As a writer of historical
fiction, expecting the release of my first ‘Tudor’ novel
sometime this year, it’s encouraging to see the signs that
historical fiction is experiencing resurgence. Indeed, five
novels short-listed for the 2001 Parker Romantic Novel are set
in the past:
Elizabeth Chadwick - Lords Of The White Castle (12th and 13th
century)
Philippa Gregory - The Other Boleyn Girl/Harper Collins
(Tudor)
Joanne Harris - Five Quarters Of The Orange/Doubleday –WWII
Jane Jackson - Eye Of The Wind/Robert Hale – (18thC)
Michelle Paver - A Place In The Hills/Corgi – (Roman Timeslip)
Many Australian writers also use history as a vehicle to
explore universal themes. Scraping through Stone by Judith Fox
(a writer based in Sydney) is one such novel. Judith Fox’s novel
tells the story of a young girl escaping an arranged marriage by
disguising herself as a young man. Thus disguised, she journeys
to the armies of the third Crusade - the crusade of Richard the
Lion-heart.
About twenty pages into the narrative, I realised that some
of Fox’s storyline resonated with another novel on my
bookshelves: Shield of Three Lions, by Pamela Kaufman. Both
novels have as their main characters young noble girls, who take
on male identities, with the aim of reaching the crusades of the
first Richard of England. Both characters spend time at the
University of Paris, befriend prostitutes and join a troupe of
performers. Both characters - in their boy's disguise- catch the
eye of Richard. Though, at this point, the character in Fox’s
book decides then to return to her female gender. The two novels
even have their two female characters falling in love with a
Scottish knight, escaping from his dysfunctional family.
Yet- the writers ‘flesh’ their stories in entirely different
ways. Whilst the writer of the Shields strived to adhere
‘soothly’ to the canon of historical romance, where all ends
happily, Fox’s novel falls in the category of literature that
uses history as its platform for expression. Scraping through
Stone’s interest remains with the internal struggles of her two
main Characters, as they search for identity and learn that not
even death takes from you what you love.
Fox’s lyrically woven and beautifully wrought tale – heavily
threaded with grief and terrible bloodshed - takes the reader
into an almost mystical realm, as if we journey with Fox’s
characters in an epic dream. A novel of sensitivity, Scraping
through Stone brought me close to tears.