A SUPERFLUITY OF RESEARCH by Joy Margetts

 

Earlier this month I visited our local library for the first time in a very long time. In a relatively small space I was really pleased to see a good selection of fiction books, and especially to find some interesting historical fiction titles. I know it is not a genre that is to everyone’s taste but I always find myself gravitating towards historical fiction – it is perhaps no surprise that it is what I write too. It didn’t take me long to find several books that I wanted to read, and I had to restrict myself to four. And then just as I was persuading myself to walk away from the bookshelves I saw a book with a cover and an author’s name that just called out to me. It was this one.

I didn’t even read the blurb on the back. I just grabbed the book and ran – well after getting it date stamped by the librarian of course! Alison Weir is a legend in the world of historical fiction, and an historian in her own right. Apart from fiction she has written many non-fiction books, based mainly on royal women of the late medieval period. I do enjoy her fiction writing – she weaves story so well around well researched fact. I don’t always agree 100% with all her theories and suppositions but she definitely brings the late medieval world to life in a riveting way. 

What I didn’t realise until I got this book home was that it was not a novel. Alison Weir has written over eleven novels, including a series of six based on the wives of Henry VIII. She has spent years researching her subject, from primary sources and the writings of other historians. Inevitably much of her research has taken her down ‘rabbit holes’ into exploring people and events that she subsequently did not add to her novels. I know this feeling. I write historical fiction because I love history, and reading and researching can eat up hours, probably when I should be doing other things. Like writing.

Other genres demand research too. In fact, I would say that most of us have to spend at least part of our time in collecting information that will find it’s way into our writing. Many of us will have overflowing notebooks, or myriads of computer folders to prove it. And when we don’t use all of that information that we have gathered – when it just doesn’t fit into our storyline, or introduces one too many superfluous characters? What then -  is all that research wasted?

Alison Weir has solved the problem cleverly. In ‘In the Shadow of Queens’ we find a collection of short stories and novellas. Some of these she has published elsewhere in e-form. Each is based around a lesser character of the Tudor court; someone who lived in the shadow of the intrigues surrounding the six wives of the King, but might otherwise have gone unnoticed. Weir tells their stories and they are fascinating. There is Margaret Douglas, the Scottish Princess, who actually had a valid claim to the throne of England. Lady Jane Rochford, the unfortunate and maybe scheming wife of George Boleyn – the brother accused of incest with his sister Anne. And then there was the high-born mistress, Anne Bassett, that possibly warmed the king’s bed after Queen Janes’ death and perhaps might have made a better choice of wife than either Anna of Cleves or Katherine Howard.

So it got me thinking. Perhaps I should use the extraneous research I have collected to write some shorter pieces. I might not have the prestige of Alison Weir, who I daresay can get any of her writing published. But I do have periods when I don’t want to launch into a whole new novel, and a eMag  that likes my short stories. Perhaps I need to go back to those overflowing notebooks and challenge myself to make stories out of what they contain. Even if just to amuse myself!

What do you do with your superfluity of useful information? I know that no reading is ever wasted – it all informs our writing. But wouldn’t it be good to do as Alison Weir has done so effectively – and make good use of what has taken us so much time and diligent effort to collect.