How music can help historical writers to create authentic worlds

My Gracie Fairshaw mystery series is set in the 1930s so I am always looking for ways to bring historical authenticity to my scenes. One of the ways I have found bring verisimilitude to my writing is through music.

In my new book Gracie Fairshaw and the Trouble at the Tower there were plenty opportunities to be inspired by music from the past. The story takes place in the Blackpool Tower – known then as The Wonderland of the World because of the many attractions it offered.

Blackpool Tower (author's photo)

There was the Tower Ascent (the lift that took you to the top of the tower), stunning roof gardens, a menagerie, ballroom, circus and aquarium as well as fabulous places to eat including the Oriental lounge. 

The Tower Ascent, ballroom and circus still exist, and if you look carefully on your next visit you might spot architectural details from the oriental lounge where the dino golf now is!

 

Evidence of the Oriental lounge still survives (author's photo)

Music was an important part of the Tower’s entertainment offer. Although I haven’t used it in a story yet, I am really interested in the Orchestrion – that used to be in the entrance to the aquarium. 

 

The Orchestrion (ThinkTank)

Orchestrions were mechanical organs, usually made by clockmakers – the one in the Tower was made by Imhof and Mukle in Germany in 1879. It was in a 13ft high wooden cabinet. The orchestrion was originally bought for £3,000! originally worked by pin cyclinders, like in a muscial box! After 35 years the machine was converted so it used Wurlitzer paper rolls. I'm sure Violet, from my Gracie books, would love working out how it operated!

The Orchestrion was removed from the tower and is now in storage at ThinkTank, Birmingham.

Orchestrion 10" record (Decca, 1958) (lp, author's collection)

Live music was also an important attraction in the Tower.

The Roof Gardens were used for dance band concerts – in the 1930s dance band music was incredibly popular – live broadcasts from hotels and the Tower could be heard on the radio and played at home on shellac 78s.

The Tower employed their own dance band leader – Bertini. He sounds Italian but he was actually a Londoner called Bert!

Bertini and the Radio Boys (postcard, author's collection)

 

The roof gardens, Blackpool Tower
 

I am lucky to have a lot of original dance bands 78s at home as well as some vinyl and CDs. I listened to these while writing my book and it definitely helps me get into the 1930s world. Bertini records are hard to find, I have one 78 and a CD – but I did find a postcard complete with a collection of band autographs on ebay – which was thrilling.

I also have some sheet music featuring Bertini – sheet music sold really well in the 1930s giving music lovers a chance to play the most popular songs at home on the piano. The sheets included the notes and lyrics and often had a photograph on the cover.

 

Bertini, The Touch of your Lips song sheet (author's collection.)

I wanted to include a dance band in Trouble at the Tower – so I created the character Fredini. I had great fun making up song titles for his band to perform.

Of course the music most associated with Blackpool Tower is the Wurlitzer. This fantastic white organ has been an attraction in the ballroom since 1929 - with the current organ being installed in1935. I couldn't resist including it in both Gracie Fairshaw books. I absolutely adore the sound!

Reg Dixon at the Wurlitzer

What you might not know, is that the Blackpool Tower ballroom was host to a professional children’s ballet between 1902 and 1972. The ballet was extremely popular with audiences - and some of the young dancers went on to stardom. 

The Blackpool Tower Children's Ballet

The most famous dancer was Little Emmie – real name Emma Tweesdale – she started dancing with the ballet when she was just 8 years old. She was nicknamed the La Petite Pavlova (after the famous ballerina Anna Pavlova.) 

 

Madame Pauline Rivers (left) and Little Emmie (postcard, author's collection)

She and the ballet’s director – Madame Pauline Rivers – also feature on sheet music and postcards. I discovered that Madame Rivers went on to adopt Emmie.

 Song sheets featuring Little Emmie

For Trouble at the Tower, I wanted to create my own Christmas ballet. In my book the ballet has been taken over by a new director – Madame Petrova – who is a former Russian ballerina. 

Gracie Fairshaw and the Trouble at the Tower (cover design Jenny Czerwonka)

I thoroughly enjoyed listening to ballet music by the famous Russian composer – Tchaikovsky, and because trouble at the Tower is set in Christmas 1935, I also enjoyed researching which Christmas songs and carols were popular in the 1930s.

My favourite piece which features in the show is Troika by Prokofiev – also known as the Sleigh Song. The song was composed as part of a soundtrack for a Russian film - Lieutenant Kijé - in 1934.

