Thanks to Beth Pehlke of Sourcebooks Landmark, I am giving away one copy of The Courtesan’s Lover.
Book Description:
Francesca Felizzi, former mistress of the Duke of Ferrara, revels in the art of entertaining wealthy men. Astonishingly beautiful, lasciviously talented, and stunningly tempting, she adores the power she wields over her patrons. Francesca knows she must succeed as a courtesan—she has two young daughters to support. But an unexpected encounter threatens to change everything, making it clear that her sumptuous life is a gaudy façade.
Francesca suddenly finds herself and her daughters abruptly plunged into the sort of danger she has dreaded ever since she began to work the streets all those years ago. In the tradition of Sarah Dunant and Marina Fiorato, a compelling and vibrant tale from an up-and-coming fresh voice that readers will want to savor.
About Gabrielle Kimm:
GABRIELLE KIMM lives between the sea and the South Downs, England, where big skies meet open countryside and the tides in the creeks dictate daily activities. She splits her time between her family, her writing, and teaching English locally. She studied at the University of Reading, the University of Oxford, and the University of Chichester.
I invited Ms. Kimm to write a guest post for So Many Precious Books, So Little Time. I would like to welcome you and thank you for agreeing to share with us.
First of all – thank you so much for asking me to come and visit your blog!
One of the things people often ask me at author events, and on blog posts such as yours is ‘as a historical fiction writer, would you like to go back in time?’ My answer is always completely unequivocal – no! I wouldn’t! Of course, a part of me would just love to see the beauties of the Renaissance for myself – to stand in front of a newly-painted Titian masterpiece, to gaze up at the still-wet Sistine Chapel ceiling, to discover, apart from anything else, whether or not I’ve got it right in my books, but so many things make me shudder at the thought of going back to the sixteenth century and getting stuck there!
On the one hand, my antipathy to the idea is based on unromantic practicalities – I’m afraid that life without my wonderful dentist, without antibiotics and a without a flushing toilet just doesn’t appeal!
But then, on the other hand, there’s the whole business of how life was for women in this era. I’m an independent, educated working woman, and I take my intellectual and social freedom very seriously, but it has to be said that for most women in the era in which my books were set – the mid sixteenth century – options for women were extremely limited. This is one reason why it’s been so wonderful writing about a courtesan, for they really were one of the few exceptions.
Yes, there were successful women working in the sixteenth century in Italy – if you were talented enough and determined enough, there were opportunities to succeed. There were artists, like the extraordinary Sofonisba Anguissola, writers, like Christine de Pizan and actors like Isabella Andreini (who will make an appearance in my new book!), but the reality for most women of the period was: little or no education, an arranged marriage, motherhood and total dependency upon father or husband. Not something that most of us would find even remotely tolerable today.
The courtesans were something completely different though, as I discovered when I started researching my novel.
When I realised that Francesca Felizzi, the independent and ambitious mistress to the duke of Ferrara in my first novel, His Last Duchess, had her sights set on becoming a courtesan, I realized that I was going to have to do a fair amount of research, as I knew next to nothing about the glamorous and dangerous world of the Renaissance Courtesan when I started writing.
I began by reading up about the lives of the best known courtesans: Veronica Franco, Harriette Wilson, Cora Pearl, la Belle Otero, Ninon de Lenclos. The list is extensive, and even a brief study of their lives shows a disparate group of women over a couple of centuries, who none the less have various attributes in common: independence, ambition, sex-appeal (interestingly not always beauty) and courage, amongst much else. Even by today’s “anything-goes” standards, some of them were just stunningly naughty too! (One account I read of Victorian courtesan Cora Pearl has her attending a top society fancy dress ball, dressed … as Eve. Not even a fig leaf.)
Then, steeped in the glamour and decadence of the age, I began to worry. Was I at risk of over-romanticising my courtesan? Was I forgetting the fact that, behind the sumptuous dresses and the gorgeous jewels, behind the façade of brilliance and wealth, the unavoidable fact of the matter was that the courtesans were basically just selling sex, with all the inherent dangers that such a lifestyle entails?
So, to make sure I redressed the balance, I immersed myself in a collection of writings by modern women in the contemporary sex industry – strippers, prostitutes, lap-dancers, escorts. Their prose was shocking and vulgar, funny, tragic, heartbreaking, eye-opening, and having read their accounts, I felt very much more secure in my understanding of the possible mindset of a woman in a situation like my courtesan’s. I felt that I understood Francesca much better for having glimpsed the realities of the difficult world behind the glittering façade.
My research didn’t just involve sex though – it brought politics into the matter as well. I discovered early on in the research that the whole of the southern half of Italy was under Spanish occupation at the time I had set my book. On learning this, I had a minor panic! I knew nothing about such things! How could I write about them? I trawled the Internet, and came across a marvellous site called ‘MyArmoury.com’ I joined the site forthwith, so that I could access the messageboard, and I posted a plaintive little plea for help and information. About five different people responded, and they all said to me – you need a man called Gordon Frye. And they gave me Mr Frye’s email address. Gordon Frye, an American, turned out to be first of all an expert on the Spanish Army at the time of the Renaissance, and secondly, one of the most generous and helpful people I’ve come across! Every question I put to him, he answered in copious detail, and in such a way that a non-expert could make total and instant sense of what could have been quite inaccessible information. I owe him a great deal. Here he is in Renaissance costume with a bunch of gorgeous horses.
I also had to find out about ships (another thing about which I know almost nothing!). There is a bunch of rather scurrilous privateers in The Courtesan’s Lover, and they sail a beautiful little ship called a sciabecco (sometimes known as a xebec) which was apparently the vessel of choice for the aspirational pirate, due to its small size and nippy versatility. Now, I’m a dyed-in-the-wool landlubber and never venture out to sea unless I absolutely have to, despite living in a village on the South Coast of England which practically lives and breathes small-boat sailing, so I had to plunder the knowledge of various local boat-men to get my sea-faring scenes accurate. (And, much to my expert friend Stuart’s amusement, my first draft got almost every technical detail almost diametrically wrong! Wind-direction, depth of water, currents, sail-setting – everything! He soon put me right, luckily). But here’s a sciabecco – a model of one, anyway – isn’t it just beautiful?
Researching something like a historical novel can be seriously painstaking – but, as I’ve always, since I was tiny, been someone who loves ‘finding things out’, it really is a pleasure. I meet wonderful, generous people along the way, and am always amazed by their expertise and generosity, and I’ve come out of writing each book so far just so delighted to know stuff I didn’t even know I didn’t know, if you see what I mean! As I’ve said many times before – I really do love my job!
Thanks again for having me on the blog – I hope you enjoy The Courtesan’s Lover!
Gaby x
This giveaway is for Canada and U.S. and ends on May 29, 2012. Please use Rafflecopter to enter.
Copyright 2007-2010: All the posts within this blog were originally posted by Teddy Rose and should not be reproduced without express written permission.