Christy English

Winners Write the Histories

Friday, June 17th, 2011 | Eleanor of Aquitaine, Once It Is Sold, The Writing Life | 2 Comments

It is an old adage, and a true one, that winners write the histories. Sometimes the histories that survive are the tales told by an enemy. This is often true for Eleanor…so many enemies wrote her history. I am glad we are taking it back.

Apache is a Navaho word for enemy. Enemy is the name by with the Apache people are known to this day. Their true name is Inde, meaning the People.

“When the enemy writes your history, “enemy” is what he names you. But our history is written in the stars. It is written on our hearts.”

Taking a New Road

Monday, June 13th, 2011 | Eleanor of Aquitaine, The Writing Life | 6 Comments

Eleanor of Aquitaine, the lady I most admire in all the world, was always making herself over. She would change her life, in the face of great odds, whenever she felt change was needed. And she did not just change her hair or the color of her gowns, she changed husbands, kingdoms, her entire world. These changes always cost her something, her old identity, her past, even her children, but always Eleanor moved forward and kept doing what she felt needed to be done to be true to herself. Yet another reason to admire and love her.

The last few days I have been thinking about the need for change in life, and whether or not I embrace it or run from it. I found this quote on a old bookmark, and I love it. So I am going to post it here. It is still relevant almost 20 years later. I am not sure who wrote this, so I have to give the credit to Anonymous.

“By doing what needs to be done right now, we make the most of the present moment.

As long as we are alive, we are free to begin again.

Instead of following an old, worn-out habit, make a fresh start this moment on the rest of your life.

Each day is a new start.

Each moment is a beginning.”

Anne O’Brien and Eleanor of Aquitaine

Monday, June 6th, 2011 | Anne O'Brien, Eleanor of Aquitaine | 2 Comments

I am not the only one obsessed with Eleanor. One of the people who shares my devoton is the lovely Anne O’Brien, author of the novel QUEEN DEFIANT.

It came out under the title of DEVIL’S CONSORT in the UK, and tomorrow, those of us here in the US will be able to get our own copies. QUEEN DEFIANT (US Version) tells of Eleanor of Aquitaine’s first marriage to Louis VII of France, her bid for freedom, and her newfound love for Henry of Anjou.

Anne has agreed to be with us today to tell us about…

Meeting Eleanor of Aquitaine …

Writing about Eleanor of Aquitaine can become a compulsion, as Christy knows from her splendid recent novel To Be Queen.  I found the same urge to tell Eleanor’s story.  What was it that drew me to write about a woman who was born almost nine hundred years ago?

My path first crossed that of Eleanor when I was holidaying in France, and I visited the impressive Abbey of Fontevrault.  And there she was, a Queen of England buried in France.   Eleanor was eighty years old when she retired from the world to live at the Abbey in monastic seclusion, yet remaining headstrong and politically aware until the final months before her death on 1 April, 1204.  There I discovered her, impressive in effigy despite the flaking paint, resting beside her husband Henry II, looking far more serene than I imagine she ever did in life.  Even Henry looks at peace which I think he never was with Eleanor for a mate.

What took my interest was that her hands are raised, not in prayer, but with an open book as if she were reading, her mind still lively even in death.  I like to think she is reading the verses the troubadours would have sung to her, even the ones her grandfather, the famous Duke William IX, might have written; some romantic and tender, some lewd and erotic.  Eleanor would have enjoyed them all.  The image has remained with me until this day.

And then there is the film Lion in Winter, Katherine Hepburn playing a magnificently aging Eleanor opposite an idiosyncratic Peter O’Toole as Henry, a stormy, volatile couple, unable to live together in peace in the final years of their marriage.  When I think of Eleanor as she was in later life, I still see and hear Katharine in that role.  Such power the screen has!

Another ‘meeting’ with Eleanor was in the fresco in the chapel at the castle of Chinon where Henry imprisoned her for long months at a time.  Here Eleanor, with red hair and crown, riding beside her daughter Joanna, is being led away by Henry to imprisonment.  She is handing over the gerfalcon, the symbol of Aquitaine to her beloved son Richard, Coeur de Lion.  I find this a very poignant and moving scene.

