Plug-ins

There's a conversation going on right now at Historical Fiction Online, about how we organize research.  Most writers have some form of "process" - the way we manage information and work it into creativity, the way we take inspiration and apply learning to it, and turn the two into writing.  My own MO is not one I suspect many authors, editors, or agents would use, much less endorse, but it works with the way my mind works, and so if I break others' rules I am unconcerned, based on results.

When I began writing, I set up a one-page timeline of major events I wanted to cover.  Very early on, I realized that what I wanted to cover was much more than my initial idea for a novel; and so the timeline became a single-shot view of Clovis' lifetime.  Born here, battled here, ascended ... first son ... marriage ... conversion ... some larger events in his world, but not specific to himself.  It is as high-level a look at the story as is possible.  From there, I began to formulate what I needed to reasearch, and I made a quick study of how to follow tangents within research, to build my world (primary sources on Clovis - particularly for a non-French- and non-Latin-speaker - are not exactly exhaustively thick on the ground; so research by context was necessarily called for), and what tangents not to follow.  I learned how to gauge, very quickly, when to stop following the often interesting threads tangents had to offer.  I learned, too, how to heft something once I had chosen to use it - and, sometimes, how to discard it after all.

For me, writing and research are much less segregated a pair of activities than, as far as I can tell, most other authors (especially in histfic) feel is acceptable.  The writers I hear talk about it all speak of "when to quit researching and start writing" ... but, for me, to withhold the act of writing just isn't an option.  And so, I am writing as I am researching.

Typically blasphemous of me, but I still stand by my finished work.


From the high-altitude view of the timeline, I begin to organize the information by where it fits into the story.  For those things specific to Clovis, it was easy enough to spot what positions certain anecdotes and events should occupy.  In some cases, I had to make a choice, out of theoretical discussions of his life, between one timeline and another.  For instance, much tradition points to Clovis' conversion and baptism being concurrent events, the latter being an observation of the former, and a commemoration of the victory on the field which yielded the conversion in the first place.  There are other possibilities, however; that baptism was viewed, then, in a different way than conversion - and that certain prominent figures actually put it off significantly ... figures on whom Clovis conscientiously may have modeled his own life.  There is also the dynamic of its being a consecration - and a king is concsecreted, already, when he takes his throne.  Finally, there is the fact that Clovis, by necessity of the charisma of his power and of his *lineage* claimed divine descent.

The contradiction between Clovis' expectation of his vital heritage - and his faith in a G-d not content with polytheism outside a certain trinity - presents both an irresistible dramatic opportunity for an author and  a persuasive (to me - and I'm the writer, which puts me in the driver's seat) case for delayed baptism.  The thematic idea, brought to us perhaps courtesy of Gregory of Tours, perhaps out of the reality of Clovis' progress in life, that he modeled himself after Constantine allowed me to use that modeling in a literate way to make certain points.

It would have been impossible for me to write The Ax and the Vase without some delay in the baptism, after conversion.  At root, essentially, I didn't buy the legend - I didn't accept that these two events occurred together.  And so, I placed the baptism well beyond the conversion - and used it to create a scene in which this man, this indomitable power in a crown, actually makes the choice to renounce the tenet of his divine descent ... and accepts that of divine right.

More than a moment's scene, this action is one which informs much of the ensuing history of Europe.  First, Clovis lends his considerable power to an alliance with the Catholic Church - then not the leading light in Christianity, nor in Gaul.  Finally, he accepts a role, as monarch, which in its essence sets that church in an unmached role of supremacy in the world.  This is a tension which played itself out from Becket and beyond, through Henry VIII and the Reformation.  This is a dynamic royals managed in capitulation, or cooperation, or confrontation, for a thousand years after Clovis' death.

This was a scene I needed to see in Ax.  It was one of the choices research gave me.


***

The other choices I had to make, using my research, was where to use such information as had little to do with particular actions by or times in Clovis' life.  I was building a basilica, I studied bricks and ancient church decoration and design.  Clovis needed a beautiful sword; I studied pattern welding.  There was a particular breed of horse popular in northern Europe, a unique animal - and Clovis' army was the first generation of cavalry in a Frankish tradition of infantry warfare.  Clovis' first prince by Clotilde dies ... and I knew the types of grave goods used for royal children.  I knew the relics found in his father's tomb.  I knew the symbolism attached to certain artifacts of burial - for adults; for children.

Some of the study placed itself almost as easily as actions and events; there seemed to be a place for much of it.  I also learned what to set myself to study; introducing a queen into a world, and a story, previously focused only on men, I put time not only into studying the textiles of women's graves - but also to working on the history of costume itself; did lace exist in fourth and fifth century Gaul?  (Answer:  of course not; though fiber-tied textiles have existed for thousands of years, it was not in place in this *time* and place.)  Embroidery.  Material.  Wine.  Crockery.  Jewelry - and its figural design and symbolism.  Carved gems.  Cloisonne'.  The articles of hygeine - sandalwood and ivory; combs and hairdressing; leg wear and dyeing techniques.

The archaeology of graves fascinated me significantly; and it offered the wealth it has a tendency to provide - yet, archaeology being what it is, how much of its knowledge reflected LIFE, as much as death?  Choices had to be made even in what indicated what - about death, or daily existence.  Delineations began to create themselves, even if only in my unprofessional mind.  I know I talked with the archaeologist nearest and dearest to me - yet I don't know that I ever asked for actual advice.  I'm arrogant that way.  But - again - stand by the product.

All the while - a scene here, a piece of dialogue there.  I wrote the blue away - taking the fact of that rare breed of horses, and providing Clovis with a timely, peculiar gift from an ally.  I turned plugs black as I went along, and even worked on flow and knitting them overall.  The tentpoles I put up didn't stand stark and alone; I clothed them with the canvas as I went along.

Utterly unacceptable.

Impossible for me to avoid.

Nothing I would, nor even could, ever apologize for.  Over time, I made this method of work serve me so very well that now I cannot conceive any other way.

Some of my research will stand, too, as tentpoles for the second novel, the work in progress *now*.  I coded, in my texts, as I went along.  Yellow highligher was Clovis'.  Pink for the other work.  Some passages I plugged into Clovis - and also bookmarked in the nascent document set aside for II.  Even some of the pre-edited text first worked for Ax was set down as reminders and context for II.  The two works are different.  But the work on each one went on at the same time.


I work in a way not allowed by any professional expectation in publishing.  Per usual, I refuse to repent this rebelliousness.  Because, for me, it yields such excellent storytelling.

Because I was aborbed in the method of creating my story concurrent to its telling, the research process remained, for me, fresh and engaging.  And because the writing took place in such proximity to the study I had put in to manage its raw materials, that too, for me, remained compelling as I went along.


***


If you are a writer - read, first of all.  Not "for" any reason - only for yourself.  Read second to educate yourself - on the process of writing, sure; and on the process of publishing, whether traditional or otherwise.  Read finally for your readers - and find those you trust, let them read you too.

And through it ALL - write.  All the time, through everything.  Segregate it from research, if that is the way for YOU.  But never actually stop it.  Never let it go.