George R. R. Martin on Fantasy and Historical Fiction

James Poniewozik of Time blog has a long interview with fantasy novelist George R. R. Martin, whose Game of Thrones is now being made into an HBO show. Martin discusses his view of J. R. R. Tolkien, balancing his respect for him with not slavishly imitating him. He makes the interesting point that when fantasy writers try imitating Tolkien what usually happens is that they simply pick up on the worst elements of his writing. Martin's favorite Tolkien character is Boromir so it is probably not a coincidence that they got Sean Bean, who played Boromir in the movie, for Game of Thrones.  

As a medieval historian I often struggle with political fantasy, finding it implausible. I can easily suspend disbelief when it comes to magic, but your political structure has to be coherent. The problem is that most writers do not understand the inner dynamics of a pre-modern society. Worse, coming to the issue loaded down with modern liberal biases, they either turn to polemics against the pre-modern society they are writing about or try to eliminate the most troublesome elements to the modern mind, without taking into consideration the logical underpinnings of the society.

An example that I often present to my students is that of women's rights. In a militarized society, where the primary issue on everyone's mind is not suffering sudden violent death, and in which women did not actively fight in the same numbers as men (in other words every pre-modern society that has ever existed) not only would women not have equal rights, but the very thought would be absurd. Any woman who complained about her second class position and demanded to be treated as an equal to men would rightfully be laughed at, told to pick up a sword and, until she could do that, to shut her mouth, get back to cooking, cleaning and children and be grateful for having a man to protect her. It would make no sense for a fantasy novel to both maintain a pre-modern militarized society and either equality of the sexes or plucky heroines giving proto-feminist speeches. (See "Toilet Training.")
        
I was glad therefore to see Martin confront this issue of plausible pre-modern societies

And then there are some things that are just don't square with history. In some sense I'm trying to respond to that. [For example] the arranged marriage, which you see constantly in the historical fiction and television show, almost always when there's an arranged marriage, the girl doesn't want it and rejects it and she runs off with the stable boy instead. This never fucking happened. It just didn't. There were thousands, tens of thousand, perhaps hundreds of thousands of arranged marriages in the nobility through the thousand years of Middle Ages and people went through with them. That's how you did it. It wasn't questioned. Yeah, occasionally you would want someone else, but you wouldn't run off with the stable boy.


And that's another of my pet peeves about fantasies. The bad authors adopt the class structures of the Middle Ages; where you had the royalty and then you had the nobility and you had the merchant class and then you have the peasants and so forth. But they don't' seem to realize what it actually meant. They have scenes where the spunky peasant girl tells off the pretty prince. The pretty prince would have raped the spunky peasant girl. He would have put her in the stocks and then had garbage thrown at her. You know.

I mean, the class structures in places like this had teeth. They had consequences. And people were brought up from their childhood to know their place and to know that duties of their class and the privileges of their class. It was always a source of friction when someone got outside of that thing. And I tried to reflect that.

Class Book: The Catiline Conspiracy

For the final book of the quarter my History 111 class voted for The Catiline Conspiracyby John Maddox Roberts. The Catiline Conspiracy is a murder mystery novel and part of the SPQR series. The essential plot follows the attempted takeover of the Roman government by Lucius Catiline in 63 BCE. Hopefully this book should prove to match well with Robert Harris' Imperium, which we did earlier. While the two novels are part of different series, The Catiline Conspiracy begins right where Imperium ended. It should prove interesting to compare the different author's interpretations of the end of the Roman Republic and the leading figures of these events, particularly Marcus Cicero.

Blog readers should feel free to send their thoughts on the book and suggest other history books and novels for future use.   

Syllabus for History 112 Spring 2009

This coming quarter I am going to be doing History 112 again, though this time I am going to be teaching as an SSL. This will be completely my class with a curriculum completely under my discretion. Here is my proposed syllabus. I decided to go with Norman Davies' Europe: a History as my textbook though I have included two chapters from Jacques Barzun's From Dawn to Decadence. I would like to thank Dr. Breyfogle for allowing me to plagiarize off of his syllabus. This is still something I am tinkering around with. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Ohio State has a system known as Carmen where teachers can photocopy material and place it online where students in the class can read it. This is a great way to get around copyright issues. The university also puts out a publication known as Exploring the European Past (ETEP). It has various modules, collections of primary and secondary source materials on specific topics. Teachers can select modules of interest, which will then be collected into customized booklets for the class. ETEP is expensive, I admit, but it is a great way to introduce students to source material and the scholarly process.


History 112
European History:
The Sixteenth Century to the Present

Spring 2009

Lectures: MW 5:30 – 7:18 Mendenhall Laboratory (ML) 0191


SSL: Benzion N. Chinn
Office hours: M 3-5, and by appointment
Office: 009 Dulles Hall. Phone: 240 994 184
E-mail: chinn.26@osu.edu
Blog: www.izgad.blogspot.com



General Information

Welcome to the wonderful world of Modern European history!

In this course, we will study fundamental events and processes in European politics, war, economics, intellectual thought, culture, and society from the sixteenth century to the present. We will attempt to explain the origins of the contemporary world; the rise of modern secularism in its various manifestations and the rise of the modern liberal state. As we shall see there is more to this story than man all of a sudden becoming rational. We will strive to understand how Europeans lived and gave meaning to their lives in the “early modern” and “modern” eras.

