Happy Sunday! I haven't posted in a while because I've been sick (yes, again! That's twice so far this season), and it has not been fun dealing with yet another horrific cold. But I promise I'll be back to commenting on your blogs and making my regular loops as soon as I'm feeling a bit better. It's been a crazy couple of weeks in NYC. Primarily because: The Yankees won the World Series!! I'm so happy we won this year, I think the team totally deserves it. I'm a baseball fan above all other sports, and I was so glad to see my boys come out on top this year. It has been utter Yankee mayhem here in the city...you can't go anywhere it seems without seeing Yankee memorabilia at every turn. The day of the victory parade it took me FOREVER to get downtown because the subways were jam packed with fans (I've heard estimates on the news that 3 million people showed up for the event)! I did find it pretty funny to see people completely drunk on the subway at 9:30 am. I usually don't see much of that until St. Pattie's Day!
Last week I opened a giveaway for The Harlot's Progress: Yorkshire Molly by Peter Mottley (Click here to enter - one copy of the book plus a special gift from the publisher!)
When I started this blog, I intended for it to feature a mixed variety of posts spanning history, art, books, fashion and popular culture. One of the things I've slowly tried to integrate into my regular blog schedule are editorial articles on some of my favorite historical characters and events. Some past topics I've covered include Marie Antoinette: A Queen Whose High Fashion Was Her Lowly Demise and Lady Emma Hamilton and her "Attitudes". Last week I posted Coco Chanel & WWII: An Unfashionable Ensemble, about Chanel's involvement with the Nazis during the German occupation of France, a controversial subject of which I find a lot of people are very much unaware. It's something I personally find difficult to swallow, being such an avid lover of fashion and of all things Chanel, but I always think it is so interesting to break down and analyze different artists and the historical context of their work: the good, bad, and the ugly. Chanel is someone I, for one, certainly consider to be an artist, and she was the type of person who would stop at nothing to make a household name for herself, regardless of if it meant taking advantage of her particularly unfortunate historical surroundings and stepping on other people along the way. I'll be posting some more historical editorial articles on here and am working on making it a regular part of my blogging regimen.
This week I started reading Robert Hick's A Separate Country. I participated in an interview with Robert Hicks a few weeks ago hosted by Grand Central Publishing on BlogTalk Radio, and I'm looking forward to getting into this book a bit more this afternoon.
Currently Reading…
A Separate Country
by Robert Hicks
Synopsis: “A stranger in a strange, beautiful, and confounding town, General Hood is ready to find happiness and comfort after losing a war and becoming one of the most controversial generals of the Confederate Army. Crippled by wounds of flesh and spirit, he meets and marries an extraordinary young woman who loves and accepts him despite his failures—especially his own part in the loss of thousands of lives under his command. As Hood struggles to build a family and a business with Anna Marie at his side, adversity and despair continue to beset him. Finally, despite Hood’s indomitable fighting spirit and his unflagging devotion to his wife and children, he must face one last, nearly invincible foe that will threaten everything he and his wife have built together."With this heartrending yet inspiring story of sacrifice, love, and hope through the very darkest of times, Robert Hicks brings an unforgettable family to vibrant life amid the equally unforgettable turmoil and exoticism of nineteenth-century New Orleans.”
Book Trailer:
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11 lovely comments:
I'm looking forward to your review of A SEPARATE COUNTRY. I picked up and put down this book several times in Borders last weekend. Finally left without it. Now I want to see if I should regret my decision and run right back to the bookstore!
I very shamefully did not leave a comment on your article about Chanel, but I love your editorial articles, and I very much enjoyed it. Keep up the good work!
The author of A Separate Country made an appearance at my local library recently- didn't go, as I'd never heard his work. It sounds quite interesting.
I'd be intrigued as well to read A Separate Country -- though I have to say, as busy as I am, I am so eager to read The Harlot's Progress I can taste it! I've resisted adding it to my Amazon shopping cart because I'm waiting to see if I win it, on the couple of blog contests I've entered.
I think it's a great idea to spotlight certain controversial artists, especially when you shine that light into some of the darker corners of their lives and illuminate things that many people don't know about them.
And of course I'm somewhat partial to Emma Hamilton and Marie Antoinette! :)
Hi Christine - So far, so good! I do the same thing in bookstores sometimes...should I or shouldn't I? Funny how these little idiosyncrasies are so common among book lovers everywhere.
theliteraryomnivore - Thank you so very much! :) and, nothing to be ashamed of...I haven't gotten around to commenting on ANYONE's posts lately, none the less ones I particularly enjoyed. I had the chance to talk to Robert Hicks on BlogTalk Radio (the link is somewhere in this post) and it was great. I would love to meet him if he comes to NYC to make any appearances.
