New Book on Richard Announced

http://www.thebookseller.com/news/richard-iii-title-bloomsbury.html

Jonathan

Jonathan Evans wrote:
>
> http://www.thebookseller.com/news/richard-iii-title-bloomsbury.html
>
> Jonathan
>
Carol responds:

Thanks, Jonathan. That sounds promising, especially since the author is the history editor of the very reputable TLS, which published the article I linked to earlier discussing Shakespeare's use of "hunchback/bunch-back." It will probably be a scholarly work without much popular appeal, but maybe the findings will trickle down to the general public. I only hope that it doesn't dash our hopes, if that makes sense.

I've bookmarked the site for future reference and will be watching for the book.

Carol

--- In , "justcarol67" <justcarol67@...> wrote:
>
>
>
> Jonathan Evans wrote:
> >
> > http://www.thebookseller.com/news/richard-iii-title-bloomsbury.html
> >
> > Jonathan
> >
> Carol responds:
>
> Thanks, Jonathan. That sounds promising, especially since the author is the history editor of the very reputable TLS, which published the article I linked to earlier discussing Shakespeare's use of "hunchback/bunch-back." It will probably be a scholarly work without much popular appeal, but maybe the findings will trickle down to the general public. I only hope that it doesn't dash our hopes, if that makes sense.
>
>

Actually, judging by both the agency that sold the book and the publisher that bought it, my bet is that the book is at least expected to have popular appeal. Bloomsbury is, after all, the publisher of Harry Potter...

> Actually, judging by both the agency that sold the book and the publisher
> that bought it, my bet is that the book is at least expected to have
> popular appeal. Bloomsbury is, after all, the publisher of Harry Potter...

There's an odd connection between Richard and the Potter books. I had a
very dear friend named John, who sadly died of cancer two years ago. He was
in his seventies when he died, but I've seen photographs of him in his
thirties and at that age he looked so like Richard it was freaky. He had a
little blob on the end of his nose and not quite such a long chin, but
otherwise, it could be the same guy (including the very delicate fine-boned
build) - exacerbated by the fact that he wore his hair in a long straight
bob. I wasn't the only person to notice the resemblance, either - one of
his colleagues later told him that she had been wary of him when she first
met him, because "You look like Richard the Third."

The thing is, John was JK Rowling's Chemistry teacher and her mother's boss,
and he was the principal model for Professor Snape in the Potter books.
John was of course extremely handsome but Snape's appearance in the books
and in Rowling's own drawings is identifiably an unkind, uglified caricature
of John. That means that by a roundabout route Snape's appearance is, in
effect, an unkind, uglified caricature of Richard.

Carol earlier:
> >
> > Thanks, Jonathan. That sounds promising, especially since the author is the history editor of the very reputable TLS, which published the article I linked to earlier discussing Shakespeare's use of "hunchback/bunch-back." It will probably be a scholarly work without much popular appeal, but maybe the findings will trickle down to the general public. I only hope that it doesn't dash our hopes, if that makes sense.
> >
pansydobersby reponded:
> Actually, judging by both the agency that sold the book and the publisher that bought it, my bet is that the book is at least expected to have popular appeal. Bloomsbury is, after all, the publisher of Harry Potter...

Carol again:

True, but Bloomsbury has many departments and has a fine reputation as a publisher of academic books:

http://www.bloomsbury.com/us/academic/

I suspect that the history editor of the Times Literary Supplement will go for the scholarly approach.

Carol

"Claire M Jordan" wrote:
>
> There's an odd connection between Richard and the Potter books. I had a very dear friend named John, who sadly died of cancer two years ago. He was in his seventies when he died, but I've seen photographs of him in his thirties and at that age he looked so like Richard it was freaky. [snip]
>
> The thing is, John was JK Rowling's Chemistry teacher and her mother's boss, and he was the principal model for Professor Snape in the Potter books. John was of course extremely handsome but Snape's appearance in the books and in Rowling's own drawings is identifiably an unkind, uglified caricature of John. That means that by a roundabout route Snape's appearance is, in effect, an unkind, uglified caricature of Richard.