The course is both topically and chronologically organized and emphasizes the common characteristics of European civilization as a whole rather than specific national histories. It traces threads of continuity while also examining the vast changes experienced by European society in these 400 years. In a course that spans several centuries and covers a large geographical area, the majority of peoples and events cannot be studied in detail. We will focus on particular cases that illustrate important patterns of change and conflict that have shaped the European world as we know it now. Hopefully this course will serve as a gateway for further explorations.

Throughout the course, students will learn skills that will be necessary for them both as history students and in most of life’s endeavors: critical and analytical thinking, writing, reading, listening, note taking, working in groups, and public speaking.



Objectives/Learning Outcomes

By completing the requirements for this Historical survey, students will:

1. Acquire a perspective on history and an understanding of the factors that shape human activity. This knowledge will furnish students insights into the origins and nature of contemporary issues and a foundation for future comparative understanding of civilizations.
2. Develop critical thinking through the study of diverse interpretations of historical events.
3. Apply critical thinking through historical analysis of primary and secondary sources.
4. Develop communications skills in exams, papers, discussions.
5. Develop an understanding of the patterns of European history, and how they inform present-day European society, politics, and relations with the rest of the world.


Important Information

Students are very welcome to come and talk with me about any aspect of the course and the wonders of history. My office hours and location are listed above. I can also be reached by e-mail (chinn.26@osu.edu).

In accordance with departmental policy, all students must be officially enrolled in the course by the end of the second full week of the quarter. No requests to add the course will be approved by the department chair after that time. Enrolling officially and on time is solely the responsibility of each student.

Disability Services: Students with disabilities that have been certified by the Office for Disability Services will be appropriately accommodated, and should inform the instructor as soon as possible of their needs. The Office for Disability Services is located in 150 Pomerene Hall, 1760 Neil Ave; Tel: 292-3307, TDD 292-0901; http://www.ods.ohio-state.edu/.

This is a GEC course. This course fulfills the second half of the GEC Category 5. Arts and Humanities A. Historical Survey. It also fulfills the GEC category “International issues western (non-United States) course.”

Attendance
I am not grading for attendance. My philosophy is that the real work of this class goes on outside of my classroom. My lectures serve to help you understand the material you are reading and to equip you with the tools to get the most out of what you read. In theory one should be able to simply do the readings, not come to class, do all the assignments (one would have to come to class for the in class assignments) and do fine. Of course any student who could do that would have no need for my class to begin with. While one does not have to come to class one still has to participate. All students most e-mail me at least one question or serious comment about the reading by noon on class days. I use these questions as the basis for the class. My lectures are, in essence, my response to your questions.

Readings

All books have been put on two-hour reserve at Sullivant library.

All books are available for purchase at SBX and other area bookstores
**[Be sure to bring a copy of the readings to each discussion section as you will refer to the readings regularly during discussion]**
Required Books:
Norman Davies – Europe: a History
Deborah Lipstadt – History on Trial
ETEP Reader (Make sure to get the one assigned to this specific class. It will have my name on it.)

Grades will be computed on the following standard scale:

A: 92.6% and above B+: 87.6% to 89.5% C+: 77.6% to 79.5% D+: 67.6% to 69.5%
A-: 89.6% to 92.5% B: 82.6% to 87.5% C: 72.6% to 77.5% D: 62% to 67.5%
B-: 79.6% to 82.5% C-: 69.6% to 72.5% E: below 62%


Two special comments:
1) Since the University does not record D- grades, a student earning a course average below 62 will receive an E in this course.
2) In order to pass the course, you must pass the Final Exam with at least a 62.

Breakdown of Assignments
Class Participation – 15%
Maps and Quizzes – 15%
Paper #1 - 20%
Paper #2 - 20%
Final – 30%

Map Assignments and Quizzes

The “quizzes” component of your discussion section grade (15% of your total grade) includes two map exercises (one take-home and one in-class) and three in-class quizzes.

· Quizzes: Each quiz will comprise 3-4 short questions based on the materials in the reading assignments and lectures.
Map assignments:
Map assignment #1: European towns and physical geography (take home)
Map assignment #2: Contemporary Europe, political (in-class).
On take-home map assignment, students will be able to use published atlases (the best option) and/or good web maps (I recommend maps from National Geographic, the CIA, and the UN).
In-class map assignment (#2): Students will be required to know the locations of the countries of Europe today. In class, they will be given a map of today’s Europe with the borders marked and asked to fill in the names of the countries from a list provided. (usually approximately 30 countries)
Grading Your Exams and Papers:
I furnish below brief descriptions of how you will earn your essay grades:
· "C” essays will include: an introductory paragraph that contains your thesis; a body of several paragraphs in which you offer evidence from the readings, lectures, and discussions to support your thesis; and a conclusion that reiterates your basic argument. That being said this paper will have serious methodological problems.
· "B” essays will include: all of the above requirements for a “C” essay. It will demonstrate basic competence and understanding of the required assignment.
· "A” essays will include: all of the above requirements for a “B” essay plus more data and some indication of independent or extended thought. To get an “A” you are going to have to impress me by doing something that exceeds my expectations of 112 students.
· As for “D” and “E” essays: usually, these essays do not include a viable thesis and/or they do not include very much information from the course.


