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The Augusta

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  1. The Augusta

    All done!

    By The Augusta,

    I'm patting myself on the back for two reasons today. Not only did my lads give an entertaining account of themselves (yes - note that word: 'entertaining') against Birmingham to start the new season off with 3 points and 63 home games unbeaten (not to mention Manure's humbling draw), but MORE IMPORTANTLY - my draft of 'Livia' is complete! Those of you who have followed this sad little tale of woe will know that I was struggling with a Tolstoyan word count earlier on, and now find that my complete draft is done at around 140,000 words. So, I now put her away for a week, before taking her out again for a one-off revision. I have suffered with her through countless disappointments and trudged with her through Spartan forests and Campanian dirt-tracks to find myself exhausted with churning out prose and dialogue. The empress has possessed me like Puzo possessed Regan over the last few months, and I will be glad to have a little rest from her constant babblings in my ear. When I reached the last few exchanges, I thought 'Is this really the sweet little thing from page one?' So - I must have achieved what I set out to achieve, and I will now set about her with a ruthless red pen and hopefully, not too much re-writing will be necessary. Oh, Liv - it's been a long hard slog, but we've got there in the end, you and I.
     
    I know that there are one or two other budding writers on the board - not to mention our esteemed Flavia, who will have been through all this rigmarole years ago - so I do have allies in this world of insanity. And insanity it is - let me tell you. Have you any idea what it is like to try to sleep at night with 'scenes' and dialogue exchanges buzzing in your head, so that you have to get back up, turn the computer back on and get them onto hard drive before they fly away forever? I now feel that I could walk up to Tiberius Nero in the street and slap him on the back. (And he did the dirty on me as a character. I wanted him to be vile and he took over my brain and made himself quite sweet in a dreary, droning sort of way.) I see actresses on TV and shout 'See - she's a Livia type' because I have this face in my mind's eye 24/7! As for my four totally fictional characters - I now want to know why they're not mentioned in Plutarch! I tell you, guys and gals, to write historical fiction I do believe you have to be just a little bit mad! And I now know why Roberts Graves went to Majorca to live on a bottle of vodka and 40 cigarettes a day!
     
    But the hard work and the main story lines are all done now, so I am sitting back tonight with a well-earned vodka and coke (decaf, of course) and preparing to print out a rain forest of paper to attack in a week's time. Or I may even leave her a little longer than that, while I remember that I have another life... Is there another life? Oh, yes - there's UNRV and the Premier League..... and work, of course.... lots of patients with left ventricular hypertrophy and left main stem stenoses. Nah! The real world isn't half as good as writing.....
  2. The Augusta
    I now find that my drafted Livia has reached the sprawling mass of 92,000 words and she's only just escaping from Perusia. This means that unless some drastic editing is done, by the time we reach 35BC where I propose to end this first part of her story, the book will be pushing towards epic proportions. And so I set about pruning; weeding out gorgeous little cameo characters that have been a joy to create but who can be sacrificed as they add nothing to the overall story. I look through, re-read, decide where I can combine that incident with that one, thus cutting out the need for that and so forth. I kid myself that it's all good fun, when in fact it's bloody hard work. It is indeed far more difficult to prune and edit than it is to write in the first place. Dialogue is my problem, I am fast discovering. I love writing it, and not to blow my own trumpet too much, I know I write it well. But I write too much of it! I am, first and foremost, a communicator; therefore, so are my characters. So, should I stick with more dialogue and cut down the narrative? Choices, choices. Choices and sacrifice. Which characters can go? Do we really need him, or her? Does she really need that conversation with her father in that scene etc. etc?
     
    And then I consider my theatrical background: perhaps, as dialogue/characterisation is some of my strongest writing, I should turn the bloody thing into a play! No - it would make Richard III seem like a one act fringe offering! I want to finish this damned novel, and I will do it if it kills me. So - a major culling is on the cards. Superfluous characters will be crucified forthwith and any scene that does not advance the story or illustrate some part of Livia's character will be axed. I must be strict with myself and not wallow in self-indulgent babbling about this gorgeous world we all love. For god's sake - how many Romans do I need to bring back to life? And do I need to add to my problems by creating even more fictional ones? No! Let's leave fictional characters to a minimum. The odd slave who helps. Get rid of her childhood tutor; does her nurse really need to have that miscarriage? All superfluous. Have I learned nothing from that bloody TV series with its meandering sub-plots? This is not Catherine Cookson!
     
