My Summer Conferences

I've given papers at three conferences this summer in rather different locations and to different groups of people. The actual conferences themselves have been enjoyable and informative, though my personal difficulties have made them a little more traumatic than I would've preferred.

The first one, at the beginning of June, was the Oxford English Graduate Conference 2014 on the theme of 'Margins'. Of course, this gave me the brilliant excuse to see Oxford - and to see Oxford in the sunshine - which was a very pleasant experience. My paper, entitled 'Reclaiming a Sensation Novelist: Re-evaluating Edmund Yates', was on a 9:00 am panel, probably a good thing because once it was over I started to enjoy the day a little more. The programme was packed full with four sets of four simultaneous panels. The variety was excellent, though I tended to stick to the more Victorian ones. Perhaps my favourite panel was 'Nineteenth-Century Women' that included three outstanding papers from Ruth Ashton (University of Leicester), Teja Pusapati (University of Oxford) and Rebecca Shuttleworth (University of Leicester) who looked at 'fallen'/'new' women, the English Woman's Journal and provincial women in abolitionist discourse respectively. The day was a success overall and I managed to overcome my inherent shyness and hold a few conversations with some interesting people.

Secondly, at the end of June, was 'Recoveries 2014: Reconnections, 1714-1914' held at the University of Nottingham. The paper I gave there was a variation on my Oxford paper, slightly shorter and with more of an emphasis on Yates's novel Black Sheep in relation to Dickens. I was pleased with how it went and got some interesting questions. Once again, there was a nice mix of paper within the time period, my favourites perhaps being Amy Watson (Nottingham Trent University) discussing Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, Adam Abraham (University of Oxford) talking about imitations of The Pickwick Papers and Elizabeth Adams (independent) on the collaborative authorship questions surrounding Mary Elizabeth Braddon. The university campus at Nottingham is stunning, a perfect place to discuss literature and culture.

Finally, I attended the 6th annual Victorian Popular Fiction Association conference which was on the theme of 'Victorian Treasures and Trash'. I attended this conference last year and it was brilliant. I'm pleased to say that this one was exactly the same. Spread over three days, there were plenty of papers to hold my attention, dealing with some Victorians I know a fair bit about and some of whom I know absolutely nothing. There's something equally fascinating and terrifying about being in a room with a heap of Victorian experts but they're all lovely people. I didn't get the chance to talk to some people I wanted to but that was partly due to time and partly due to my shyness going into overdrive. I did spend a lot of time hiding but I was there. That's the important thing.

My paper was on the Thursday morning and was a completely different creature to the Oxford and Nottingham papers. While they focused on the collaboration rumours surrounding Edmund Yates, this one delved into textual analysis and comparison to Dickens in a paper called 'Bleak House to Black Sheep: Literacy and the Street Boy'. I was fortunate to be on a panel with Sarah Lill (Northumbria University), whose paper on Edward Lloyd was both fascinating and slotted most neatly in alongside mine. There were too many excellent papers to name and I wouldn't want to leave anybody out so let me just say that it was a brilliant conference with some thought-provoking panels.

All of these conferences have thrown up things I want to now read, whether related to my research interests or not. Thanks to Oxford, I need to get more acquainted with Dickens's Christmas journals, read some Marilynne Robinson and delve - quite carefully - into George Moore. Nottingham taught me that I need to finally read The Pickwick Papers and dramatically improve my knowledge of Mary Elizabeth Braddon's 'lesser' novels. The VPFA gave me a lot of potential reading material including stories by Louisa Baldwin, Dr Paull's Theory by A.M. Diehl, Behind the Mask by Louisa May Alcott and a few texts on stammering from the nineteenth century. I may also give The Mill on the Floss another shot.

It's been a busy five weeks but rewarding nonetheless. I only hope my papers proved as interesting to others as theirs did to me.

Wherein Rosalind Russell Helps My PhD

I now at least have a valid reason for all those classic films I watch. One of them drew a connection for me over the weekend that I'd completely missed in my PhD research and gave me another hypothetical lead for for the cause of a character's disability.

Now, the disability strand of my thesis is only one chapter long but, really, I like to think it's the most important. That's possibly because it's the one I'm working on currently but we'll deal with that notion when I start on the next chapter. Anyway, in it I hypothesise about the rather vague descriptions of the disabilities of two Edmund Yates characters. It's all conjecture but the possibilities of hereditary problems throw up a few interesting angles for the chapter.