Late Paper Assignments and Make-Up Exams

Students must take the final exam at the scheduled times. Students will be allowed to take a make-up exam only for urgent reasons, such as medical or legal emergency. In such instances, students should, if possible, contact the instructor at least one day in advance. The student will be expected to present written proof of the emergency, such as an official statement from the University Medical Center. Without a valid excuse, students may be permitted (at the discretion of the instructor) to take a make-up exam. However, their grade will be reduced by a full letter (e.g., an A will be dropped to a B) for each week that passes after the scheduled exam time.
Extensions for the paper are granted at the discretion of the instructor to those students presenting valid and verifiable excuses (again you will be expected to provide written documentation). Students who are unable to fulfill assignments as scheduled for family, religious, or medical reasons must contact the instructor before the due date of the assignment. Papers that are received late without just cause or without a previously approved excuse will be graded down by a full letter per day late.

The pressures of other course work, employment, and extra-curricular activities do not constitute valid excuses for late assignments. Note due dates on the syllabus and plan ahead. If the instructor is not available to approve excuses, leave a message on his/her e-mail or office voice mail (failing that, you may leave a message for the instructor on his e-mail or voice mail). There is no provision in this course for additional papers for extra credit or to substitute for requirements.


Submission of Assignments
All assignments are mandatory. If you do not submit one assignment, your final grade will be reduced by one full letter grade in addition to giving you zero for that assignment. If you do not submit two or more assignments, you will automatically fail the course.


Grade Reconsideration
A student who wishes reconsideration of his/her grade on an examination or paper should resubmit the assignment in its entirety to the instructor. The exam/paper should be accompanied by a written exposition explaining why the grade is not an accurate appraisal of the work. Appeals must be initiated within ten days after the paper/exams were returned to the class. In reviewing a paper or exam on appeal, the instructor reserves the right to raise, confirm, or lower the grade.


Plagiarism, Cheating, and Academic Misconduct
Plagiarism, cheating, or other academic misconduct will not be tolerated and will be reported to the Committee on Academic Misconduct. It is the responsibility of the Committee on Academic Misconduct to investigate or establish procedures for the investigation of all reported cases of student academic misconduct. Faculty Rules (3335-5-487) require that instructors report all instances of academic misconduct to the committee. Be forewarned that I will pursue cases of academic misconduct to the appropriate University committee. For additional information, see the Code of Student Conduct at http://studentaffairs.osu.edu/resource_csc.asp .
Plagiarism is theft. Please read the attached definition of plagiarism (Appendix B from University Survey: A Guidebook and Readings for New Students), see the websites: http://cstw.osu.edu/ and http://cstw.osu.edu/writing_center/handouts/index.htm. If you do not understand what plagiarism entails as it is described in this excerpt from the student handbook and/or websites, you should see the instructor before beginning any of these assignments.

Paper Assignments:
Over the course of this quarter you will be assigned two papers to write. While you have to do both of these assignments, you can choose the order that you do them in.

Paper Assignment #1: You will write a 3-5 page paper reviewing a work of historical fiction (either from the list below or approved by the teacher). In particular you will analyze the work in question from a historical perspective. How does the author view the period being dealt with? How accurate is the book; what sort of liberties does the author take?
Paper Assignment #2: You will write a 3-5 page paper reviewing a scholarly work of non-fiction (either from the list below or approved by the teacher). What argument does the author make about his subject matter? Is the author’s argument convincing? How does the work contribute to our understanding of the period?
Both of these assignment will require that you formulate a thesis and that you devote body of your essay to defending that thesis.

Works of Historical Fiction
Libba Bray: A Great and Terrible Beauty (Victorianism, Women)
Tracy Chevalier: Girl with a Pearl Earring (Early Modern Society, Women)
Bernard Cornwell: Richard Sharpe series (Napoleonic Wars)
Charles Dickens: Tale of Two Cities (French Revolution)
Umberto Eco: Eternal Flame of Queen Loana (Fascism, Historical Method)
Emile Guillaumin: The Life of a Simple Man (Nineteenth century French peasantry)
Thomas Keneally: Schindler’s List (Holocaust)
Katharine Mcmahon: The Alchemist’s Daughter (Scientific Revolution, Early Enlightenment, Women)
James A. Michener: The Drifters (Cultural Revolution)
Patrick O’Brian: Aubrey/Maturin series (Napoleonic Wars)
Erich Maria Remarque: All Quite on the Western Front (World War I)
Conrad Richter - The Light in the Forest (Enlightenment, Rousseau)
Baroness Emma Orczy: The Scarlet Pimpernel (French Revolution)
Arturo Perez-Reverte: Captain Alatriste series (Early Seventeenth Century Spain)
Elizabeth Peters: Amelia Peabody series (Victorianism, Egypt, Women)
Alexander Solzhenitsyn: August 1914 (World War I)
Art Spiegelman: Maus (Holocaust)
For more suggestions see http://www.historicalnovels.info/index.html

