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Category Archives: Blogs
Another Publication Day for Muse, May 27, 2014
I’m really pleased that Anchor Canada is publishing a new edition of my novel, Muse, on May 27, 2014, only nine months after the original. Thanks, Random House, for the vote of confidence in my novel! The new edition is a smaller paperback, so will cost less, and they’ve given the book an attractive new look with a redesigned cover.… Read More
Getting Into Mindset of Solange
Getting into the mind of a literary character is a gradual process, just as it is with real people. My biggest wow moment in my understanding of Solange Le Blanc in Muse came when I was on the secret tour of the popes’ palace in Avignon. I stared at the bare walls of a basement chamber trying to imagine the décor of the Pope’s bathing room as the guide was describing it . . . read more Read more
Tribute to Mary Novik: Petrarchan Sonnet by Joan Boxall
Before I spoke at the North Shore Writers’ Association meeting, clever poet Joan Boxall introduced me by singing (Joan is also the member of a Vancouver choir!) a Petrarchan sonnet she’d composed for the occasion. Here it is, courtesy of Joan. She also took the photo of me signing books for the members. Thank you so much, Joan! … Read More
Lunar Eclipses: Canada 2014 & Avignon 1343
Last night, I spoke at the monthly meeting of the North Shore Writers Association, and read a passage from my novel Muse in which a lunar eclipse takes place. Around 1 am, I rose from bed to look out the window. The moon, high in the sky, was dramatically eclipsed. We see the diagrams in the newspapers and know the… Read More
Solange & Role of Women in Medieval Avignon
Late-medieval Avignon was a city of men. A vast number of clerics were employed by the Pope and cardinals, and foreign merchants, craftsmen, and artisans swelled the ranks of local people providing services to the church. The city was a cultural and economic magnet, an attractive place to set up shop. It was also notoriously corrupt . . . read more Read more
Social Status & Food People Ate in 14th-century Avignon
Seven hundred years after the popes lived in Avignon, we can read reports about their banquets and gain insight into their luxurious life style. The type of food people ate depended on their rank. Although there was a vast difference between the diet of a pope and a peasant, the poor did not starve, because the Pope gave out 6,000 loaves of bread daily. The staples of a peasant’s diet were grains, legumes, onions, garlic, vegetables, coarse dark bread, eggs, and milk products, with a little fish, meat, or poultry . . . read more Read more
Secrets of the Avignon Popes
Muse is set in medieval Avignon during the period when the popes resided there, rather than in Rome. Writers such as Francesco Petrarch flocked to the city to seek patronage from the Pope and cardinals. The city was bursting with craftsmen, merchants, goldsmiths, and money lenders as well as the architects, master masons, and artists who worked on the Pope’s immense palace. Under Clement VI, who appears in Muse, the palais des papes became the most celebrated court in Europe, a salon for the artists, musicians, and intellectuals who were the avant-garde of the Renaissance . . . read more Read more
Muse & Woman Hero’s Journey
My novel Muse arrived, imaginatively speaking, when I was teaching a literature course in which we were exploring Joseph Campbell’s concept of the hero’s journey. We were riffing on that, looking at ways of describing a woman hero’s journey, when a student told me about Veronica Franco, an “intellectual courtesan” of 16th-century Venice. This discovery was one of the triggering ideas for Muse. From the poet Veronica Franco, who had unfortunately been written about, I made the leap to the walled city of Avignon, which I had recently visited, guessing that courtesans, as well as popes, had lived there in the 14th century . . . read more Read more
The UNESCO World Heritage City of Avignon
Attractively situated on the southern Rhône in France, Avignon is a walled city with spectacular medieval sights. The historic centre has many charms to offer the tourist. Today Avignon is a UNESCO world heritage site, where tourists, not 14th-century clerics, throng the narrow, winding streets and visit the grand palace of the Avignon popes. The towers of the palais des papes are visible for miles as you approach on the fast train, the TGV from Paris. You must enter the wall through one of the twelve gates where medieval travellers were likely to be greeted by a traitor’s rotting torso or severed leg to warn against committing treason. Today, the main artery running north to the palace is as mercantile as during the time of the popes . . . read more Read more
Balancing Fact & Fiction in Muse
The inspiration behind my novel Muse is the amazing town of Avignon in France, where the popes resided in the 14th century. I visited it five times to explore the popes’ palace, the city wall, the rivers and canals, and the surviving medieval streets and buildings. I went there to soak up the atmosphere and walk in Solange’s shoes . . . read more Read more