspired, and inspiring, in their turn.