Carol responds:

Which might explain why some of us are also fans of that most misunderstood of Rowling's characters, Professor Snape!

Carol

--- In , "justcarol67" <justcarol67@...> wrote:
> pansydobersby reponded:
> > Actually, judging by both the agency that sold the book and the publisher that bought it, my bet is that the book is at least expected to have popular appeal. Bloomsbury is, after all, the publisher of Harry Potter...
>
> Carol again:
>
> True, but Bloomsbury has many departments and has a fine reputation as a publisher of academic books:
>
> http://www.bloomsbury.com/us/academic/
>
> I suspect that the history editor of the Times Literary Supplement will go for the scholarly approach.
>
> Carol
>

Ah, yes - I stand corrected. I actually had no idea Bloomsbury acquired Continuum and that Continuum no longer exists independently. More's the pity...

The book might indeed be scholarly, but Horspool's previous books seem to be popular history (I haven't read them, though, so I can't say for sure - I'm judging by the reviews) and Straus is a big-name agent, so... who knows. Scholarly or popular, I hope it will be a good book.

--- In , "Claire M Jordan" <whitehound@...> wrote:
>
> There's an odd connection between Richard and the Potter books. I had a
> very dear friend named John, who sadly died of cancer two years ago. He was
> in his seventies when he died, but I've seen photographs of him in his
> thirties and at that age he looked so like Richard it was freaky. He had a
> little blob on the end of his nose and not quite such a long chin, but
> otherwise, it could be the same guy (including the very delicate fine-boned
> build) - exacerbated by the fact that he wore his hair in a long straight
> bob. I wasn't the only person to notice the resemblance, either - one of
> his colleagues later told him that she had been wary of him when she first
> met him, because "You look like Richard the Third."
>
> The thing is, John was JK Rowling's Chemistry teacher and her mother's boss,
> and he was the principal model for Professor Snape in the Potter books.
> John was of course extremely handsome but Snape's appearance in the books
> and in Rowling's own drawings is identifiably an unkind, uglified caricature
> of John. That means that by a roundabout route Snape's appearance is, in
> effect, an unkind, uglified caricature of Richard.
>

That's very interesting! And your friend must have been a handsome man.

Oddly, I recently read the Manga Shakespeare version of Richard III (illustrated by Paul Warren, if I remember the name correctly; I have no idea where I put that book) and I kept thinking how much that version of Evil Richard reminded me of Snape. With more a bit of a young Trent Reznor thrown in.

From: pansydobersby
To:
Sent: Wednesday, February 20, 2013 12:48 AM
Subject: Re: New Book on Richard Announced


> That's very interesting! And your friend must have been a handsome man.

I have described him at that age as "almost supernaturally beautiful: like a
cross between an 18th century Romantic poet and a slightly undernourished
pre-Raphaelite knight." He looked extremely like the SoA portrait - in
which that long chin has been played down a bit. Slightly less like the
reconstruction, mainly because of that chin - but on the other hand the
reconstruction has been given pretty-much exactly John's mouth and eyebrows.

Richard wouldn't have had such a long chin if he'd been born nowadays, of
course. There've been two recent papers indicating that Mediaeval people
had larger, longer and more forwards jaws than we do because their food was
tougher, causing them to chew more forcefully, and also because they had an
edge-to-edge bite (which you can see in Richard), moving the jaw slightly
forwards and down relative to the modern overbite. This was because in the
absence of forks they cut their meat into bite-sized pieces by holding a
chunk of meat in one hand, biting into it and then using a knife held in the
other hand to saw the bulk of the meat off the piece they were biting, which
conjures up a much less refined image than one usually thinks of with
Richard.

