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DKR’s Cultural Musings, with a little bit of Memoir — History, Romance, and Costume Drama
I have liked the broadly defined genre “historical romances” since I was about eight. Off and on.
To top and tail this tale, when I was eight, using my father’s library card with his permission, I checked out a book by called Desiree, a fictionalized biography of one of Napoleon’s mistresses. (She actually went on to become the Queen of Sweden, of all things.)
This book, by Annemarie Selinko, an Austrian novelist, began my 20+ year fascination with Napoleon Bonaparte, and by association at first, with European history. The book, though about an unmarried couple in a romantic adventure in the midst of a violent revolution, was actually written in a decorous enough way that it didn’t at all shock me, even though at that age there would have been many things I didn’t understand. But the book was all about emotions, not the body. So I understood it well enough. It was intoxicating.
Later, perhaps in my early teens, I dipped illicitly into one of those soft-porn things written for ladies, called “romance.” I never liked them. They were like saccharine to me. I continued to seek out historical novels. I wanted them to be about real people, or at least real myths.
