Through Their Eyes

When writing a story as seen through the eyes of a protagonist experiencing a past era, I have two options; I can write the story as I might describe it in my own modern terms, or I can write the story as the protagonist might have written it. The second option is much more difficult than the first, and the writer needs to research the manner of writing and speaking in that bygone era, as well as the level of technology and the social/cultural norms the protagonist will encounter. In the case of this particular writing effort it was necessary for me to become conversant with shipboard routines as were observed by British mariners in the mid-1700s. The manner in which a writer of that time might describe his daily routine, and the manner in which he would spell certain words, or express certain ideas, also adds greatly to the "authentic flavor" of the narrative.

Here is an excerpt from a story I've been working on for some time. It is the personal journal of a British seafarer in the 1700s who has found himself in dire straits. Working his way to the American colonies as a deckhand on a small barque, he finds the Master of the ship to be not only a cruel taskmaster, but also a sadist whose idea of discipline leads the ship's company to mutiny. The title of the work is "Nigel Wolfe ~ Mariner".

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I am but recently come to the island of Grand Bahama and yet my notoriety is already the subject of some discussion in the taverns here. It is but two months since I gained my freedom from the villainous Master of the ill-fated barque “Revenge”. I had been committed under his hand by fate, there to learn the disciplines of command and navigation. There it was I saw instead the most inhumane conduct one man may visit upon another. That unworthy Master, having taken to flaying the backs of the crew for the slightest imagined contravention of his sensibilities, was removed from authority at the point of a cutlass, and I was installed in his place by my shipmates despite my lack of experience.

Having been thus invested with their command, and against their murderous cries for vengeance, I deposited the former Master on an uninhabited shore with food and water sufficient for several weeks of frugal living. I countered the angry objections of the crew with assurances that such humanitarian conduct would assure them a pardon for taking the ship… once the facts of the matter were made known to the authorities. I then made sail for the English settlement at Grand Bahama, secure in the knowledge that the Governor of that community was a fair minded nobleman by reputation; one who would surely see the true justice in our actions.

My confidence was not misplaced. The entire crew of the Revenge has been granted pardon for their actions in the recent unpleasantness with her former Master, and that worthy vessel is now turned to the profitable undertakings of the English Governor of this place. I, too, am rewarded with pardon, and as testament to my good judgment in not visiting death upon the former Master of that barque, I have been given command of the Governor’s ship “Harrier”, an aging brigantine, and provided with a Letter of Marque authorizing my taking of Spanish prizes. As yet I am neither Master nor Commander, and bear no formal rank save that of general privateer at the leave of my lord Governor. In my hands I hold authority over a barely adequate crew whose collective skills and experience leave much to be desired.

Harrier herself is a rather small brigantine, sporting two masts as do all in her class, and a simple bowsprit. Her foremast is square-rigged with main course, top sail, and t’gallant. For’rd she bears rigging for a foretop staysail and a foretop t’gallant staysail, and she sports a modest spritsail below her bow spar. Harrier’s mainmast stands greater than her for’rd sister by the measure of three tall men, bearing a square-rigged topsail, with fore-and-aft main staysail and topmast staysail. Her mizzen course is oversized, and I warrant she’ll turn handsomely with proper handling and the right wind. She draws a moderate draft and should be able to give respectable account of herself in all but the shallowest of inshore waters.

The Lord Governor of the English settlement on Grand Bahama has further displayed his belief in my judgment, his confidence in my abilities (and his expectations of profitable consequences) by making me a gift of some 350 gold doubloons. At his urging I will venture northwest, into Spanish waters around the Florida peninsula, there to take such prizes of that nation as fate permits. Naturally I understand that the Lord Governor expects a fair return on his investment, and I shall do my utmost to multiply his gracious gift by several fold. I shall use the majority of the funds he so generously awarded me to bring the Harrier into full seaworthy condition, and fill out her straggling crew. They are as yet an ill-trained yet eager lot; I can but hope that the promise of plentiful prize monies will maintain their spirits during the hard times ahead. The Lord Governor has assured me that there are a great plenty of Spanish prizes to be taken if I am venturous and if the crew be of stout hearts. I sincerely doubt he has ever been under sail except as a passenger under conveyance, and I have but little confidence that he is aware of the sizeable difficulties with which he has so casually graced myself and my crew. Yet his heart is good, and his purse sizeable. Who am I to argue with such a worthy?

Tho’ she bears ports and carriages for 20 guns, Harrier carries but 10 iron cannon at present, and her magazine is burdened with only enough powder and round shot for a short expedition. I fear this stock is barely enough to permit the rudest of gunnery practice before we must exhibit our skills and expend our powder in more earnest actions. I must remain hopeful of taking additional powder and shot stores from prize ships.

July 30th
Wind: Moderate and steady, 2 points north of due east
Weather: Clear, increasing clouds and a falling glass – storms approaching from the east
Sea: Light chop

Outward bound, standing West North West from Grand Bahama on the morning tide at 3 bells on the morning watch. The crew is high in spirit, and I am pleased to have a fine navigator as my assistant. I have also managed to acquire the services of an excellent sail maker and skilled carpenter. With the addition of these three worthies, the crew of Harrier is well apportioned for our future undertakings. As we weighed anchor and left port, we sighted the sloop Sea Tiger returning from three months of raiding against Spanish interests along the peninsula. Her rigging is haggard and her hull bears testimony to hard fighting and ill treatment under Spanish guns. We can but wonder what awaits us over the horizon.

