Historical Novels? (Siege of Malta)

[sbrothy]

I just received a slap over my fingers with a good old-fashioned slide-rule. Officially for an off-topic post but, in reality for falling victim to the Dunning-Kruger Effect.

Thus I hope I don't overstep any unmarked lines here when I offer a historical view of one of my pet peeves in relation to the Knights Hospitaller. This is after all a history forum...

Basically, what I'm trying to say is that I know this is off-topic to the thread started by @pines-demon (as all I've got to go on is the word "l'Hospital" taken completely out of context) as well as to "my own" thread as that's (at least technically) about physics.

So a new subject it is. Perhaps some of you have good suggestions for other historical novels. A favorite genre of mine second only to SciFi.

I’m a particular fan of Jean de Valetta. If there ever was a real action hero and a master social engineer I’ll wager he fits the bill pretty well.

My infatuation with this particular part of history was catalyzed by reading The Religion.

I subsequently connected some of the details of the book (specifically the tactical and sociological ones) with the real history and I think the novel held up pretty well. During my search for the book and links I also stumbled across this: Knights of Malta


EDIT: “Fun fact”: According to my link above it seems historians generally agree that Jean de Valette was around 67(!) at the time of The Siege of Malta. That’s a pretty hardcore age for a man to be wielding a sword in the middle of the fray in 1565! A sword, I might add, I probably couldn’t even lift.

 

[sbrothy]

Although this one might be more on the fictional side (even flirting a little - not much - with metahpysics), there are a lot of historical accuracies too.

The Physician (The Cole Trilogy)

"A child holds the hand of his dying mother and is terrified, aware something is taking her. Orphaned and given to an itinerant barber-surgeon*, Rob Cole becomes a fast-talking swindler, peddling a worthless medicine. But as he matures, his strange gift—an acute sensitivity to impending death—never leaves him, and he yearns to become a healer.

Arab madrassas are the only authentic medical schools, and he makes his perilous way to Persia. Christians are barred from Muslim schools, but claiming he is a Jew, he studies under the world’s most renowned physician, Avicenna. How the woman who is his great love struggles against her only rival—medicine—makes a riveting modern classic."

*
"A "bartskær" (Danish), "bartscherer" (German) was a barber/harcutter who also worked as an entertainer and autodidact "surgeon", treating wounds for people unable to afford a real doctor. They often served in the military as fieldmedics."
---- https://denstoredanske.lex.dk/barber

In medieval times where medicine was based on the "4 color balance theory" I'd prefer one of these over a munk with only theoretical and pseudoscientific knowledge.

I was a little surprised that it was made into a film already in 2013! But I'm sure you'll agree that the movie adaptions seldom do the original novels any favors.

 

[BWV]

A few that have IMO believable historical characters and events (i.e. not costume dramas with modern attitudes and pulp plots)

I Claudius and Count Belisarius by Robert Graves
Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy
The Battle by Patrick Rambaud (about the Napoleonic battle of Aspern-Essling)
The Dying Grass by William T Vollman (mammoth book about the Nez Pierce war)
All for Nothing by Walter Kempowski (family in E Prussia as the Soviets invade at the end of WW2)
Zama by Antonio Di Benedetto (existential novel about minor official in 18th century spanish empire)

 

[sbrothy]

Starting this thread I was thinking mostly litterature, but if we're branching into film/TV (no reference to previous poster) this one is worth a watch:

Rome TV Series.

Not only isn't it excessively drawn out, it's also touches on a lot of history - while admittedly still being a TV-drama - meaning the protagonists miraculously get broiled up in somewhat ludicrous amounts of historical happenings, I guess that's TV for ya.

 

[Frabjous]

I Claudius and Count Belisarius by Robert Graves

Great books.

I would add
Memoirs of Hadrian by Yourcenar
A Place of Greater Safety and Cromwell trilogy by Hilary Mantel

 

[BWV]

Great books.

I would add
Memoirs of Hadrian by Yourcenar
A Place of Greater Safety and Cromwell trilogy by Hilary Mantel

The Abyss is another one by Yourcenar

also, Memoirs of Hadrian is getting made into a TV series
https://deadline.com/2024/02/margue...an-tv-adaptation-andrea-iervolino-1235832745/

 

[pinball1970]

I read Leon Uris "Exodus" years ago.

 

[sbrothy]

I read Leon Uris "Exodus" years ago.

Sounds promising. I know it’s wiki, and wiki itself (read: the bunch of fanboys editing the article) even admits it’s a little vague… still, “selling the filmrights” to a novel you haven’t yet written strikes me as very amtitious and self-secure.