    I will arm myself to the teeth for the drastic cuts, and my goal is now to get Liv to the Spartan forest fire in an absolute maximum of 200 pages, leaving an equal number for development of her story with that little blonde chap she has to marry. I will need all the help Apollo and his nine maidens can send me!
  3. The Augusta

    Jumping the Shark

    By The Augusta,

    Inspired by the disenchanted posts now appearing from our UNRV members, I take the liberty of cutting and pasting a blog I actually wrote on 18th January this year, originally posted by me on 'Why Space'. It's harsh but it is how I feel.
    _________________________________________________________________________________________
     
     
    Decline and Fall - another closet-opening admission
    Current mood: disappointed
    Category: Movies, TV, Celebrities
     
     
    So the second series of the HBO/BBC collaboration, 'Rome', has finally premiered in America. So far, we have no date for it to be screened on the BBC, and who knows - if the gods are kind, maybe we won't get it at all.
     
    Don't get me wrong: I am like any other member of a minority whose beloved subject does not receive enough quality TV time; we seize upon what is offered us like grateful dogs squabbling over scraps and attempt to bring all our intellectual powers and insights to bear upon the offering, in an attempt to turn it into art. 'Rome' is as far from art as 'Dynasty', and as far from history as 'Asterix the Gaul' - in fact, Asterix has the nod.
     
    I am not just a crusty old classicist/ancient historian with my nose buried in Tacitus and Dio. Of course I want my beloved Roman boys to live and breathe on the screen, and in an authentic setting, and this is where HBO have triumphed. Like Roman Abramovich, they have put in the money; and like Roman Ambrovich, they expect their millions to have some return. To do this it is necessary to sacrifice intricate and complex historical narratives for gloss, soap opera style dialogue and glittery bitches - in other words, entertainment for the masses, so the masses will tune in. In Britain, alas, for Series 1 the masses tuned in for a couple of episodes and rapidly tuned out again. This was a pity, for the series is certainly not aimed at historians.
     
    As with most US/UK collaborations, our American cousins want to involve us when they require 'class' (their interpretation - not mine). They put in the money, they gave us and the Italians the casting, and even called a historical adviser to give their soap opera that aura of authenticity. The historical advisers have done well. The enormous budget has been spent on accurately reproduced sets full of authentic details such as religious rites, wall-paintings, a grimy Aventine and Subura, and the changing of the calendar on the wall of The Regia. All of which, to we historians, adds the right flavour and seduces us into believing for a moment or two that we are really in the Rome of the first century BC. I'm even prepared to overlook the anachronisms in some of the female costumery and coiffure, for I generously allow that glittery bitches from whatever era must have a certain sex-appeal, and no-one looks sexy in a stola. I am not a prude, and love a good sexy scene as much as the next full-blooded human, but some of the sex in 'Rome' has been purely gratuitous - with even the obligatory titillating lesbian scene to hook in the men. Did Octavia (that paragon of ancient rectitude whom even the most scurrilous Roman chronicler could find nothing against) ever really shag Brutus's mother? I am pretty sure she didn't shag her own brother, but what the hell - trying to prove that she didn't is something akin to trying to prove the existence of God. Octavia, however, certainly shagged her first husband Marcellus, who was not in the first series at all - his place was taken by a mythical person called Glabius, who was done away with to advance a thin plot. Atia, mother of the future Emperor Augustus, was busy shagging Mark Antony, when she should have been happily shagging her second husband Phillipus - another non-person in Series 1. None of this did anything to help us understand the history; it was purely for 'entertainment'.
     
    When the show first aired on the BBC last year, I watched the first two episodes and gave up. Later, I thought I'd give it a fairer go and bought the boxed DVD set. I did give it a fair go. I carefully watched each episode about three times each, and the more I saw, the more I began to hate this overdone soap. Poor scripts can be given some life and weight by superb acting, and like its sets, the acting does rescue 'Rome' to a degree, but the liberties taken with the history have finally tipped me over the edge. I read an American review online today, in which the reviewer told us that Marcus Agrippa declares his love for Octavia. I think that may just have been the breaking point for me.
     
    If you know nothing of the history (which is fascinating in itself if dealt with properly), and wish to see good performances and impressive sets; if you can engage with Alexis Carrington in a long frock, and two largely fictional characters who seem to be changing the history of the world, then you will enjoy 'Rome'. As for me - I am putting this one to bed.
  4. The Augusta
    I haven't blogged for ages - which is something I must rectify. However, I will recommence my musings by admitting to a terrible vice. I AM OBSESSED WITH LARA CROFT. There - I've said it. You must think what you will. As a female I have the inherent ability to multi-task. This means that I will be able to complete my review on Severus; scrape together something vaguely erudite about Dixon's Reading Roman Women; visit the Forum every day to read new posts and contribute to any that take my fancy; stay in touch with certain friends by PM; work, eat, clean bathrooms (a hard task this morning in sweltering heat), shop, and administer affection and basic care to two cats. BUT - I must also find time for Lara. Lara, when she breezes into my life every year or two, leaping her way across chasms, solving riddles and fighting nasty baddies, claims a great part of my heart and my attention. This attention, since yesterday, 1st June 2007, or 'L-Day', has been fractionated once again as I anxiously thrust the disk into the PS2 and get cracking!
     