I have a long memorial article about John at
www.whitehound.co.uk/Fanfic/A_true_original.htm , if you're itnerested -
with illustrations which give some idea of what Richard himself would have
looked like with stubble and a Cheshire Cat grin.

SPOILER ALERT: Snape also ends up not being quite the coal-souled villain everyone takes him for. JK Rowling: Ricardian?

--- In , "justcarol67" <justcarol67@...> wrote:
>
> "Claire M Jordan" wrote:
> >
> > There's an odd connection between Richard and the Potter books. I had a very dear friend named John, who sadly died of cancer two years ago. He was in his seventies when he died, but I've seen photographs of him in his thirties and at that age he looked so like Richard it was freaky. [snip]
> >
> > The thing is, John was JK Rowling's Chemistry teacher and her mother's boss, and he was the principal model for Professor Snape in the Potter books. John was of course extremely handsome but Snape's appearance in the books and in Rowling's own drawings is identifiably an unkind, uglified caricature of John. That means that by a roundabout route Snape's appearance is, in effect, an unkind, uglified caricature of Richard.
>
> Carol responds:
>
> Which might explain why some of us are also fans of that most misunderstood of Rowling's characters, Professor Snape!
>
> Carol
>

Pansy wrote:
> I have described him at that age as "almost supernaturally beautiful: like a cross between an 18th century Romantic poet and a slightly undernourished pre-Raphaelite knight." [snip]

Carol responds:

*Nineteenth*-century Romantic poets, maybe? The young Romantics (Byron, Shelley, and Keats) were children in the eighteenth century, Byron is the only one who was known for being handsome though Shelley looks rather, well, pretty in some of his portraits. Neither Wordsworth nor Coleridge, the two who were old enough to have produced any poetry in the eighteenth century (and even that was quite late, their joint production of "Lyrical Ballads" in 1798), was known for good looks though Coleridge wasn't bad looking as a young man. That aside, almost all the famous Romantic works other than that first edition of "Lyrical Ballads" were published in the first half of the nineteenth. Ironically, the oldest of the five, Wordsworth, died last, living until 1850.

Carol

Ah that he had passed on before he wrote The Prelude - the bain of my studies for twenty years!  



________________________________
From: justcarol67 <justcarol67@...>
To:
Sent: Wednesday, 20 February 2013, 14:30
Subject: Re: New Book on Richard Announced

 

Pansy wrote:
> I have described him at that age as "almost supernaturally beautiful: like a cross between an 18th century Romantic poet and a slightly undernourished pre-Raphaelite knight." [snip]

Carol responds:

*Nineteenth*-century Romantic poets, maybe? The young Romantics (Byron, Shelley, and Keats) were children in the eighteenth century, Byron is the only one who was known for being handsome though Shelley looks rather, well, pretty in some of his portraits. Neither Wordsworth nor Coleridge, the two who were old enough to have produced any poetry in the eighteenth century (and even that was quite late, their joint production of "Lyrical Ballads" in 1798), was known for good looks though Coleridge wasn't bad looking as a young man. That aside, almost all the famous Romantic works other than that first edition of "Lyrical Ballads" were published in the first half of the nineteenth. Ironically, the oldest of the five, Wordsworth, died last, living until 1850.

Carol

From: justcarol67
To:
Sent: Wednesday, February 20, 2013 2:30 PM
Subject: Re: New Book on Richard Announced


> *Nineteenth*-century Romantic poets, maybe?

Yeah, probably.

> Byron is the only one who was known for being handsome though Shelley
> looks rather, well, pretty in some of his portraits.

It's more the long hair and the fact that in the photo' in which he looks
most like Richard, John is wearing a fine white shirt and looking extremely
dreamy - I've actually labelled the image file "John looking poetic".
Although the composition is somewhat spoiled by some hideous 1970s curtains
behind him.