Non-Fiction:
Gene Brucker - Giovanni and Lusanna: Love and Marriage in Renaissance Florence (Renaissance, Women)
B.S Capp - The Fifth Monarchy Men: A Study of Seventeenth-century English Millenarianism (English Civil War, Apocalypticism)
Elisheva Carlebach - Divided Souls (Jews, Early Modern Identity)
Natalie Zemon Davis - The Return of Martin Guerre (Women, Early Modern Society)
Elizabeth Eisenstein - The Printing Revolution in Modern Europe (Renaissance, Scientific Revolution)
Leon Festinger - When Prophecy Fails (Apocalypticism)
Jeffery Friedman - The Poisoned Chalice (Enlightenment)
Christine Garwood - Flat Earth: The History of an Infamous Idea (Victorianism)
Carlo Ginzburg - The Cheese and the Worm (Early Modern Society)
Night Battles (Witch Trials, Early Modern Society)
Ecstasies (Witch Witch Trials)
Matt Goldish - Sabbatean Prophets (Jews, Early Modern Society)
Christopher Hill - Antichrist in Seventeenth-Century England (Apocalypticism, English Civil War)
Susannah Heschel - The Aryan Jesus: Christian Theologians and the Bible in Nazi Germany (Nazism)
Richard Kagan - Lucrecia’s Dreams (Inquisition, Women)
Thomas Laqueur - Making Sex
Solitary Sex[1]
Phyllis Mack - Visionary Women: Ecstatic Prophecy in Seventeenth-Century England (Women, English Civil War)
Richard Popkin - Messianic Revolution: Radical Religious Politics to the End of the Second Millennium (Apocalypticism)
Dava Sobel - Galileo’s Daughter (Scientific Revolution)
Pieter Spierenburg - The Spectacle of Suffering: Executions and the Evolution of Repression: From a Preindustrial Metropolis to the European Experience (Early Modern Society)
Barbara Tuchman - Guns of August (World War I)
D. P. Walker - The Decline of Hell: Seventeenth-Century Discussions of Eternal Torment (Early Modern Religion)
Frances Yates - Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition (Renaissance, Scientific Revolution)
Perez Zagorin - How the Idea of Religious Toleration Came to the West (Wars of Religion)

Movies: At several points during the quarter I will be showing films related to the material. While I think these films are useful and will be worth your while to watch, I am not about to invest an entire class period in showing them. I will though introduce the film and start it during the last half hour of class. Students are free to stay and watch or leave at their leisure. I have penciled in two tentative films, but I am open to alternatives.
Class Schedule and Assignments

1. March 30. Introduction: The Historical Method
Highly recommended: Herbert Butterfield – The Whig Interpretation of History

2. April 1. Renaissance and Reformation
Davies 469-507.
Luther’s 95 Theses (http://www.iclnet.org/pub/resources/text/wittenberg/luther/web/ninetyfive.html)
Papal Condemnation of Luther (http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Leo10/l10exdom.htm)

3. April 6. Religion Wars and European Society
Davies 526-39, 563-69.
Carmen: Magdalena and Balthasar, Edmund Williamson
Move: The Return of Martin Guerre

4. April 8. Scientific Revolution
Carmen: Barzun - “the Invisible College”
Video – Galileo’s “Dialogue” (http://library.ohio-state.edu/record=b5743543~S3)[2]
Quiz #1

5. April 13. Rise of Absolutism
Davies 615-28.
Carmen: Barzun – “The Monarch’s Revolution”
James I, Charles I, Thomas Hobbes, Louis XIV

6. April 15. The English Civil War and the Glorious Revolution (Passover No Class. You are still responsible for your reading and for the material I post.)
Davies pg. 545-53, 628-38.
ETEP – The English Revolution
Carmen: John Locke (From the Second Treatise on Government)

7. April 20. Enlightenment I
Davies 577-614.
Carmen: John Locke (Justification for the Glorious Revolution), Voltaire, Rousseau, Wollstonecraft.
Map # 1 Due

8. April 22. Enlightenment II
Candide(http://www.literature.org/authors/voltaire/candide/index.html),
Kant – “What is Enlightenment?” (http://www.english.upenn.edu/~mgamer/Etexts/kant.html)
Quiz #2

9. April 27. French Revolution I
Davies 675-757

10. April 29. French Revolution II
Carmen: French Revolution
ETEP – The Napoleonic Empire in Europe: Liberation or Exploitation?

11. May 4. Industrial Revolution
Carmen: Industrial Revolution I & II.
Paper #1 Due

12. May 6. Marxism
Davies pg. 835-41.
Communist Manifesto (http://www.anu.edu.au/polsci/marx/classics/manifesto.html)

13. May 11. Imperialism and the European City
Davies pg. 848-54.
Carmen: Orwell, Belgian Congo, Vienna and Paris I & II

14. May 13. World War I and its Aftermath.
Davies 875-96, 901-38.
Carmen: Palmer, Kern

15. May 18. The Russian Revolution and Stalinism
Davies pg. 959-65.
Reading: ETEP – The Russian Revolution
Carmen: Behind the Urals

16. May 20. Nazi Germany
Davies pg. 965-98.
Quiz #3

17. May 25. Memorial Day. (No Class)

18. May 27. World War II
Davies pg. 998-1055.
Movie: Downfall

19. June 1. Cold War
Davies pg. 1058-1136.
Map Assignment #2 (In Class)

20. June 3. Cultural Revolutions
Reading: ETEP – The End of Consensus: The Student Revolts of the 1960s.
In class presentations on European countries.