 

A traditional sleigh ride

It makes me feel so Christmassy when I hear it! It really helped to get me in the mood for writing my festive mystery!

I hope you have been encouraged to seek out some of the music I've mentioned and will have a listen yourself!

ACTIVITY

Find some paper and a pen or pencil. Turn on the radio and tune into a station you wouldn’t normally listen to that is playing music! 

Start to write any words or images that it makes you think of. If you struggle to imagine things copy down some of the lyrics – if there are any – and see if that suggests a story to you! Or perhaps if there are no lyrics you could make up some that seem to fit the music.

Discussion points for teachers/parents 

Music often reflects the tastes of people at any given time - what music is popular now? Is it different to the music enjoyed by your family when they were children? Why do you think different generations may not like the same time of music?

Music can make us feel happy or sad, it can even make us laugh! It has been used to lift people's spirits in times of war or when times were hard - such as during the depression of the 1930s. If you were to create and bury a time capsule containing objects from now for people to find in the future - what music would you include. 

There have been many different ways to listen to pre-recorded music such as wax cyclinders, 78s, vinyl records, 78s, CDs, minidiscs, MP3s and streaming. Some formats have had a revival in recent times.

How do you think people will listen to music in the future? Will there be nostalgia for old methods?

Author Susan Brownrigg

Gracie Fairshaw and the Trouble at the Tower by Susan Brownrigg is an historical novel for 9-12 year olds set in Blackpool, 1935.

Susan's books are published by Uclan Publishing. They are available from bookshops and online retailers.

 

Finding the story in old objects

Do you ever feel like writing a story, but don’t know where to start? Maybe you keep promising yourself you’re going to make time to write, but when you finally manage to sit down at the keyboard, or with a pen and paper, your mind suddenly goes as blank as the paper.

You need something to write about. But don’t worry, you don’t need to have a plot or a fully developed character to start writing. All you need is an object. And if you want to write historical fiction, then the most useful thing to start off with is an object from the past.

I have recently inherited some old things from my parents. My favourite is this little clockwork pig. 

 

When you wind up the key in its back, it starts to play its drum in a lovely rhythm – Ta Ta Ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta, Ta Ta Ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta – and turn round in a circle. As you can see from the photo, the pig’s clothes are badly in need of repair now, but that’s not surprising because he is nearly 100 years old. He belonged to my dad when he was a child, back in the 1930s. He must have been a very special toy because my father kept him safely all his life.

If you want to use the clockwork pig to inspire a story, you just start asking questions. Why was he so special? Who gave him to my dad? Imagine you were a child in the 1930s and the clockwork pig was yours. Where would you keep him? Would you keep him on display or would you hide him away because he was so precious? What if you took him to school and he got lost? Who would mend him if he was broken?

You could even write a story from the point of view of the clockwork pig. There’s a classic book by Russell Hoban called The Mouse and His Child, written from the point of view of a clockwork mouse, so you would be in good company if you decided to do this. 

The Mouse and his Child by Russall Hoban

 Another thing that my father left me is this model Spitfire.

 

This is a very special model because it is made from the same materials that were used to make real Spitfires. My grandpa worked in a Spitfire factory during World War II, and someone there must have made it for Dad. I imagine that this would also have been a very precious toy, maybe something that other children would have liked to own themselves. But the great thing is that you don’t need to know anything about my dad to use his model Spitfire to start building a story. You can completely make up the person it belonged to. How had they come by it? Why was it special to them? Maybe they had seen real Spitfires flying overhead? Maybe their dad was a pilot who flew Spitfires? Maybe their mum had an important job in an aircraft factory?

My mum also left me some treasures, including this box with her name on it. 

 

Inside the box I found some of her costume jewellery, but also this Victorian locket with a very old photograph in it. 

 

The sad thing is, I have no idea who it is! But this is another ideal starting point for a story. Who could this lady be? Why did a picture of her end up in Mum’s jewellery box? Of course, there could be a simple explanation, but as writers looking for a story we are not interested in simple explanations. She is quite hard to see, but if you look carefully you can see that she is very elegant and well dressed. I particularly like her hairstyle. Photographs were usually only taken on special occasions in those days, so I wonder what she is dressed up for?

So, this week’s writing challenge is simply to find an object – you can use either a real object or a picture of something – and start asking lots of questions about it. Before you know it, you will have the makings of a story. Don’t worry if the story turns out to be nothing to do with the original object – the point is to use it as inspiration and see where your imagination takes you.

