As it's National Poetry Day, I thought I'd share a few thoughts on Byron. The celebrity cult of Lord Byron began while he was still alive, boomed when he died, and still continues today. He remains an object of fascination, scandal, and appeal. I've been interested in him since I first read about him in a "Famous People" encyclopaedia. It was a children's book, so it did not explore the more infamous aspects of his life. But it was enough to inspire me to delve further into research on the man and the myth - including the puzzle of the mirror . Ultimately, Byron went on to become a major inspiration for my first published book Day's Dying Glory , right down to its title. His early poems (generally my favourite ones) feature heavily in the book, and I enjoyed weaving in lines and references which Byron-fans would spot where others might not even notice them. Poets and poetry have inspired hundreds of writers. It is fascinating that language can be so power...
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| Arthur Rackham's timeless illustration (from Wikipedia) |
There was a big push a few years ago to rewrite fairy tales. Snow White and the Huntsman got a less than warm reception, but Maleficent was more kindly received. Not wanting to be left out, I also had a go at rewriting a fairy tale, although I think I was a little bit late to the party.
Memories of the Grand Tour was based on the Grimm Brothers’ fairy tale, Hansel and Gretel, and features my only female narrator. I don’t know particularly why I chose a woman’s voice for this one. Generally, I find men in Gothic Horror to be easier to write about, simply because they had more possibilities and options during the time in which I set most of my writing. A Victorian woman sitting alone in a pub, for example, would say a great deal about her character before the story even starts, whereas male characters in the same situation wouldn’t even invoke a raised eyebrow. Strangely, by contrast, both Gothic Horror novels which I am currently working on have female protagonists and narrators. I suppose societal difference can be explored more fully in novels than in short stories.
Anyway, Memories of the Grand Tour is the story of a woman who decided that she was not going to conform to society’s expectations and so decided, in her youth, that she would undertake the Grand Tour along with her brother. During their journey through the vast forests of Germany, her brother is distracted by the promise of a reward for anyone able to kill a deadly wolf which has been plaguing the woodsfolk. The main character finds herself staying in a little house, where she keeps experiencing a terrible smell of burning, and which is the home of an old man who is an aggressively bad host.
But, of course, the old man is being haunted by the memory of something which took place many years earlier and, as the story goes on, the reader too begins to realise that perhaps it isn’t just a memory which is haunting him. M.R. James believed that a ghost ought to be malevolent and this is something which has caused a great deal of debate in our household. One of our shared favourite books is The Children of Green Knowe and the ghosts in that are most certainly not malevolent. Yet, there is a malevolent spirit in the story which has been terrorising the family for generations.
Memories of the Grand Tour was a hard story for me to write because it takes place in an area I’m not at all familiar with. Gothic Horror is so reliant on detailed descriptions of people and places that it’s much easier to write settings which you’re familiar with. As a result, Memories of the Grand Tour took a few iterations for it to get to the place it’s at now and then I submitted it for one of Globe Soup’s competitions which had feedback provided. They liked it but it certainly wasn’t what they were looking for, which actually amused me because they weren’t really able to say why it hadn’t done better than an Honourable Mention. But it did highlight to me that many short story competitions are looking for specific things, rather than just engaging tales. This, in itself, was one of the main reasons why I decided to create this anthology: because Gothic Horror is a genre which does not do well in competitions, but which many people love to read.
[You can find Judith's other blogs in this series here]
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