21. Conclusion
Lipstadt - History on Trial
Paper #2 Due

22. June 8. Final Exam

[1] For those who might be put off (or attracted) by Laqueur’s racy titles, these are serious works of scholarship dealing with changes in notions of sexuality during pre modern times. Once you get past the book title one is going hard pressed to find much to titillate or take offense at. One way or another I do strongly recommend them.
[2] This documentary is part of your reading assignment. You are to have watched it before coming to class.

The Return of Martin Guerre and the Feminist Fantasies of Natalie Davis

(Since, in my last post, I talked about Natalie Zemon Davis and her book, the Return of Martin Guerre, I thought to share with you a review I wrote a few years ago, while I was still an undergraduate at Yeshiva University, on the book. We were assigned the book in class and, as an assignment, had to write a review of it. To the professor's surprise most of the papers were very hostile; a good example of how different the Yeshiva University student body is from a normal college campus. My review was one of the more hostile ones. Back then I was much more the fighting conservative than I am today. If I were to rewrite this I would probably tone it down a bit. It definitely is a great book, despite its flaws, and I have every intention of using it when I have students of my own.)

The integrity of the field of history rests upon the assumption that the writing of history is a fundamentally different sort of undertaking than the writing of historical fiction. While even the most rigorous historian inevitably colors the facts with his own speculations, (Ranke is a prime example of this) history is supposed to about the interpretation of past events through the lens of documentary evidence. The writing of historical fiction on the other hand[1] is centered upon the attempts of an author to speculate upon the hidden stories and motivations that lie outside the realm of documentary evidence. While the art of historical fiction may be of value to the historian, it is not history. To blur this line is a disservice to the field in that it renders the study of history as mere partisan propaganda. This is so particularly when such writings are done in support of an ideology. If one is going to be a historian then one has to convince the reader that there has been a genuine attempt to check one’s ideology at the door.

An example of this issue can be seen in the Return of Martin Guerre by the noted feminist historian, Natalie Zemon Davis. To be sure, it should be noted, that whatever the book’s flaws, it is a fascinating and well-crafted bit of writing. The stated facts of the case which Davis discusses are these: In mid 16th century France, Martin Guerre, a peasant of Basque descent, abandoned his wife, Bertrande, and child, Sanxi, over a fight he had with his father over some grain. Eight years later a man named Arnaud du Tilh came around, claiming to be Martin Guerre, and was initially accepted as such by Bertrande, the rest of the family, along with everyone else in the village. Doubts began to rise however and Martin Guerre’s uncle, Pierre Guerre, along with Bertrande, come to accuse Arnaud of being a fake. The case was resolved when the true Martin Guerre, after twelve years, came home, minus a leg that had been shot off by a cannonball in Flanders. Arnaud was hanged, Martin Guerre resumed his proper place and Bertrande was absolved of having committed adultery, as the impression of the court was that she had been tricked into believing that Arnaud was her husband and was not a party to his fraud. These are the facts as the Parlement of Toulouse seemed to have understood them and according to the generally accepted rules of historical explanation, baring any evidence to the contrary, this version of events should stand; any attempt paint a different picture should carry the burden of proof upon it.

It would seem that Bertrande was a simple housewife, whose main concern in life was trying to keep body and soul together, who, tragically, was abandoned by her husband and tricked into living with an impostor for four years. This interpretation of events evidentially does not suit Davis, not because she has contradictory evidence, but because such a picture does not take into account the feminist conscience that Bertrande “must” have had. As such Davis offers an alternative reading of the events, one that takes into account the fact that Bertrande possessed “a concern for her reputation as a woman, a stubborn independence, and a shrewd realism about how she could maneuver within the constraints placed upon her sex.”[2]

This rewriting of events begins even before the departure of Martin. Bertrande and Martin did not have a child for the first eight years, or so, of their marriage and it was assumed that the couple was under some curse, which prevented Martin from impregnating his wife. This “curse” was lifted, if we are to take the written accounts at their word, when, at the advice of a “wise woman.” Martin and Bertrande “had four masses said by the priest and were given sacred hosts and special cakes to eat.”[3] This resulted in the birth of their son, Sanxi. To a historian still schooled in "outdated," "patriarchal," modes of study, it is not certain why Martin and Bertrande, unable to produce a child, still stayed together. This could have been for any number of plausible reasons; maybe the families would not have allowed it, Bertrande may have actually been in love with Martin or she might have been scared to death of what he would do to her if she left. For Davis the explanation for this is obvious; Bertrande, while not wanting to be married yet to Martin, did not wish to end up back under her father’s control. She thus, by allowing it to be claimed that Martin was cursed, manipulated the situation so she could be both outside of her father’s control and exempt from the normal duties of marriage. “Then when Bertrande was ready for it, the old woman ‘appeared suddenly as if from heaven’ and helped to lift the spell.”[4] (I.e. this was a scam worked out between Bertrande and the old woman.) Does Davis offer us a source that has someone, from that time, making the claim that Bertrande manipulated the situation? No. Does Davis even bother to bring down a case, from that time period, in which a woman played such a game and thus allow us to draw some sort of comparison? No.