Leslie - I'll let you and Christine know how A SEPARATE COUNTRY goes; I haven't read any hist-fic set during the Civil War before but I've heard great things about this book and I'm really enjoying it so far. As you know, I'm more of a Renaissance-to-the-Napoleonic Wars history buff. I probably know more about European history than I do about my own country's!
For fabulous historical fiction set during the American Civil War, I cannot more strenuously recommend the luminous, poignant and lyrical MARCH, by Geraldine Brooks. The title has a double meaning. And the premise is wonderful: Brooks takes a famous literary character we barely know from the original source (the father, Rev. March from LITTLE WOMEN) and tells his story (in the process giving us an amazing Civil War story) from his POV. The last third of the novel shows Marmee from a different, and yet fully plausible, perspective as well.
I recently purchased Hicks' other book Widow of the South which I'm very excited to read - like you I haven't read any hist fic set in the civil war. I have very much enjoyed your editorial articles - I love how you can sometimes discover little known facts. I took a women artists class during my senior year in college and we spent a week or so on fashion designers - and I had not heard this about Coco. Thanks Allie - look forward to more!
Allie, I'm with you on knowing more about European history than American history. I have a friend in England, and when we talk, I can rattle off names, dates, and events from William the Conqueror right through the Hanovers. Then she'll ask me a question about, say, the American Revolution, or the Civil War, and I begin stuttering.
She thinks it's very funny that I know more about her history than my own. What can I say? Those royals, they are fascinating!
Christine, does your English friend know her history as well as you do?
I think we remain fascinated by royalty precisely because (a) it's foreign to us, as Americans; and (b) it appears glamorous. Even though there were multiple wars on British soil and generations of men sent to battle there, on the Continent, and even over here, most readers don't think of the grit, but of the glamour.
Whereas, with American history, it's hardscrabble; it's about long, hard winters, deprivation, and pioneering, and bloody battles for freedom, as opposed to balls and corsets and crowns.
I never read any American historical fiction, and I'm not sure why. Gone with the Wind doesn't count or does it.
{Congrats even though as a Phillies fan I ignored the first half of your post :( }
Leslie, thanks for the Civil War hist-fic recommendation. I'll be sure to check out MARCH the next time I'm in a bookstore (which could very well be in a couple of hours on my way home today).
dolleygurl - It truly makes me happy to hear that you like my editorial stuff. It is the most fun for me to write. Your comments always make me smile! :) I bet that Women Artists throughout History class was fascinating. I always did the best in History of Art and other History-related classes. I took a History of Fashion class my freshman year at FIT, and I found that one to be really interesting, but we didn't really delve into the personal lives of designers either.
Christine, I completely agree with you! There is something about those royals that is eternally fascinating to us Americans, who have more of a gritty history in comparison to the elegant lavish history of Europeans. Leslie talked about this a bit in the forward of her ROYAL AFFAIRS. I really liked her analysis (pg. 3): "Americans, in particular, enjoy a collective love affair with monarchies--probably because we don't have one, and can sanctimoniously feel superior to those benighted blighters who God and birthright have placed above the peons of their respective nations, yet who still manage to be more than human. Americans have 'Hollywood royalty' instead, or myriad professional sports stars, pop icons, and politicians who behave badly. But nothing seems to be quite as alluring as a royal affair."
Leslie - I think you're right about the fact that American history, at least on the surface, seems more "down and dirty" than that of our neighbors across the pond. At the same time, I think that if one were to remove the tiaras and tea time from European history, one would find that Euro history is equally (if not more so) soaked in bloodshed and hardship as our own is. A very interesting topic for analysis!
Jenny Girl - GONE WITH THE WIND absolutely counts! It's a classic. I'm ashamed to say I've only seen the movie. My boyfriend Ron saw a really beautiful copy of GWTW in the window of a local thrift store for $5 and was going to get it for me, but when he went back later to pick it up, it was gone. I read a lot of American historical fiction in high school but none that took place during the Civil War, mostly Revolutionary War novels. Re: Phillies vs. Yankees - (hehehe)...thank you for your gracious congrats. The Phillies definitely put up a good fight this year!
I have A Separate Country on my shelves and need to read it, I'll be interested to see what you think!
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