    Tomb Raider: Anniversary. The latest offering from Eidos starring my favourite lady after Livia! Purchased at 9.15am yesterday morning by this very sad middle-aged woman who has had a special relationship with one of the greatest game heroines ever, I salivated all through the working day; the anticipation was almost too much, but eventually, at about 7pm last night, I settled down to send Lara off on her latest adventure. It's not a new adventure, of course: Anniversary is Lara's farewell to PS2 before she steps prettily over to the new PS3 next year. So, Eidos have put out a total remake of the very first Tomb Raider, which was one of the best games ever devised. Therefore, we know the storyline and the levels - more or less - but everything has been enhanced with the new game engine and gorgeous graphics that have turned the original landscapes into sheer wonderment. Those pesky velociraptors(?sp) are much more troublesome this time round - especially as I, as a veteran Raider, set the game to 'difficult'. Even those silly bats can hurt my Lara. For the first level - those gorgeous caves in Peru - I struggle to get back into analogue stick mode! Lara was a D-pad girl when she was in all her glory, but I know times must move on. A few tumbles off high cliffs later and I am back in the swing of things, especially as I get my fingers working in tune with the 'jump and grapple'. I happily find all secrets and complete the level after a few stumbles and little or no damage to health. Thankfully, Eidos and Crystal Dynamics have abandoned the ridiculous headset worn by Lara in the last game, Legend, and she is back to the lonely tracking through endless ruins, where eerie background music sends a tingle down the spine. Just Lara alone, meeting up with her wolves and bears. When we finally arrive at 'The Lost Valley', our old friend the T. Rex has become a real boss. No longer can we hide behind rocks and sneak out to fire at him; he is a real piece of work this time and takes a lot of skill to despatch. But I finally do it, and feel the old adrenalin rush and that sense of achievement when he lies dead. This is what Tomb Raider was always about, and Eidos have triumphed once again.
     
    So, going to bed at 2.10am last night/this morning, I asked myself: just what is it about Tomb Raider that attracts me like no other game? I love the Caesar games - constructive, thoughtful etc.; I love other 'puzzle' and adventure games such as Prince of Persia or even the earlier Silent Hills (the latest two were rubbish). I have never been a 'shoot-em-up' fan, nor a driving fan, and although I'm a fan of football, the soccer games bore me rigid. But Lara rules supreme for me. It could be because she is female, and everything we all want to be. It could be because she raids tombs and ruins, which fits with my love of the ancient world. It may even be because Tomb Raider 2 (my ALL TIME favourite) was the very first game I ever played on a Play Station when my son got one for Christmas (he was 6!). I don't really know what magic Lara holds, but her charisma infects me yet again with each new game - even the bad ones like Angel of Darkness and the ridiculously easy and short Chronicles. I play my favourite ones over and over again when I find myself bored. She is incredibly therapeutic when I want to kill someone.....
     
    So, thank you Miss Croft. I may flirt with Persian princes and build Roman cities, but you will always be my number one girl!
  5. The Augusta
    I read through my re-drafted draft of the re-drafted draft of Parts 1 and 2 of my Livia work-in-progress last night. To anyone who has not yet realised that I am a crazy aspiring novelist with a toxicity fetish, let me clear this up now. I have been drafting things for many years. I once got as far as sending something to Macmillan many years ago, to be told that I could definitely write and should choose a more modern subject as Rome was not the order of the day. Bugger 'em - I thought. So, they published Thomas Hardy - what do they know? However, given this vague praise from an actual publishing house that people have heard of, made me thrust out my chest and get on with it. So, a novel about Octavian's rise to power languished in my bedroom drawer for about 15 years! I had entitled it 'Imperium' (thank you Robert Harris - who does not let his titles rest in his drawers!). Then I took it out and added most of Gus' reign to it (down to banishment of Postumus) and entitled it 'Emperor' (thank you, Conn Iggulden!). I finally decided to scrap all that and make the bloody thing about Livia instead - and after all, she needs to speak to the world with her own voice for once. As yet I have no title - nor will I ever tempt fate by entitling it anything until it goes off on its long round of cruising for a customer. (Imperatrix sounds far too much like *or*!) So, let us just call it 'Livia' for now and have done! And there is a bonus for me - now that the POV has shifted to a lady, I don't have to write all the battle scenes from Grip and Gus' POV! (I can remember my very first Philippi took a week just to draft, and then I had to rewrite because I realised Brutus' lines were drawn up in the wrong order!) No - I'll leave the military stuff to Conn and others. Hats off to 'em! (I didn't do a bad Actium, as I seem to remember - perhaps I'm more nautical than I thought! - although I did chicken out a bit and have Cleo frantic on her flagship while Arruntius was lurking up her pretty little posterior and Lurius was lying on his oars! ) )
     
