2011-01-05

Author interruputus

One has to pay due respect to Murphy's second law* but if the year goes as planned it should be a good one. I've two books which should be coming out, and another two that I'll be writing. As ever,the more I get into the topic of a new book the more I look forward to writing it. The problem is, I looked forward to it so much I got started early, and am having trouble picking up the threads now that I'm back after the holidays.

I had already set up a number of maps locating where my protagonists were at key times, and much-annotated time lines with scrawls that my time off has rendered somewhat cryptic. L6.C7 I understand, because I tend to write text references in Latin or Arabic as convenient, so this refers to a quote in chapter 56, line 107 - but in which text? 'Chk H re pel' means that I want to check what Herodotus says about peltasts, but why I wanted to do that I now forget. And then there's something written in Greek that even a Greek probably couldn't understand.

Having done some archaeology, I can usually unerringly dig down to a printout or journal from the strata of paper that slowly builds up around my desk and computer monitor, but after a three week break the piles are looking both ominous and unfathomable. I know, for example, that there's an article on trireme building I'm going to need soon, but it's currently a needle in a paper haystack. Also somewhere in that haystack are my passwords for two text repositories and to my virtual classroom for the e-Learning course I'll be starting next week.

I really did enjoy my holiday break. However I suspect I might need another three weeks to get back to where I was before I took the time off.

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*If everything seems to be going smoothly, you have overlooked something.

2010-12-06

Weighing the cost of the holidays

As we roll up to the Saturnalia, I'm thinking about what I can afford for the holidays. Not so much in terms of cash, because I know what I want Santa to deliver and some time ago made the necessary arrangements to get it. And that's part of the problem, because my presents will be mainly books and computer games. I spend a lot of time working and playing on my computer or sprawled out on the sofa snoozing gently with a copy of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire balanced on my stomach. Do I really need something that will encourage yet more physical inactivity?

What I should have asked for are a set of weights and some ice skates. Because by my current performance, if I put on weight over the festive period, I'll still be dieting and exercising it off in spring. So the question is what I can afford? vintage port, certainly. Maybe a bit of single malt scotch. Then my wife makes a Christmas cake which is diabolically tempting, but so loaded with sugar and alcohol that it is not permitted within six feet of a naked flame. I'll have lots of that, and sugared plums too. Then there's the chocolate, the crisps, the cookies, the nuts, and the chocolate crisp cookies (with nuts).

I'm not sure when I moved from thinking of some food as too expensive in terms of cash and started thinking of it as too rich in calories instead. It would be good to think that there was a window in which I could afford to eat calorific foods without severe consequences to either my wallet or my waistline. If there was, it was before I started writing, as these days my mid-winter blowout leaves both in need of some attention.

That said, Christmas is a time for counting one's blessings. I was walking to the shops the other day and saw some builders working on a house in gently swirling snow while the temperature went hunting for double figures in negative territory. Those guys probably don't have to count calories, and I almost hope they earn more than I do. But I still wouldn't swap jobs - with them or anyone.

2010-11-05

What is this thing called history?

Recently I've been spending some time at the end of the empire, right down in the fifth century AD, when the whole thing was about to be wrapped up and taken away to make room for the Middle Ages.

There's a lot of controversies, both major and minor, about this period. Almost everything is up for debate; from the motivation of the principal characters, to exactly what happened, when it happened and of course, above all why it happened.

That, as far as I am concerned is what history is all about. A historian should not lay out his narrative as cut-and-dried facts - he should be presenting these facts just as a barrister presents an case in court. In history, as in a court case, the known facts are not the end, but the means to an end. And with a court case and with history, that end is the same - to get as close to the truth as is humanly possible.

Not understanding this, is I think, the major reason why some kids get turned off history at school. Instead of being told 'these are the facts, deal with it', the students should be persuaded to use these facts to construct an argument.

Who did more damage to Rome - Nero or Caligula? Why do you think so? Was Claudius murdered? Is the legend of the foundation of Rome more accurate than many modern historians think? History devoid of debate becomes antiquarianism. That's still fun, but it's much more fun when we start discussing what the facts are trying to tell us. We should always remember that the word 'history' comes from the Greek for 'inquiry'.

2010-10-05

Ancient history, modern technology

This blog entry is a little delayed, because I was working late to wrap up the first draft of another book. More details on this later, but all going well, you should see the fruit of my labours some time next year, once all the editing and graphics have been completed.

As ever while I'm writing, I'm intrigued how modern technology and writing ancient history overlap. For this book modern archaeological techniques using ground-penetrating radar had helped to reconstruct ancient earthworks. I downloaded the publication describing this reconstruction from a university archive, and read it on my computer.

As I tried to follow the description of my general on campaign, I had Google Earth open in a window on a second computer monitor (my desk looks like the command module of the space shuttle), and a large-scale map of ancient Germany on my iPad. Now, once I'm done giving the text a final read-through, I'll email it to my editor. We'll probably discuss things on Skype once he has read it.

At least the version of Tacitus I have been using is in paper form. That's my favourite translation in a 105-year-old copy of Church and Broadribb. I sometimes wonder what the old historians would have thought, seeing the tools their modern counterparts have at their disposal. Yet I'd trade them all in an instant for Tacitus' access to the Roman senatorial records.

2010-09-04

Frankfurt on my mind

Try to talk to a publisher in the middle of October, and the chances are that you'll be asked to leave a message. This is because the publisher will be fully engaged in the major event of the year for those who get books published for a living - the Frankfurt Book Fair. This five-day fair so dominates many publishers' lives they are almost shocked when you remind them that most members of the general public have never heard of it.

It's not as though the public have not had the chance. The fair has been a regular annual event almost since Gutenberg set up the first printing press about 500 years ago. The fair attracts publishers, large retailers, agents, TV and film people, academics and trade associations. Everyone involved in the book world is there - except authors. So I've never been there, but Frankfurt is very important to me, because that's generally where my publishers negotiate the publishing rights and licensing fees which have seen my books produced in over a dozen languages (and counting). This provides a substantial chunk of my income.

There's another effect as well - Frankfurt keeps me busy over the summer. This is because sometimes a publisher wants to take an idea international, or wants to produce a model of what a planned book will look like (this model is called a 'dummy'), to see what sales such a book can expect. For me as an author the timing goes like this. I produce something in July and August while the rest of the world is taking a break. (I did get to swim in the lake almost every day in July and August, so don't feel too sorry for me.) In September my raw prose is turned into something resembling a book, and in October, while I'm enjoying some well-earned repose, my work schedule for the coming year is determined by negotiations thousands of miles away in Germany.

Frankfurt is on my mind this month, because one of my latest productions will be on the auction block. That production is a book giving my take on the Greek and Roman Myths. The book itself came out at the end of August in the UK and will be out just before Christmas in North America. Naturally, I'm hoping that international publishers find it irresistible. I'd particularly like to see the book find a Greek publisher. There would be something particularly satisfying in seeing my explanation of those ancient legends written in the language of the people who originally told them.