Davis’ insinuations do not stop there. After Martin’s disappearance, Davis wonders if Bertrande was comforted in her solitude by that “wise woman who had counseled her during her bewitchment.”[5] This of course, makes perfect sense as it is well known that women, in 16th century France, were secretly organized under the banner of the female conscience and merely went “along with the system, passing it on through the deep tie and hidden complicity of mother and daughter.”[6] It would seem that the existence of such a secret system seems so obvious to Davis that she does not bother to offer us a single source as to the veracity of such a claim.
Davis’ most egregious claim is that, far from being duped by Arnaud, Bertrande was well aware, from the very beginning, that Arnaud was a fake and simply went along with the charade because she wanted a husband. Davis takes it as a given that “the obstinate and honorable Bertrande [was not] a woman so easily fooled, not even by a charmer like Pansette. By the time she had received him in her bed, she must have realized the difference.”[7] Now we know that Arnaud was slick enough to fool Martin’s own sisters, who knew Martin for longer than Bertrande did. The reason why it is unlikely that Arnaud fooled Bertrande, according to Davis, is that “as any wife of Artigat would have agreed, there is no mistaking ‘the touch of the man on the woman.’”[8] The most obvious problem with such claim is that it is not backed, as far as I can tell, by any sort of empirical data; I would love to see the study that a test group of blindfolded women could recognize a man based on how they were touched. Lacking that I can see no reason what so ever why this bit of folk wisdom would be relevant. (Imagine a conservative saying something like this and getting their book published by the Harvard University Press and being made the director of the Shelby Cullom Davis Center for Historical Study at Princeton University.) What is even more amusing is that Davis’ source for this, which she only indicates in her end notes, is a 17th-century historical work[9] by Etienne Pasquier (1529-1615), titled Les Recherches de la France. I must say that there seems to me to be something just a bit disingenuous when someone, who has a consistent track record of treating folk wisdom about women, written by men, with absolute scorn, turns around and builds a thesis around such folk wisdom merely when it suits their purpose.

Davis crosses a certain line here where her writing ceases to be a matter of putting objective facts, tied together with the writer’s speculations, on the table and instead becomes a forum for the writer to give her speculations, tied together with some historical facts. The challenge for Davis is to explain why her telling of the Martin Guerre case is intrinsically more deserving of the title History than a top of the line work of historical fiction such as the Killer Angels, by Michael Shaara. Killer Angels chronicles the events, in the form of a novel, of the battle of Gettysburg. This is a book that won the Pulitzer Prize, in 1974, and is considered a classic of American literature. No one, as far as I can tell, has ever offered a sustained attack on Shaara’s presentation of the battle of Gettysburg. Nevertheless, no one would ever consider Killer Angels to be a history of the battle. The reason for this is that Michael Shaara, in the end, had the people involved in the battle say and do things that cannot be justified strictly in terms of documentary evidence. In truth, though, one could say that Shaara was simply trying to resurrect the style of historiography used in antiquity by Thucydides and Josephus.

In many respects Killer Angels is superior to Martin Guerre; it is demonstrably evident that Killer Angels is on far firmer grounds, factually, than Martin Guerre. By the standard of historical events, Gettysburg was a very well documented battle. We can track, down to the hour, what the major figures in this battle, such as Lee, Longstreet, Pickett, Hancock, Meade and Chamberlain, were doing. All of these people left numerous volumes in memoirs and correspondence discussing their actions and their motives, which Shaara put to good use; we can be fairly certain that whatever was really said at the battle of Gettysburg was not that far off from what Shaara had his characters say. This is in contrast to the events described in Martin Guerre. Neither Martin Guerre nor Beatrice nor Arnund actually left any written records. All that we have is a slim book written by the judge in that case, Jean de Coras, and also Gullaume Le Sueur’s Historia. We have little in the way of solid ground to portray their mindsets. As such anyone who would wish to tell their story is forced to rely on his or her own imagination.

To be fair to Davis, one could argue that unlike Killer Angels, Martin Guerre gives its sources and, unlike Shaara, Davis points out where historical evidence ends and her suppositions begin. My response would be that even if Shaara would have bothered to put out an annotated edition of his work, documenting his sources, pointing out to the reader where he had allowed his imagination to fill in the blanks and offering a defense of these intuitions, Killer Angels would still be considered historical fiction, albeit one that contained a useful “study guide” to the real events.

In the end, Martin Guerre, while it may not fit in as history, cannot merely be pushed aside as historical fiction. Davis may take too many liberties for it to be considered history yet Martin Guerre is not structured like a novel, it is too self-conscious; most of the work contains Davis’ surmises upon the events. Rather than either of these two categories, Martin Guerre should be viewed as a running commentary to a work of either history or historical fiction that unfortunately does not, as of yet, exist. In this sense, Davis has performed an admirable service for the student of history in that she has allowed the reader to get a glimpse into the thought processes of a genuinely talented historian and has offered an invaluable look at the thought processes, struggles and issues that go into writing genuine history.