And if you want to hear Dad’s clockwork pig drumming, go to the Time Tunnellers’ YouTube channel, where you can see him in action!

Catherine Randall's debut novel, The White Phoenix, is a thrilling adventure story set during the Great Fire of London for 9-12 year olds. It was shortlisted for the Historical Association’s Young Quills Award 2021. The White Phoenix is published by the Book Guild, it is available from bookshops and online retailers including Waterstones, Bookshop.org and Amazon.

For more information visit www.catherinerandall.com.

How to grow a time-tunneller - by Ally Sherrick

Physics and I have never got on. It’s a lot to do with the maths. But also because the laws of physics say time-travel isn’t possible – at least not in the way I’ve always wanted it to be. But I decided early on that it wouldn’t stop me from trying. If you’ve got a few spare minutes, why not hop on board my trusty time-machine and let me take you back to where my adventures in time-travel first began ...

The Tardis

First up there were all those brilliant time-travelling TV programmes I used to watch. Doctor Who was the first, though I probably saw more of the back of our sofa than what was happening on the small screen, especially when the dreaded daleks arrived on the scene. Of course, The Doctor is the ultimate time-traveller – a Time Lord who uses an amazing police-box tardis to travel through space and time. 

But other intrepid explorers who also flirted with a spot of time-travel were Star Trek’s Captain Kirk and the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise. In the original series, they did a lot of travelling back to the 1960s – no prizes for guessing why! But the episode called ‘The City On The Edge Of Forever', where a temporarily insane Dr. McCoy beams down to a planet and accidentally changes history by travelling back in time through a mysterious archway called The Guardian of Forever, is a bit of a classic. It even has its own Wiki page!

 

Star Trek

And then there were was The Time Tunnel, the story of the top secret Project Tic-Toc, a time-travelling experiment gone disastrously wrong. I thrilled as brave scientists Doctors Tony Newman and Doug Phillips were pitched into a new time, place and set of perils each episode, while the team back at base battled to snatch them back from the spiralling vortex that was the Time Tunnel of the title.

The Time Tunnel

Their itinerary was a history-fest of seminal moments in the past – the sinking of the Titanic in 1912, the eruption of the Indonesian island of Krakatoa in 1883 and a fictitious Viking-infested Cornwall of 544 where they meet a young man called Arthur Pendragon and a magician by the name of Merlin. Sometimes characters from history got caught up in the Time-Tunnel too – the Renaissance writer and scholar Machiavelli joined Tony and Doug at the American Civil War’s Battle of Gettysburg. And there were cliff-hanger endings aplenty. For a young Time-Tunneller in the making, what was not to love?

And of course, as an author, how can I not talk about the books? A Traveller in Time by Alison Uttley about a young girl called Penelope Taberner who travels back to Tudor England and gets caught up in the infamous Babington Plot to rescue Mary, Queen of Scots from imprisonment by her great rival and cousin, Queen Elizabeth I of England. The Ghost of Thomas Kempe by Penelope Lively (who also wrote the classic A Stitch in Time). Not a time-travel story in the traditional sense – but it features a 17^th century apothecary poltergeist, the Thomas Kempe of the title, who haunts a young boy, James in a bid to make him his apprentice.  And The Wolves of Willoughby Chase by the superlative Joan Aiken, which transports the reader to an ‘alternate history’ and the time of King James III of England, when courageous young cousins Bonnie and Sylvie must do battle with their wicked new governess, Miss Slighcarp in a country prowled by packs of ravenous, wild wolves.

The Ghost of Thomas Kempe, The Wolves of Willoughby Chase

and A Traveller in Time

With all those brilliant time-travelling tales to feed my imagination, it was only a matter of time before I took the plunge and began digging back into the past to create my own stories. So far I’ve travelled to London in 1605 and the events surrounding the infamous Gunpowder Plot in Black Powder; wartime Suffolk in 1940, a year after the discovery of the famous Sutton Hoo Ship Burial in The Buried Crown, and 1520 and the court of King Henry VIII and his first queen, Katherine of Aragon, in The Queen’s Fool. As for my next stop? Well, I can’t say too much about that right now! But if you’re planning to join me, you might need to bring one of these with you to help light the way ...

A lamp to cast light on the past!