    Enough of such tomfoolery! I am now seriously trying to do our Livia some justice and was quite pleased with Parts 1 and 2 (down to marriage to T. Nero). But as all writers are supercritical of their own efforts, I found myself loving some of it, and hating other bits. Whole scenes need chopping, others need expanding. I need to tweak a bit here, and polish a bit there, while still trying to keep the pace of Part 1 going in an increasingly more political Part 2. I have enjoyed recreating just how devastating an effect the Proscriptions had on the nobles though, and there is a certain 'death' which happens to a purely fictional character but is part of my own story that I think goes quite well. And listen to this, folks - at last a novel/recreation or whatever you want to call it, that actually has a place for Salvidienus Rufus! (Not the nicest of guys, however.)
     
    What I am trying to do in this work, seriously, is to show how the events of Liv's early life shaped her personality and character - into the woman she would become. (And no - it does not include poisoning!) Like all heroines she has flaws as well as virtues, otherwise she would not be real, but the process is proving to be very enjoyable. What I am most pleased with is that the woman emerging is telling her story with a mixture of humour, poignancy and downright matter-of-fact Roman hard-headedness, and still managing to be a lady into the bargain. I am intending to take the story to 35BC after the victory at Sicily when the tide really turned for that little blond thing she married and she was awarded her first statue and her person was made sacrosanct, which has a direct bearing on the way I have shaped the fictional account of her childhood, thus bringing the novel full circle.
     
    For those who write (Skarr in particular) - there is a certain amount of satisfaction in seeing a character take shape into a full-blooded person from just a few scraps of historical data: Livia's father, for instance, has more or less run away with me and formed his own character. I intended him to be a cold fish, and he's turned out to be a complex, warm and honourable man who I will be sorry to part with. Her mother I have had to create almost from scratch, but I've had a lot of fun with our Alfidia. I shall be sorry to lose her too, and as we have nothing in our sources to say when, where or how she died, I may even change my mind yet about her end. My purely fictional characters are much easier to deal with as they only have constraints of historical context, not fact.
     
    But it is definitely an obsession. When I don't write for a few days, I feel her watching me! It was her birthday recently - I churned out three whole chapters! She is here, and she is keeping an eye on me. I only hope I can do her justice.
  6. The Augusta
    And so I prepare to compose my first blog. A little explanation is perhaps required about the figs. The blame for this obsession is to be laid very firmly at the feet of our dear Pertinax, who, through posting a video clip taken from Episode 4 of Claudius, has now made figs synonymous with my cyber-personality. It was something that tickled my fancy and I am grateful to our Pertinax for it. I wonder if he knows that the esteemed lady did in fact cultivate her own fig tree at Prima Porta, named 'The Livian'.
     
    I could wax lyrical on my thoughts for the day, of course; I could even post a long philosophical essay about the meaning of life, but I won't. As the subject of my first blog I will take the UNRV itself. The Thanksgiving thread is to blamed for this, as it made me realise that no matter what life throws at us, there is always something to be thankful for. I have many things: two kids who bring me more laughter than tears; an over-attached Persian cat for whom I am very much the centre of the universe; a job that I actually like - yes, a first, and a decent boss. I say decent, but there are one or two reserves. Simon is a Consultant Cardiologist and all-round scientific genius, obsessed with making money. We rub along well together, and after 6 years in his employ, I can get away with murder. Simon, however, has a simple philosophy in life: work, work, work, for it brings money, money, money. So what? - I hear you all say: many people are like that. But in Simon's case it has become so much of an obsession that the old phrase 'all work and no play' aptly applies to make Simon a very dull boy. He extends this philosophy to his children and wife. In vain poor Pamela begs to go on holiday for a whole fortnight each year. No, Simon says: two weeks away from work is a waste. He will, after much bludgeoning by Pamela, consent to a week's sojourn in the Scilly Isles. But come this February - fanfare and drum-roll - the lovely Pamela has finally persuaded him to go away for a week's ski-ing. So that is my boss. A man so brilliant that he has government funding to invent an artificial left ventricle - although funds have dried up at the moment and his research has suffered a setback because he can't get hold of any more pigs. Don't ask! (It is of some comfort that they receive a full general anaesthetic.)
     