 

[Klystron]

A few that have IMO believable historical characters and events (i.e. not costume dramas with modern attitudes and pulp plots)

I Claudius .... by Robert Graves
Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy
...

"I, Cladius" was also adapted as a cable series starring the illimitable Derek Jacobi in the eponymous role. Jacobi's st-st-stutter alone is worth a view.

"Blood Meridian" ranks among the finest American literature along with Cormac McCarthy's other 19th and 20th Century novels including "Child of God" and his "Horses" trilogy. The first novel in the trilogy, "All the Pretty Horses", has been made into a film starring Matt Damon.

Often compared to James Joyce, Cormac McCarthy includes and invents unique descriptors and arcane terms seldom encountered outside serious literature. Like e e cummings, old Cormac's lack of accepted punctuation and indentation requires close reader attention if only to identify which character is speaking. I recently reread "The Orchard Keeper" for the third time in order to fully understand the convoluted relationships among the characters.

Spoiler: Who killed whose daddy?

Bootlegger Marion Sylder strangles evil Rattner, who is not a war hero and definitely by the final sequence lacks a platinum plate in his ugly skull, but only after Rattner breaks Sylder's shoulder while stealing his Ford coupe. Rattner is probably the father of Marion Sylder's erstwhile sidekick and the nephew of the eponymous Keeper.

 

[sbrothy]

"I, Cladius" was also adapted as a cable series starring the illimitable Derek Jacobi in the eponymous role. Jacobi's st-st-stutter alone is worth a view.

Especially for me as I stutter too. So I can totally put myself in Claudius’ sandals (We have so much in common!) Up until he was poisoned. I want no part of that!

 

[sbrothy]

Especially for me as I stutter too. So I can totally put myself in Claudius’ sandals (We have so much in common!) Up until he was poisoned. I want no part of that!

Which reminds me that his actual murder (perpetrated by Agrippina?!) is written and drawn in vivid detail in the comic (graphic novel):

Murena

Rright down to the, also poisoned, feather.

I consider this on-par with an actual historical novel. Including the amount of research that went into it.

 

[Klystron]

As we loosen your selection criteria for historical novels, consider Bernard Cornwell's prodigous output. While not a fan of his popular "Sharpe's Rifles" series of novels, I rather enjoyed reading and watching his "Last Saxon" series of historical novels and TV adaptations. His detective novels set in early England are interesting for the many historical details included in the narrrative. Brown ale for breakfast, anyone?

 

[sbrothy]

I realize it's "loosening" up pretty violently, but as a graphic novel geek I think a lot of them are seriously under-appcriated. Id take a serious graphic novel over a TV-series every time.

But yeah, I realize I started the thread and then pretty much relaxed it's premise to a violentl degree. I'm sorry.

 

[sbrothy]

Still, I've received input to keep me busy for several months at least.

 

[BWV]

"I, Cladius" was also adapted as a cable series starring the illimitable Derek Jacobi in the eponymous role. Jacobi's st-st-stutter alone is worth a view.

I love the BBC series - Brian Blessed as Augustus, Patrick Stewart as Sejanus, John Hurt as Caligula, but worth noting the book is far more epic - BBC budgets make the story seem like a play, but the books have epic action scenes that would require a multi-hundred million dollar CGI budget to do justice

 

[pinball1970]

Sounds promising. I know it’s wiki, and wiki itself (read: the bunch of fanboys editing the article) even admits it’s a little vague… still, “selling the filmrights” to a novel you haven’t yet written strikes me as very amtitious and self-secure.

A good friend of mine said it is very biased, I just read it at face value, it was certainly powerful at 15.
Not my usual subject matter at that age, i do not think I was mature enough.
I tried to read "Rubicon," by Tom Holland years later but I could not get past his lyrical style. It was recommended by a very intelligent friend who concluded I was "too stupid" to appreciate it.
I saw a documentary he did on Syria and he was exactly the same, wordy and lyrical with it. Just not my thing.

 

[sbrothy]

A good friend of mine said it is very biased, I just read it at face value, it was certainly powerful at 15.
Not my usual subject matter at that age, i do not think I was mature enough.
I tried to read "Rubicon," by Tom Holland years later but I could not get past his lyrical style. It was recommended by a very intelligent friend who concluded I was "too stupid" to appreciate it.
I saw a documentary he did on Syria and he was exactly the same, wordy and lyrical with it. Just not my thing.

Hah. Well that’s certainly a serious defense: “You’re just too stupid to understand the depth of my intelligence!”

EDIT: And I use “depth” completely unironically.