Lesson 1 of the Beyond the Dusty Books course for STAR RWA, September 2019

Hello, All. I’m Christa Bedwin. I'm the only one I know of on the internet, so if you want to learn more about me, I'm easy to Google or find on Amazon.

[I think I should add more detail since this is an intro, but not so relevant to this lesson at the moment: What I mainly write these days is time travel novels between two contrasting cultures: modern California vs. Enlightenment Era Edinburgh, modern west coast against Renaissance Venice, modern Toronto vs. Early Medieval Cornwall, WWII Arizona Navajo vs. 18th century exiled Acadian French mama, etc. I used to teach high school science, and I'm a technical editor, too, so I'm pretty rigorous about getting the historical facts right, and a professor I know this summer mentioned that my footnotes were entertaining. As a student once said about me... I am strict but fun -- one of my favourite compliments ever. Also, I was raised in the Rockies and have been to more than 40 countries. Enough about me for now, but I'd love to hear about you! Please say hello, maybe answer the question below too.]

If you’ve encountered me before around the RWA or web somewhere, you might have heard me talk about the following blog post, about how my son and I travelled and volunteered through Europe and learned a lot of cool ancient skills for my historical writing, for free!

https://www.heartsthroughhistory.com/blog/2018/05/14/rocket-yourself-back-into-the-past-go-wwoofing-to-research-your-next-historical-novel-by-christa-bedwin/

I won’t belabour that blog post at the moment, but if you’d like to see some nice cat and handsome farmer / nobleman (a real nobleman, actually related to the Queen) photos, check it out. The essence of the post is different ways to think outside the box for book research, and in this course, we’ll explore some more ways. How can we make our research even more authentic by getting outside the book box, maybe even getting our hands dirty? And why should we want to? 

And… while I’m talking outside the box, I hope that the following isn’t too esoteric, but I had the following thoughts last night and wanted to share them as the introduction to the course. Have any of you ever been to Cirque de Soleil or Chinese opera or another show from another culture? Or even experienced some Very Unusual custom from the State Next Door? Please tell us about it!

My son and I went to Cirque du Soleil last night (here’s a link to a quick 80-second clip of the show we saw, in case you’re not familiar with it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ig2gKhoGbDk). I realized that what thrills me about Cirque du Soleil is exactly the same as the core message/principle of this class — layers and colours* and surprises and fireworks beyond the expected circus are what make Quebec’s Cirque du Soleil world-class… and also illustrates what we can learn and add to our stories by taking our book research beyond the English-language books and perspectives that we grew up with.

Cirque du Soleil is a circus… but it’s a circus created by people who have a liberal arts education based on the French system: music, art, philosophy, multiculturalism, human rights…. they all come into it. And, of course, liberal doses of joie de vivre, sexual freedom, and love for the human spirit, as only the French can do it (in my opinion).

A standard circus is based on making money and thrilling people, right? So the owners might collect rare animals and, in the past, unusual looking people. They’ll do a repertoire of standard amazing tricks and feats. Some people write their books that way, too, piling in whatever tropes and trends the marketing folks tell them will sell this year. They don’t particularly care about the quality of their tricks, so long as the playbill will sell the circus/ the blurb will sell the book.

Cirque du Soleil, however, is a circus with integrity, bringing in all the colours and layers of French Canadian life — the cast is multicultural, picking and choosing from all the best that Quebec, Canada and the world have to offer, with, for a sampling, a chair stacker from China, a male acrobat tossing in a quick Middle-Eastern inspired bare-chested bellydancing routine. There’s a nod to the LGBTQ community: one handsome male performer gives a girl in the audience a flower. The handsome male performer who follows him outdoes him in stunts, and then takes the flower away from the girl and gives it to a handsome man a few seats along the row, with much flirtation.

Likewise, healthy love between women is celebrated — the heroine of the show, though she dreams a little of love and romance with a man, spends more time dancing with herself (she has an angel self, a future self, a ponderful self…. what a wonderful way to illustrate all the many selves a woman is). And the women who act the selves/guardian angel clearly demonstrate loving, caring, body language between women — no puritanical fears, no sexuality about it, just that simple French body comfort that comes naturally. Anglophones just couldn’t produce this same show, much as we might like to. The culture is different. But we can watch, and learn, and profit from the experience.

Since the show is in Canada, and on ice, of course we need a dog sled… but since it’s Cirque de Soleil, the sledder is on skis, and doing ski jumps during that sketch. And since we have no dogs in this show, and since the French have studied their Rousseau** and their Marx and their Orwell…. let’s have the people in their austere business suits pull the sled. The imagery of several technically stunning dance routines are also rife with social commentary on what the soul deserves and whether that’s a life in a cubicle, or perhaps something more colourful and free?

And some of us want to write our books like that: With colours and layers that make the heart sing, that make the mind ponder. With surprises that are so intense that you actually cry a little (I did: 44 minutes in, on this show -- I checked my watch). With technical tricks and contrasts that simply make you gasp.

And so that when the show, or the book, is over, our readers have learned something new, and want to read it/see it again because there are layers they didn’t catch the first time, or want to luxuriate in again. They’ve caught a detail they just have to read more about. Caught their heart on a character that they just can’t forget.

If you want to write those books, or just think about them over the next month, then you’re in the right place.  [If you'd like to sign up for the course, shoot me a message and I'll point you in the right direction.]

Today's footnotes and further resource:

*Since this is a multicultural course, I’ve decided I just might spell in my native language — Canadian. Expect plenty more foreign words to cross your screen this month, but please feel free to ask about or question anything at all!

**At the moment I have a spare French exchange student teenager in the house (a-ha! another way I study culture without going to the books)... meaning I could ask the boys "what's Rousseau's central tenet again?" and expect them to know the answer. Since they had it on the tip of their tongues but couldn't recall the specifics, quick googling happened to confirm what I thought I meant and will spell out to save you from another google, or incite you to do one: Rousseau believed that we are born with a basic nature in us (here, French student tapped his chest to show that our soul is inside), and that sometimes what we do for society makes us go against our soul... exactly illustrated at Cirque's Crystal by glass cubicles, ice dancers in black and white, and a beautiful brilliant, red-haired girl with a red scarf whose beauty and motion just calls to our souls.

And just for some more foreign funny accents, but all in English, here’s a link to the all-free YouTube BBC podcast channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQ8rts-rIVQG5APBpE-aE7w