Re: Wordsworth
I had a English lecturer at university who inplied that he outlived his talent and it would have been better if he had popped his clogs at an earlier age.
Elaine

--- In , Hilary Jones <hjnatdat@...> wrote:
>
> Ah that he had passed on before he wrote The Prelude - the bain of my studies for twenty years!  
>
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: justcarol67 <justcarol67@...>
> To:
> Sent: Wednesday, 20 February 2013, 14:30
> Subject: Re: New Book on Richard Announced
>
>  
>
> Pansy wrote:
> > I have described him at that age as "almost supernaturally beautiful: like a cross between an 18th century Romantic poet and a slightly undernourished pre-Raphaelite knight." [snip]
>
> Carol responds:
>
> *Nineteenth*-century Romantic poets, maybe? The young Romantics (Byron, Shelley, and Keats) were children in the eighteenth century, Byron is the only one who was known for being handsome though Shelley looks rather, well, pretty in some of his portraits. Neither Wordsworth nor Coleridge, the two who were old enough to have produced any poetry in the eighteenth century (and even that was quite late, their joint production of "Lyrical Ballads" in 1798), was known for good looks though Coleridge wasn't bad looking as a young man. That aside, almost all the famous Romantic works other than that first edition of "Lyrical Ballads" were published in the first half of the nineteenth. Ironically, the oldest of the five, Wordsworth, died last, living until 1850.
>
> Carol
>
>
>
>
>
>

Amen (sorry Wills) and Colerdige had a few dross moments too - but back to our Richard.



________________________________
From: ellrosa1452 <kathryn198@...>
To:
Sent: Wednesday, 20 February 2013, 22:02
Subject: Re: New Book on Richard Announced

 

Re: Wordsworth
I had a English lecturer at university who inplied that he outlived his talent and it would have been better if he had popped his clogs at an earlier age.
Elaine

--- In , Hilary Jones wrote:
>
> Ah that he had passed on before he wrote The Prelude - the bain of my studies for twenty years!  
>
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: justcarol67
> To:
> Sent: Wednesday, 20 February 2013, 14:30
> Subject: Re: New Book on Richard Announced
>
>  
>
> Pansy wrote:
> > I have described him at that age as "almost supernaturally beautiful: like a cross between an 18th century Romantic poet and a slightly undernourished pre-Raphaelite knight." [snip]
>
> Carol responds:
>
> *Nineteenth*-century Romantic poets, maybe? The young Romantics (Byron, Shelley, and Keats) were children in the eighteenth century, Byron is the only one who was known for being handsome though Shelley looks rather, well, pretty in some of his portraits. Neither Wordsworth nor Coleridge, the two who were old enough to have produced any poetry in the eighteenth century (and even that was quite late, their joint production of "Lyrical Ballads" in 1798), was known for good looks though Coleridge wasn't bad looking as a young man. That aside, almost all the famous Romantic works other than that first edition of "Lyrical Ballads" were published in the first half of the nineteenth. Ironically, the oldest of the five, Wordsworth, died last, living until 1850.
>
> Carol
>
>
>
>
>
>

Snape liveth yet.

In another possible parallel, Rowling doesn't understand why so many of her readers adore Snape. Just as so many historians...you know.

~Weds


--- In , "justcarol67" <justcarol67@...> wrote:
>
> "Claire M Jordan" wrote:
> >
> > There's an odd connection between Richard and the Potter books. I had a very dear friend named John, who sadly died of cancer two years ago. He was in his seventies when he died, but I've seen photographs of him in his thirties and at that age he looked so like Richard it was freaky. [snip]
> >
> > The thing is, John was JK Rowling's Chemistry teacher and her mother's boss, and he was the principal model for Professor Snape in the Potter books. John was of course extremely handsome but Snape's appearance in the books and in Rowling's own drawings is identifiably an unkind, uglified caricature of John. That means that by a roundabout route Snape's appearance is, in effect, an unkind, uglified caricature of Richard.
>
> Carol responds:
>
> Which might explain why some of us are also fans of that most misunderstood of Rowling's characters, Professor Snape!
>
> Carol
>