In a much-needed break from work I watched the first half of Sister Kenny, a 1940s biopic about an Australian nurse who found an effective treatment for infant paralysis brought on by polio (a review of the film will follow in a few days). A light pinged on in my brain. Although it should've, polio hadn't made it onto my original list of wacky and obscure diseases that could cause disability and yet the symptoms and results could match the character's very neatly. Polio was apparently identified in 1840 so it was recognisable - but not treatable - at the time Yates was writing.

So there we are. I've got a legitimate reason for indulging in one of my favourite pastimes. And if that indulgence includes Rosalind Russell who am I to argue?

My Morning Internet Routine

As regular readers of either this blog or my excruciating Twitter feed (@CharmedLassie) will know, I'm a stay-at-home research student and wannabe writer. This means I have to scavenge for self-discipline and remind myself that the only person who loses out if I don't get anything done is the idiot staring into space and listening to Radio 2 most of the day. However, I've noticed that my morning routine, before I can get started on any work, is very ordered and specific. Maybe even worth documenting?

• The first website I visit is Facebook due to the fact I'm playing three games on there at the moment. Yes, a waste of my time, perhaps. But they have the advantage of keeping me at the computer, or getting me there for set periods of time to harvest crops or build up my city. Whenever I'm sat at the computer my conscience inevitably kicks in. Plus, they offer little incentives: work for an hour and you get ten minutes tending to your farm. It actually works.
• My email pops up in the corner. I check (mostly delete) all that and log into Twitter while I'm sorting out my Facebook games. I'm obsessive; I have to read all the way back to where I left off the night before. I respond to anything directed at me.
• I visit The Telegraph website. I scan the homepage but I'm mostly interested in the 'Comment' section. I get riled, I respond to articles and I send any interesting ones to my Twitter feed.
• I go to The Guardian website. I visit the 'Comment' section and then usually the 'Culture' page, again sharing anything I find of interest.
• The Independent website is my next stop. What I use this for mainly are the headlines on the right-hand side. They're really good for breaking and recent news stories, several of which end up on Twitter.
• I go to the New Statesman website and check out their homepage.
• Next port of call is The Spectator Blog page, full of political observations and stories that, while interesting, probably wouldn't make it onto mainstream news sites.
• Next it's the BBC News site! Local news then most-read stories. I then check out the 'Entertainment' section.
• It's the turn of my Google Reader page. I scan the updates from the blogs I'm subscribed to and read/respond where appropriate. Then I look at the sites related to articles I may want to write for Lesbilicious.com and plan those into my day.
• I check my university email.
• I FINALLY GET TO WORK!

Is this obsessive? Looking at it like that, I think it might be. However, I do have a severe craving to be well informed. I blog about both writing/reading and current affairs and, though I'm blowing my own trumpet a little, I feel like I'm pretty up-to-date with what's going on around the world. I know people who really don't care what's going on in Westminster or the Middle East and I struggle to understand the apathy. I would just much rather know.

And I do get to work eventually... honest.

Am I the only one with this sort of rigid routine?

Naming Historical Fiction Characters

It sounds like one of the most obvious aspects of writing historical fiction but as I began a Victorian project last night I decided I needed to be very careful with my opening action: naming my characters.

After all, there would be nothing more embarrassing than to submit a manuscript and for someone to kindly point out that the name you've deliberately selected didn't exist until forty years after your novel ends. That's assuming it gets picked up at that point. Depending on how you go about publishing it could be your readers detecting your error and instantly losing faith in your ability.

I've previously blogged about choosing meaningful names for characters. When planning and writing historical fiction you have to add another aspect to this: legitimacy. For my particular era, there are interesting names out there which draw away from the Catherines, Elizabeths and Janes who are so prevalent in Victorian fiction and history. I could have Lena as my heroine, or perhaps Honora. As it happens, I'd already determined my protagonist should be as plain as possible - so I've named her Jane.

The entire supporting cast needed equal consideration though, and surnames are a additional problem. If you intend on shortening a name within the story ensure the contraction was used in the era you're writing about. Don't assume that just because you've read or seen something which uses a particular name that the name was common back then. It all depends on how much you want to accentuate your characters. Adding a somewhat exotic name can have the effect of distancing your story from the period in which it is set. If that's your intention that's fine but make sure it is.

Finally, I would just add a word of caution: always verify your names from more than one source. This isn't to suggest that any particular sites are unreliable or incorrect, but as with any aspect of your research you should be sure to avoid embarrassment or inaccuracy further down the line.

A couple of sites I'd recommend for research are:

Behind The Name

Baby Names Garden

Alternative Baby Names

As for my assembled cast? I've deliberately stayed relatively plain.

Jane, Eliza, Ralph, Amelia, Harry, Henry, Mrs Weeks, Margaret, Patrick and Sarah. Subject, of course, to change!