And so I was drawn to write about Eleanor, not in her later years as Queen of England, but in her early days in her first disastrous marriage to Louis VII of France and her dramatic union with Henry Plantagenet.  What an amazing life she led.  Exciting, controversial, passionate, not always wise in her choices, she proves herself to be a true heroine.  And what a remarkably strong voice she has despite the passage of time.  Never have I written about a heroine whose character was so clearly formed for me from the first moment I put pen to paper.  Anne Neville in The Virgin Widow, a young girl at the beginning of the book, took time to develop her voice.  Eleanor made herself known instantly.

So how could I resist breathing new life into this dramatic woman so that we might appreciate her today?  I allowed her to speak and act as I thought she would.  This is the story of Queen Defiant.  I loved writing her story; I found Eleanor totally fascinating, as I hope you will too.  Please visit me at my website and on Facebook for regular updates on what we – Eleanor and I – are doing.  I always look forward to hearing from my readers.

Find out more on my website @

http://www.anneobrienbooks.com/

Visit me on Facebook @

http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/anneobrienbooks

You can also follow me, and Eleanor, on Twitter.

Anne, thank you so much for joining us today. QUEEN DEFIANT comes out tomorrow, June 7th, and will be available in bookstores everywhere.

TO BE QUEEN: The Prologue

Wednesday, May 25th, 2011 | Eleanor of Aquitaine, To Be Queen | 5 Comments

I read from TO BE QUEEN during a signing and discussion at Pomegranate Books in Wilmington, NC earlier this month. In this video, I begin by mentioning that Eleanor was 82 when she died, “quite old” for that period. Women usually didn’t live that long. Men either, for that matter. Just one more way in which Eleanor is unique.

A copy of TO BE QUEEN will be given away as part of a celebration of the Romantic Historical Fiction Lovers Group on Goodreads. Join the group, and join us Friday for the celebration…

http://www.goodreads.com/group/show/33864.Romantic_Historical_Fiction_Lovers

Eleanor of Aquitaine and Chick Lit

Wednesday, May 18th, 2011 | Chick Lit, Eleanor of Aquitaine | No Comments

As a reader, I have always enjoyed fun chick lit.  I take the time to pull myself out of the 12th century, and relax away  from the political machinations of the early Plantagenets.  Henry, Eleanor and their sons are endlessly fascinating to me, but there are times when I need to be closer to the here and now, and to read something with a happy ending. When that is true, I turn to authors like Rachel Gibson and to humorous tales of female woe, like BRIDGET JONES’ DIARY. To me, even the title of that book is funny, before I open page one.

Of course, in my mind, all roads lead back to Eleanor, and I ask myself what she would think of this proclivity of mine, the joy I find in light, humorous tales, where no matter what ensues, in the end, love conquers all. Romance novels fit into this category as well, and I enjoy those, too. Romantic love is not a concept Eleanor would allow to take root in her daughters, but for a peasant like me, Eleanor might shrug one elegant shoulder and say that whatever fairy tales I like to tell myself to wile away my hours is my own concern, and can certainly do no harm.

This is the attitude of most of the world, actually, when the subject of chick lit and romance is brought up. A bit of sneer, hidden behind a condescending smile. And yet, there are a lot of us who read these books and love them.

Happy endings are, of course, one huge draw. The familiarity of a known plot arc, with the assurance that the character who is making us laugh at her life, will by the end find true love.  But some of this chick lit romance goes a step further, the heroine learning something more than how to brave the wilds of the dating world, or how to find love in the arms of her chosen man.

Here are a few things good chick lit consistently brings to my mind, things I think even Eleanor of Aquitaine would not protest as peasant foolishness.

Value yourself or no one else will. By the end of these novels, if the characters have not come to learn this, they are certainly closer than when the book began.

The discovery of inner strength. Eleanor was no doubt born knowing her own strength, or at least that it was there to be discovered. A lot of us find our strength by trial and error, and learn to cling to it and nourish it as we get older, so that in turn it can nourish us.

So as summer begins to rise from the ground, I turn to the occasional book of chick lit or romance novel. Sometimes the lessons are less important than having fun. Maybe that’s a lesson, too.