Activity

Build your own time-machine

Calling all Time-Tunnellers big and small! You’ve been invited by a top secret research project to design and build a time-machine for the 21^st century. What materials will you use? Maybe you’ll decide to repurpose it from an existing object like Dr Who’s police-box tardis? Or will you assemble it from recycled or ‘found’ bits and pieces? Or you could build it using revolutionary new materials that have yet to be invented. When you’re ready, put your design down on paper, using labels and a description to explain how it all works. Then give it a name and let your time-travelling adventures begin!

Ally Sherrick is the author of books full of history, mystery and adventure including Black Powder, winner of the Historical Association’s Young Quills Award 2017. She is published by Chicken House Books. 

 

You can find out more about Ally and her books at www.allysherrick.com and follow her on Twitter: @ally_sherrick

 

Finding stories in old places - tips from author Jeannie Waudby

For as long as I can remember, old buildings have filled me with a longing to know who lived there before. Very often, there is no way of knowing, and for me this meant trying to think up their story for myself.

I grew up on a little island in Hong Kong. It had been taken to be a leprosy treatment centre and most of the buildings were built in the 1950s. But the old ones, from hundreds of years ago, always fascinated me. As a child, I thought that the people had left long ago – whereas in fact they had to leave not long before the hospital was built.

Jetty valley

One of the oldest buildings was a little temple. It’s the tiniest building at the bottom of this picture in the middle, near the steps.

Then there were the graves. These were beautiful white tombs, shaped like the moon, always on a hillside. I wondered whose graves they were, and what their lives had been like on this island that was home to us now. The tombs made a deep impression on me so that years later, when I was studying art, they slipped into my pictures.

Moon grave

This woodcut shows a tomb with some burial pots. Most of the tombs were in the emptier part of the island where it was wild and grassy.

And in this watercolour the tomb is on the left, looking over the sea towards a neighbouring island.

Hillside tomb

Although we lived in Hong Kong, every few years we visited the UK, which to me was a huge exciting foreign land. On my first visit we travelled by ocean liner because planes were still very expensive. I remember the journey well even though I was little. It took one month, and one of the places we visited was Pompei. I recall arches, painted walls and the fact that life had stopped suddenly and tragically here because of a volcano.

When we went to the Highlands, where my mother came from, I felt at home straight away. To me, the mountains and sea felt just like the ones back home in Hong Kong. Even the rocks on the shore had the same yellow lichen and green seaweed, like hair. But I did get to see something I had never seen before: castles.

Eilean Donan

This aquatint shows Eilean Donan Castle and the Five Sisters of Kintail, with my impression of the light beaming onto the loch. A house where we often stayed had a cannon ball in the fireplace, from a battle long ago that left the castle in ruins.

Later, when I was older, my dad, who was English, would take us to visit famous historical places in England: the Tower of London, a Roman villa, the Victory warship and the wonderful Roman baths which you could still have a warm dip in if it was allowed. Inside the Victory, I smelt for the first time the sharp tang of centuries-old wood. To me it felt as if stories were humming just below the surface of the walls.

 

I started writing novels when I was a child, although I didn’t ever finish them. This is the first page of one I started when I was 11. It was set in England in the nineteenth century because we had just come back from the UK and while we were there, we stayed in a flat in a Victorian house.

For me, old places have always been doorways to stories.

Ickworth

Writing Prompt

When I am somewhere old, I can never shake off the possibility that it might turn out to be a time machine… and where would it take me? Think of an old building or place that you know. If it was a time machine, where would it take you? Who would you be? What would you be doing there? Would there be a hidden danger? 

 

One Of Us by Jeannie Waudby is a YA thriller/love story, published by Chicken House. It was shortlisted for the Bolton Children's Fiction Award and the Lancashire Book of the Year 2016 and has been adapted by Mike Kenny as a play in the Oxford Playscripts series.
One Of Us is published by Chicken House
The Oxford Playscripts play is published by Oxford University Press

 

For more information about Jeannie and her books visit her website.

 

The Chessmen Thief: Action scenes and how to write them - by Barbara Henderson

Viking stories are exciting, aren’t they? All that fighting and pillaging and exploring. And who doesn’t love a Viking ship? Sleek and iconic, we tend to think of them as pulling into some bay or harbour and wreaking havoc in nearby villages and settlements. We sometimes forget that they were also often attacked by others at sea – they definitely lived a dangerous life! One of the great things about historical fiction is that the stakes are often so high – with no rescue service, or hospitals, or mobile phones. Basically, life was a lot more dangerous in the centuries gone by.