Going Native

When writing about the more recent past, I feel that I have some degree of common ground with the characters in my stories. Cultures and societies change, often more swiftly than we are aware, but social values and norms from two or three generations in the past are pretty close to my own, and I feel like I'm on "familiar turf".

I've found that writing about historical settings with little or no common ground can be treacherous without some measure of first hand experience. At the very least I need to do some serious research before attempting to put the reader into the head of a protagonist in antiquity.

Even more difficult for me is writing about primitive cultures. While most readers won't have any common ground with the protagonist in a primitive situation, they will invariably be able to differentiate between "realistic" and "artificial" situations and responses. I've got to make my story believable enough to convince both casual readers, and readers who might have some knowledge of the situation.

This excerpt is from a short story I wrote entitled TO DREAM PERCHANCE TO SLEEP.

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Fog hung like thick moss in the cold morning air. Individual trees poked up through the white blanket, rising above the heavy carpet that filled the shallow valley. No sound disturbed the stillness save for the soft dripping of dew in the tall grasses. No breeze stirred the thick white vapors. A fur-clad body appeared briefly, only partially revealed by the heavy mists which swirled around him, stirred to motion by his movements. The figure moved silently through the damp growth, paused with head turned – apparently listening intently for a moment – then moved again and was gone. Moments later another body parted the grass and paused to listen. A third joined the second; both waited, then moved noiselessly and were lost again in the smothering fog.

A deep-chested snort disturbed the stillness of the early morning; a huge shadow loomed. A gigantic bison stopped, raised his muzzle to the sky and snuffed the heavy wet air. White plumes of damp exhalation jetted from his nostrils as he cast his massive, shaggy head from side to side. Failing to detect the scent of predators, the monstrous bull half turned and delivered a short grunt. The sound had not yet faded when a second bison appeared, followed closely by a third, a fourth, and then many as a herd of the enormous beasts moved slowly through the hanging fog. Young bulls moved with alert posture, breathing heavily, eyes rolling, their noses up and ears pivoting to catch every scent and sound. Cows moved silently, looking from side to side; the wet grass paint-brushing their bellies and soaking the tangled mats of their shaggy coats. Silent calves, shorter and all but hidden in the tall grasses, ranged among the cows on slender, shaky legs. The herd bull snorted, whuffed, and turned to trot ahead of the ambling cows and their calves. His thickly matted hide made an odd wet sound as he pushed forward through the fog-damp grass.

The first graying light of the dawn changed the texture of the fog and it began to thin rapidly. The first breezes of the day blew whispers through the soughing grass; fitful gusts tore the thinning whiteness into long ragged streamers. The cows perked their heads and stepped more quickly; the calves trotted faster to keep up. The first rays of yellow sunlight peeked over the horizon, pierced the rapidly fading haze and were sparkled into dazzling starbursts by countless dewdrops; the grasses blazed with shimmering brilliance. The cows moved in a single file, each following in turn the wet path of the heavy bull.

The last vestiges of the fog died a silent death under the yellow eye of the rising sun. The lead cow stopped for a moment and lowered her head to crop a tender clump of grass; others following closely behind her were forced to stop momentarily.

A harsh, ragged shout broke the crisp air, followed almost immediately by a second from a separate location. A blur of motion cut the sparkling light and a heavy wooden spear sank into the barrel of the lead cow. Stunned, the cow staggered, coughing hoarsely. A second spear leapt from the grass, arced low through the cold air, and buried itself behind her left shoulder. Other cows, bellowing in confusion and fear, surged forward in a mass and swept around the wounded cow like a rushing stream around an immovable boulder. Startled calves bleated and scattered. At the head of the procession the herd bull bellowed in anger, wheeled, and thundered back to protect his harem.

More shouts crackled in the cold and dancing figures rose from the grasses waving spears and ragged fur cloaks. More spears flashed through the gathering breezes and sank deeply into the sides of the wounded cow. She staggered and wobbled, and braced her forefeet wide to keep from falling. An anguished cough racked in her throat and frothy, bloody foam bubbled from her muzzle. The dancing brown figures moved in, yelling and brandishing their deadly lances.