[1] The type at least that honestly engages the issues instead of merely using real events as a background for the author’s fantasies.
[2] Davis pg. 28
[3] Davis pg. 21
[4] Davis pg. 28-29
[5] ibid pg. 34
[6] ibid pg. 31
[7] ibid pg. 44
[8] ibid
[9] Pasquier actually put out numerous editions of this work throughout his lifetime. The first edition was put out in 1560, this was followed by editions in 1596, 1607 and 1611, in which the author added large amounts of information to. The one Davis makes use of was published in 1621. (See http://www.historians.org/info/AHA_History/nzdavis.htm)

Staying in the Haredi World is Good for Your Sex Life

Jewish Philosopher likes to argue that the reason why people leave Orthodox Judaism is because they have sexual desires which they are unable to pursue within the confines of Orthodox Judaism (See here and here). While one can challenge his generalizations about those who leave Orthodoxy, I would like to approach the issue from a different angle. While Jewish Philosopher’s arguments might have at least some grain of truth in many cases, this line of argument can also be turned around and used against those who remain within the Haredi world. One can make a very strong case that there are many people who remain within the Haredi world, in large part, because, by doing so, they are maximizing their opportunities for sex. This might sound counter-intuitive considering how constrictive Jewish law can be when it comes to sex. But consider that, while Orthodox Judaism strongly opposes pre-marital sex and is one of the few societies left in American culture in which there are real consequences for being caught fooling around, particularly for women, it is perfectly normal for Haredim to get married in their early twenties or even in their teens. Not only that but Haredim have a well-developed matchmaking system to help people get married.

In the spirit of Rodney Stark, who analyzes organized religions in terms of economics (People make religious choices based on their rational self-interest, and act so as to maximize their social resources.), I offer a curved model to describe one's sexual opportunities within Orthodox Judaism. We start with the Haredi world, in which one has a statistically high chance for sex. As we move toward the left one undergoes a statistical drop in one's opportunities for sex. This rises slightly once you get to the outer fringes of Modern Orthodoxy, where there is an increased tolerance for pre-marital sexual activity, and rises greatly once you get outside of Orthodox Judaism, where one is no longer beholden to Orthodox sexual mores.

While I do not have any hard statistics to back this theory up, it does confirm to my own anecdotal experience. To give two examples of this. Recently I got into a conversation with a Haredi woman about the television show the Tudors. I have not seen the show, but I was able to fill her in about sixteenth-century English history in general and Henry VIII in particular, which she was quite unfamiliar with. While her Haredi education left her ignorant of English history, it has not stopped her from watching television, even television shows that have graphic sexual content. In another conversation with a Haredi person, we shared our mutual love of Bernard Cornwell, a writer whose high adventure works of historical fiction are filled with blood, violence, and sex. I have previously listened to this person’s iPod, a banned object in his yeshiva, and found it full of secular music, much of it rap music with explicit lyrics.

I do not see these people as hypocrites for bending the rules and doing things that the Haredi world forbids. I would hope that this exposure to secular things, and the recognition of their own weaknesses will, in the long run, make them more tolerant and not lead them into becoming the sort of people who, due to their own insecurities about their lives, suspect everyone else and go around on witch-hunts to ferret out those who fail to live up to community standards. Their actions are not the momentary lapses of a people caught in the heat of the moment nor do they appear to be addicts. The only explanation left is that they are making fully rational decisions to go against Haredi norms; this must be viewed as part of an ideological disagreement. There is nothing wrong with this; it is perfectly normal for people to find the society that they best fit into and remain there despite minor disagreements.

My question to them, though, would be why they remain within the Haredi world. They could easily declare themselves to be Modern Orthodox and live exactly as they do now and no one would think twice about them. On the contrary, they would be viewed as deeply observant Jews. What have they gained by remaining in the Haredi world? Well, the girl, despite being a rebellious teenager, got married at the age of nineteen and now has several children. This past week I got to meet the boy’s fiancé. She is a cute little thing with the same name as a character from the musical Rent. That is not a bad deal for a young man in his early twenties.

(To be continued …)

We are Going to Do Feminism Like It Is 1895: A Review of the Gemma Doyle Trilogy (Part II)

(This is the continuation of an earlier post. See here.)

In my mind, these books are everything that feminist literature should be. Without a question, the issue underlying the series is female empowerment and Bray makes no apologies for it. Gemma and her friends, as women, live in a world in which they have few choices and little control over their lives. The Realms offer them a world in which they have power and the possibility of being able to change the course of their lives back home.

Bray is not defending the Victorian world nor is she trying to turn back the clock. She manages, though, to bring a level of nuance that one does not usually find in literature dealing with women’s issues. There is more to her feminism than pontificating about the plight of women struggling against the tyranny of patriarchy. Bray does not feel the need to preach or pass judgment against the Victorian world. In ways that are very reminiscent of Elizabeth Peters’ Amelia Peabody series, Bray is willing to accept the Victorian world for what it was, warts and all, and instead of mocking it, she has fun with it.

Bray has no interest in polemicizing against men; these books do not break down into intelligent and open-minded women going up against the men, who are all stupid and bigoted. Take for example Gemma’s older brother, Tom; he can be an idiot at times, but Bray manages to keep him genuinely likable. Gemma’s love interest, an Indian boy named Kartik, is a very interesting character. Bray is willing to allow him to be Gemma’s equal, instead of turning him into a male version of a damsel in distress. In truth, the main enforcers of patriarchy in these books are not the men but the women, particularly such characters as Spence’s headmistress, Mrs. Nightwing, Gemma’s grandmother, Mrs. William Doyle, and Lady Denby. Ultimately the message here to women is not that men have wronged them and they have the right to demand their due; instead the books ask women to look inward and ask themselves if they are the cause of their own oppression and, more importantly, how are they, as women, going to take the initiative and solve the problems that face them.

