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Jump to navigationJump to searchThe Interview: Bookbag Talks To Charlotte Frost (view source)
Revision as of 13:25, 6 July 2011
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* '''Bookbag: When you close your eyes and imagine your readers, who do you see?'''
CF: I came across Knighton during a community history project. He was peripheral to the project, but in every other respect he was an important historical figure sorely in need of a new biography, so afterwards I went back to him and snapped him up.
* '''BB: The research you did for ‘’Sir ''Sir William Knighton’’ Knighton'' was obviously extensive. Have you been trained to do this and did you find it difficult?'''
CF: I had a first degree, and picked up the rest as I went along. My mentors were the professional archivists and librarians at the resources I visited, and historians doing similar research. Knighton's biography didn't involve any statistical analysis or complicated hypothesis, just the same background reading, attention to detail and record keeping that we do when taking out a lease, claiming on insurance etc. Even so, Knighton's life, especially his medical career, did at times seem impervious to any amount of investigation.
CF: Sitting at a little desk at the top of the Round Tower in the Royal Archives at Windsor Castle, reading an extract from Knighton's journal in his own hand, written for his eyes only. His thoughts just flowed, mixing routine diary entries and personal expenditure with observations about acquaintances, and recording the highs and lows of his emotions. Every biographer dreams of survivals like that.
* '''BB: I’ve I've always had a soft spot for George III but less of a liking for George IV. Who is your favourite personality from the Knighton era?'''
CF: Many of George IV's contemporaries shared your reservations about him, and Knighton suffered by association. My own favourite from the Knighton era is Henry Brougham, who as a liberal lawyer, political reformer and writer was Knighton's bitter enemy in public, but as a scientist corresponded with him on friendly terms in private. And Brougham was one of Harriette Wilson's lovers. If only I knew how to pronounce his name.
* '''BB: Is writing the ‘day job’'day job'? If not, do you wish that it could be?'''
CF: It's ''one'' of the day jobs. If it takes off, I won't complain.
* '''BB: You’ve You've got one wish. What’s What's it to be?'''
CF: For the world to continue to open up to me, and for continued health with which to enjoy it. That sounds revoltingly meretricious, but I really do have a fantastic life and I don't want it to change. Sorry, that's two wishes, not one.
* '''BB: What are you reading at the moment? Which is the best book that you’ve you've read recently?'''
CF: Knighton has put me in touch with the Jane Austen and Georgette Heyer communities, and through them I've rediscovered JA and GH. I've just ordered Kirsten Ellis's [[Star of the Morning: The Extraordinary Life of Lady Hester Stanhope by Kirsten Ellis|biography of Lady Hester Stanhope]] – a Bookbag recommendation for the Regency era – and my own big discovery is Theatres of Memory and Island Stories by the historian Raphael Samuel. I feel like hugging them.
