eek! Lost an hour!

[erastes]

Just realised its 930. not 830 as I thought. Bugger.

So, I'm watching "The 300 Spartans" yesterday and felt decidedly short changed. There was a distinct lack of Spartans in Speedos. *G* I read that Miller was inspired by that film to do his graphic novels, *blinks* He must have more imagination than me. However I'm glad he has.

I finished "The Seventh Son" and found something wonderful. That I'm finally interested in my own country's history.

I know that I have several friends - generally from "younger" countries where there - instead of hundreds of years of dates and battles and marriages - there is just generally "and the beautiful dark skinned natives lived in peace with nature until the English came" - who find my previous loathing of history baffling. I suppose it was because it was taught so horribly. For a start it was only taught over 2 years - we could drop it at Third Year unless we were taking it for O level - and for another thing it was so selective. We learned The Wars of the Roses, The Industrial Revolution, the English Civil War, Peasants Revolt - I can't remember anything else. We didn't do either World War, or anything about Cromwell, or the Irish "Problem"

Hence I didn't know about Cromwell being an utter bastard until much later, or anything about the potato famines until I actually went to live in Ireland. Anything else I learned I learned from Shakespeare

So it was with some delight when I started getting as interested in the York and Lancaster debacle as ever I was with GRRM's world (and yes I understand the reasons for this!) I have realised (way after just about everyone else in the world) that Richard III has been villified, and spun as expertly as any spin doctors of this day and age. How stupid I felt, reading the end of the book and actually longing that Richard would make it - even though I knew that he'd been killed at Bosworth. Idiot that I am.

Well, I'm off to Dad's. I'm late, even thought I got up an hour early. (or so I thought...) *smites the stupid clocking changing*

Comments

[lyras.livejournal.com]

How stupid I felt, reading the end of the book and actually longing that Richard would make it

Oh, I do that.

My Richard III obsession came pretty early, inspired by all the historical novels I could lay my hands on. I did history at A-level, but I was terrible at it, mainly because I was too emotionally involved in events. I remember writing a very earnest essay full of extraneous details about Richard's life, which unfortunately had nothing to do with the topic at hand! The teacher refused to mark it. Mind, he was an awful teacher - he had these photocopied notes, and he'd literally just read these aloud to us in class while our eyes glazed over.

[lareinenoire.livejournal.com]

Oh goodness, I did exactly the same thing -- wrote an essay filled with all sorts of interesting details about Richard III and ended up annoying my teacher, though she did still mark it at least. I'm now writing a PhD dissertation on the consorts from the Wars of the Roses. Apparently I'm still obsessed. ;)

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Ooo - that sounds wonderful!

[lareinenoire.livejournal.com]

I'm having lots of fun with it -- getting to read all sorts of things, ranging from the genuinely awful to the brilliant. At least some of the awful ones are hilarious.

[lyras.livejournal.com]

I'm now writing a PhD dissertation on the consorts from the Wars of the Roses.

Ooh! *happy geeky sigh*

It's good to know that you can love history, and still be emotionally invested in it, but able to distance yourself enough. That's where I failed :).

[lareinenoire.livejournal.com]

We'll see if I'm distanced enough. ;) I was highly annoyed by a recent biography of Anne Neville where the author attempted to call Richard III a paedophile.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Heh. I had a law teacher like that. She was paid damned good money to teach the subject and all she did was read out of the text book!

[lyras.livejournal.com]

To add insult to injury, they were handwritten photocopied notes, and really hard to read when it came to revising for exams!

[aunty_marion]

I haven't read 'The Seventh Son' - who's it by? (If you're interested in Richard III, you should read (if you haven't already!) 'The Daughter of Time' by Josephine Tey.)

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Reay Tannerhill - it's not bad.

I'll certainly look out for that one - thanks!