    I spend my working day like this: toiling away at the computer and dealing with a hundred very demanding private patients who believe that the world begins and ends with them and Simon is their personal physician. I type 50 plus very long letters a day. There are times when I am on automatic pilot.....
     
    And then I visit UNRV. Truth to tell, I even have the odd quick visit during the working day. This site has become a haven for me. I spend the day- when not typing - listening to my colleagues (charming as they are) chatting on about the latest 'Big Brother' eviction, or who will win the celebrity 'Come Dancing' series. Added to this is the usual office bitching about 'those downstairs' who never do a hand's turn and moan on and on about how much work they have to do. And we must throw in for good measure the usual collection of hypochondriacs, who are always to be found in any medical establishment. I have one colleague who persistently hurls her bowels into the daily conversation at every opportunity; another who has so many ailments that she is a medical phenomenon; and a third who hijacks the nearest visiting consultant to inject her thumb joint, made painful by repetitive strain injury on the computer keyboard. Repetitive strain injury? Ye gods! She should have bashed away at an old manual Remington!
     
    I had discovered Forums on the Internet for almost every sphere of interest over the years, and one day I decided to type into Google 'Roman History Forums' - et voila! I hit the enter key with no great hopes, I have to say. Many Forums (of course it should be fora) are a let down when you get there: filled with trolls and posters whose vocabulary seems largely to consist of vulgarities strung together with the odd 'and' or 'but' or 'innit'. Imagine my joy when I read posts from Primus Pilus, Cato, Ursus, Phil, Decimus, Doc, Pertinax, Wotwotius, Gaius Octavius, all discussing topics of great interest to me - and in beautiful English! Even Andrew Dalby was there! I was in seventh heaven. This is not to say of course that there are no other good Forums out there. Surprisingly enough I am a member of a Chelsea Supporters forum which is filled with well-educated, knowledgeable people who, while biased (naturally), nevertheless write a decent prose. But this one is clearly at the pinnacle. I sometimes feel very humble to be among such company. It is a place where I can exchange knowledge, learn new things, and benefit from the persuasiveness of a decent, well-formed argument, even if it goes against my own views. Everyone is polite and welcoming; no-one is made to feel that they don't belong or are simply being tolerated. However, the troll types are given short shrift, and well done to our Triumvirs for that.
     
    But most of all, this is a place where I can laugh. After a hard day's work and an hour or so listening to the latest traumas and dramas of teenagers' lives, I can relax and come to UNRV. It really is like settling down on the sofa with a glass of red wine and pampering myself. A huge thank you to all of you out there.
  7. The Augusta
    So this is a Roman site, but I must be indulged here. Today I watched my beloved Blues win the Carling Cup against a young Arsenal side that gave us a bloody good run for our money. But all that was nothing. Around the hour mark in the match our Captain, John Terry, was stretchered off after swallowing his tongue and being KO'd for a whole 5 minutes, after a sickening (accidental) injury in the penalty box. Despite being a central defender, he went in for an attacking header and firmly connected with the boot of Arsenal's Diaby, which wrenched his chin back and nearly knocked his head off his shoulders. These things happen, it is football. The Arsenal player responsible was in tears. JT himself, knocked out cold, came round in hospital and could not remember anything about the day at all beyond eating his breakfast. After scans on his neck, which showed it wasn't broken, and brains scans that showed ho haemorrhage, he insisted on going back to the Stadium to catch the end of the celebrations and thank the lads for winning the game for him.
     
    There are jokes about Terry in the British Press, and among British football fans. If JT's leg was severed in a match, so the saying goes, he would have the physio sew it back on and he would play on. Beneath the humour there is the truth of the matter: this is a working class hero who cares little for the money he earns - having been at Chelsea since he was a YTS lad of 15 - who bleeds for his team, and will one day, as I said to my daughter today, be prepared to offer his life for a mere football team. It's the stuff heroes are made of. Old-fashioned heroes. The boy is an old-fashioned centre-half who will dive in amongst feet when there are 92 minutes on the clock and his team are winning 4-0 - just to stop the opposition scoring. Among today's mercenaries who come to 'big' clubs so that they can earn
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