I think the reason for Bray’s success in this matter lies in the fact that she not only writes good fantasy but good historical fiction as well. She has created characters that are true to the time period. Her characters do not break down into the rational, intelligent, modern sounding characters and their bigoted intolerant opponents who are essentially straw-men of premodern modes of thought. Gemma does not come across as a modern feminist in a corset; she believably inhabits the world she lives in. She is not striving to prove that she is the equal of men or that she should be able to be a doctor, lawyer or even the Prime Minister just like a man. It is not that she even rejects her world; she is simply someone who finds herself desiring to have more options and struggles with the implications of this desire. One suspects that Gemma would not fit into the modern world. She still wants and needs the structure of the Victorian world, even if it is simply a moderated version of it.

The character who is closest to modern feminism is Felicity. In a Great and Terrible Beauty, she already has gotten involved with a gypsy youth. In Rebel Angels she experiments with going to a ball in a gown with a plunging neckline. By the time we reach The Far Sweet Thing, she is dreaming of going off to Paris, wearing breeches and working as a model. There is even a hint of a lesbian relationship between her and Pippa. Bray, though, conceives Felicity’s “feminism” not as an intellectual or moral struggle against the forces of oppression, but as Felicity being a brat. Felicity is the sort of character who does whatever she wants; damn the consequences to her or anyone else. This is one of the reasons why she is such a fun character and why we love her, but Bray never tries to imbue Felicity with any sort of moral authority. Instead, she ingeniously uses Felicity to turn tables on modern feminism and mock them in turn.

It does not take a whole lot of imagination to realize how the real-life equivalents of Gemma and her friends would lead to modern feminism. Even Ann, the Neville Longbottom of the group, is, by The Sweet Far Thing, working on becoming a professional actress. It is an interesting question to speculate whether the rise of modern feminism was the inevitable result of the women’s movements of the nineteenth century, but at best this could only have been seen in hindsight. The real-life equivalents of Gemma and her friends could not have conceived that they were a movement, where this movement was heading and if they did they would not have necessarily approved of it.

(To be continued …)

We are Going to Do Feminism Like It Is 1895: A Review of the Gemma Doyle Trilogy (Part I)

This past summer a girl, that I was going out with, recommended that, since I, like her, was a Twilight fan, I should try Libba Bray’s A Great and Terrible Beauty (GTB). The date proved to be lousy, but the book proved to be a wonderful suggestion. Captured by its sharp, tongue and cheek wit and its parade of references to classical literature and poetry, I quickly read A Great and Terrible Beauty along with its sequel, Rebel Angels, and waited until the end of December for the final book in the series, A Sweet Far Thing, to come out. The lesson from this, I think, is that a good book is worth a bad date. The Gemma Doyle Trilogy is a work of historical fiction/fantasy about a nineteenth century English girl who attends a girl’s finishing school near London called Spence Academy. Gemma grew up in India as the daughter of an English official but is sent to Spence soon after her mother, Virginia Doyle, dies under mysterious circumstances. While the official story, which is put out, is that she died of cholera, Gemma saw her, in a vision, stab herself in order not to be captured by a dark creature, sent by someone named Circe in order to capture her. (I do love a book that is not afraid to kill of characters.) Gemma has to balance her visions, her attempts to come to terms with them and their implications with life at Spence. At Spence girls are fashioned into young ladies fit to play their role in high society, which is to marry well, run a household and bear children who can carry on the glory of the British Empire. This is the world of upper class Victorian England; a place in which absolute conformity is demanded and even the slightest act of deviance can destroy one’s reputation. Not that everyone actually plays by the rules; what matters is the appearance of conformity. Gemma quickly befriends Ann Bradshaw, a poor scholarship student, who is an even bigger misfit in this school than Gemma. The two of them have to take on Felicity Worthington and her followers, Pippa Cross, Cecily Temple and Elizabeth Pool. One of the things that I really loved about this series though is that despite Felicity’s Draco Malfoy like character, Bray does not simply keep her as an antagonist. Felicity and Pippa actually end up, by the middle of GTB, becoming good friends with Gemma and Ann. Not that Felicity really reforms; she remains her arrogant, cruel manipulative self, but she is quite lovable in her own way. She may be a vicious snake, but she is our vicious snake. Pippa also is a great character. Not to give anything away, but Bray does some very interesting things with her. One of the weaknesses of the Harry Potter series was that, up until the Half-Blood Prince, Rowling never tried to make Draco Malfoy likable or particularly effective as an antagonist to Harry. There could have been something very attractive about Draco. He has Crabbe and Goyle to protect him from any of the students. He has Severus Snape to protect him from any of the teachers. And if he gets into some real trouble he always has his father, Lucius Malfoy, to protect him from the Ministry of Magic. This boy is untouchable and he can do whatever he wants; who would not want to be him. Gemma, Ann, Felicity and Pippa form a club centered on a diary, which Gemma discovered by following one of her visions. This diary was written by a former student at Spence named Mary Dowd. From the diary the girls learn about a magical world, the Realms, and a group of powerful women, the Order, which maintained order within the realms. Gemma soon discovers that, in addition to her visions, she also has the ability to enter the Realms and even bring people with her. Here Gemma and her friends experience a world unlike the Victorian England they know, a world in which they have power. Needless to say, with the discovery of the Realms Gemma and her friends have far more to worry about than tea and dances. Particularly once Circe and the forces of the Winterlands come after them. (To be continued …)