Some moments in history stay actively in human memory. Others drift silently away until no hint remains. Two recent archaeological digs demonstrate how much we have “forgotten” about the past, one in Israel and one on the Greek island of Despotiko.
In this novel Juliet Grey is interested in redeeming a much maligned historical figure, who, while usually portrayed as “heedless to headless” was, in fact, a much more sympathetic character. She creates a richly developed inner world for Marie Antoinette from ten-year-old Archduchess of Austria to Dauphine of France on the verge of becoming queen.
The Moonstone is a venerable Victorian classic mystery described by T.S. Eliot as “the first, the longest, and the best of modern English detective novels.” We follow the exotic Moonstone diamond from its home on a Hindu statue through war and intrigue onto the bosom of a proper Victorian lady in a grand country home—only to lose sight of it again for a long but entertaining time. Who took it and where is it? You’ll meet several amusing narrators and wind through intricate clues in this classic, which is available these days as a free e-book.
Van Booy has created a masterful piece of fiction, although it is not an easy read. I found it disorienting at times, and sometimes the masterful demanded I take notice of the author’s skill rather than lose myself in his characters and their world. At the core of Everything Beautiful Began After are three very flawed characters whose emotional crippling as children leads them to unusual relationships as adults. Love and grief take extreme forms that enlighten and intrigue the reader. Click on title to read review.
Ransom focuses on the moment in the Iliad when King Priam retrieves his son Hector’s body from Achilles. In twenty years of teaching that part of the epic, I never survived a class without having to wipe away tears. For me, it is the single most revealing moment in literature about what it means to be human. Nothing tops it. To choose that moment for a book’s primary subject! —audacious and, it turns out, wise.
Two sets of ancient ruins—the graceful temple columns rising against the backdrop of shimmering desert sands in honor of the Mesopotamian god Bel, and a Persian mountain fortress containing a possible Zoroastrian fire altar—these disparate places, one in modern Syria and one in northern Afghanistan, reveal two sides of modern archaeology: the allure of beautiful and exotic locations that connect us to the past and the dangers archaeologists face while digging in the midst of wars and conflict.
Waiting for Robert Capa is both a puzzling book and an alluring one. It contains gorgeous, vivid descriptions of life in Paris and Spain in the ‘30s, but we never lose ourselves in Fortes’s imagined semi-fictional world because she tells Robert and Gerda’s story with the all-knowing voice of historical retrospective.
A blog post about Judith Starkston’s writing projects and a discussion of whether it’s better to work from a planned outline as a writer or go on a magical mystery tour into unknown territory. Also a link to an eloquent discussion of the subject by Alex Shakar.
An excerpted article from the Oriental Institute gives an overview of the Hittite Empire, its modern discovery, and the central role the Chicago Hittite Dictionary plays in Hittitology today.
The process of writing fiction is an elusive process. The Wall Street Journal’s “Word Craft” column has once again delivered some excellent pearls about the layered truth and the unpredictable force of imagination in writing.