A hundred yards away the herd bull pawed the damp earth. The instinct for preservation, product of countless generations of successful survival, overwhelmed the massing herd. The terrified cows and calves gathered quickly in a tight circle; calves in the center, and cows facing outward. Young bulls broke from the circle to paw the ground beside the herd leader, tossing underdeveloped manes and snorting their adolescent defiance. The herd bull raised his massive head to examine the scene; his nostrils flaring as he watched the brown figures around the dying cow. A sound like rushing storm winds rumbled deep in his throat and he turned to face the circled herd. A bellow broke from his massive barrel and the formation fell apart. The herd turned as one and raced away across the valley like brown leaves driven by a high wind. The big bull followed last, nipping the flanks of the slower cows. The tremor of their passing died as they swarmed up a distant hillside, topped the ridge, and were gone. The wounded cow staggered again, her legs shaking violently as she tried to raise her head. Blood poured from her muzzle and sides, matting her thick coat and puddling in the trampled grass. Disregarding the danger presented by her wickedly curving horns, one of the attackers, a big hulking man with shoulder length hair and a badly scarred chest, bent for a moment and then straightened slowly, a massive rock in his hands. He moved toward the cow and muscles stood out like thick cords on his arms as he raised the rock high over his head. Uttering a fierce cry of determination, he brought it crashing down on the head of the cow. All four of her legs buckled at once, and the beast crumpled to the ground. In an instant a dozen spearmen rushed forward and thrust their lances deep into the mountain of matted fur. A final hoarse cough escaped the throat of the cow; a violent shudder shook her body, and she was still.

A Deadly Business - WWI Aviation - an excerpt

Attempting to write about a past era is difficult enough in descriptive terms. But writing about a past era as it was seen through the eyes of another requires extensive research into the technical matters of the story, and a familiarity with the manner of writing and speech used at that point in history. It can be difficult to capture the "feeling" of looking out through someone else's eyes and thinking with someone else's thoughts. The following excerpt is from a story involving WWI Aviation/Combat which I've been working on for many months entitled "A DEADLY BUSINESS".

This is a portion of a daily journal entry by an American pilot in the story.

"Our orderlies awoke us early this morning, just after 4 AM. With hot coffee, generous quantities of eggs, bacon, and biscuits to fortify us for the frigid temperatures of high altitude, we mounted our machines and took off. The field was still dark, but the sky was lightening with the anticipatory glow of dawn. First Lieutenant Robert “Bob” Chubb was recently posted to Second Flight and joined our number this morning on our dawn patrol to the eastern portion of our patrol sector. As he had not yet made a flight in hostile territory, he was assigned to fly on my right wing and I was given the task of watching over him.

We climbed toward the sun, now creeping above the horizon, then turned our noses northward toward Pont-a-Mousson. With our noses now facing Germany we each triggered our guns briefly to ensure they were functioning correctly. When that conurbation of humanity which lay upon the river had passed beneath us and we were well within Boche territory, we turned our machines westward and flew parallel to the front lines. At our altitude of 15,000 feet the sounds of our engines must have been fairly miniscule to those on the ground, and I warrant we went all but unnoticed unless a gaze happened to fall upon us by chance. The air was clear with almost no clouds; we had the sun to our backs and anyone attempting to discern us against that blazing backdrop would be all but blinded.

We had patrolled thus for nearly three quarters of an hour when I perceived a number of machines at a distance of some two miles to the west, flying in a formation at a slightly lower altitude. I wagged my wings to alert Captain Hunter, then pointed over the forward edge of my office at the distant fliers. By gestures he indicated that he had also seen them, and then with a wag of his own wings he signaled that we should stoop to investigate. By prearrangement we did not initially increase our throttles, but simply put our noses down a bit in a shallow dive.

Within moments we discerned the distant aeroplanes to be five German Albatros D.V machines. For the moment they seemed totally unaware of our presence and continued in their flight at an angle away from us toward the south west. A sudden burst of white smoke ahead of the D.Vs proved to be a warning to then regarding our presence from their own archy. It was too late, however, and we burst through their formation with guns blazing. Chubb and I had concentrated our fire on the same machine and I was gratified to see it burst into flames, roll onto one wing tip, then plummet downward as we swooped past.

I pulled my control stick back and climbed quickly to regain the altitude I had lost in the dive, spinning my head around to the right and left in an effort to keep from colliding with my fellows whilst maintaining an awareness of the Boche machines. Below their group, spiraling slowly downward, I saw another Hun with smoke streaming from his engine cowling. He was apparently attempting to regain control of his machine and turn away from the front lines and the dangers of no-man’s land, though I doubted from the smoke that he would do so under engine power. He was beyond immediate reach, however, and no longer presented any threat to us, so I turned my attention back to the remaining three Boche D.V machines.

One of the Albatros machines had pulled up in a steep renversement and was diving back down toward us with guns blazing. The other two Boche had split up, one going left and one going right, each with a member of our Flight in close pursuit. Captain Hunter turned his own machine to face the diving Boche, and at the last second before they would have collided he flipped his N28 upward and over onto its back, then snapped it into a tight reversed loop. Finding himself below and behind the diving Albatros, he fired a line of blazing bullets which stitched the entire length of the enemy machine. From my higher point of view I could see the canvas erupting upward along the length of the Boche machine as Hunter’s bullets tore through.

The Albatros ceased firing, but it continued its downward plunge unabated, beginning to rotate slowly over as it went. One or more of Captain Hunter’s bullets must have found the Boche pilot; he was either dead or entirely disabled and certainly doomed either way. I banked my machine in order to watch the machine as it fell and could see that no efforts were being made to interrupt its plunge; the pilot must certainly be dead in his office. It stuck the ground less than a mile behind the German lines. Surprisingly there was very little in the way of an explosion, although it did burst entirely to small bits upon impact. "