 

A viking ship (Illustration by Annie Glennie)

When my Viking book The Chessmen Thief was sent off to the printers, I asked my editor: ‘Now that we’re done, can you tell me – which part of the book do you actually like best?’

She thought for a moment. ‘The action scenes,’ she answered simply.

‘Me too.’

It’s true: a memorable action scene works like a quick turbocharge of energy, giving your story new momentum.

I am not suggesting that I am an expert at all – there are far more talented and experienced authors for children around. But I am more than happy to share what I have learned so far. Ladies and gentlemen, for what it’s worth, here is how an action scene should work. I am drawing on chapters 13 and 14 of The Chessmen Thief to show what I mean. 😊

To give you some context, Kylan (my slave boy and protagonist) is on a Viking longship sailing from Norway to Scotland with his boss, Jarl Magnus.

Step 1: You need one or two sentences of calm atmosphere. Then introduce the threat.

When the wind picks up and carries us in the exact direction we want to go, we step away from the oars and relax. I climb the first level of the mast where I like it the best. No one judges me there or asks me questions.

Until I see it in the distance. Unmistakeable: another vessel, making straight for us.

 

 The Chessmen pieces at the British Museum that inspired my book

Step 2: Take a moment to describe your character’s reaction. It works best if the other characters do not recognise the danger. This technique is called dramatic irony – the reader understands more than most of the characters do, which makes for great tension.

My stomach tumbles and my lungs do something they have never done before: refuse to inhale and exhale. Instead, a strange kind of panting is all I am capable of, with the weight of all the oceans in the world on my heart.

‘Raiders!’ I shout, but all that emerges from my throat is a croak. The men below are singing and sharing a quick horn of ale before their muscle power is required again. ‘Raiders!’ I yell, a little louder, but still no one pays me any heed.

Step 3: Crank up the jeopardy. The reader needs to understand what is at stake.

As the ship approaches, I can see the straggly beards of men who have lived long apart from any kind of company. Their swords are rusty but sharp. There are spears, axes and halberds, and all manner of weapons.

At the front, almost leaning over the hull of their galley, are three raiders with coils of rope around their bodies, ready to throw weighted hooks across—and only now do I see what the front of their ship is made of! It’s not water glistening on the wood—it is reinforced with iron spikes, and they mean to ram us! ‘TURN THE SHIP!’ I yell down with all my might.

Step 4: Give your protagonist something to do.

Suddenly, I am pulled off my feet backwards, the huge hand of the Jarl on my shoulder. ‘Here, boy!’ He thrusts something into my hand, slicing into my palm a little as he does: a dagger, and oh Lord, it is sharp!

The beautiful Isle of Lewis where the chessmen were found

Step 5: The best action scenes have a brave protagonist.

With a terrible clang, a huge metal hook lands over the side of our ship, a rope attached. It tautens almost immediately: the raiders are pulling our ship towards theirs, weapons in hand.

Our men scatter and take refuge, but something possesses me to do exactly the opposite. Darting to avoid the missiles and arrows, I run towards the hooks and slash at the rope attaching the ships to one another.

Number 6: You can’t beat a cliffhanger.

With a final gasping effort, this rope, too, snaps. The enemy ship is only two horse-lengths away. Soon a warrior of strength and stature will be able to jump. Oh no: they are readying themselves!

But then something happens that I have not foreseen. Behind me, there is a commotion; a box is knocked over, heavy footfalls thud on the deck. And then, right past me, Jarl Magnus raises his shield as he runs, mounts the gunwale and, literally, leaps into the air over the whirling waves.

Number 7: Know when to stop.

Relentless action scenes can be exhausting to read. Follow any action scene with a chapter or so of calm – your readers need a break. Let them have it! Once everyone is safe, my protagonist Kylan is going to spend the next chapter learning to play chess!

Writing Task:

Now have a go at writing your own action scene set on a Viking ship. It doesn’t have to be an attack – how about a storm, or a whirlpool, or a shipwreck? Plenty more dangers to invent. I’d love to see what you come up with!

The Chessmen Thief is a Viking adventure inspired by the iconic Lewis Chessmen which you can see at the British Museum, The National Museum of Scotland and The Museum nan Eilean on the Isle of Lewis. The famous hoard of walrus-ivory-carved chess pieces was found in the Outer Hebrides in 1831, but the figures were likely carved in Trondheim in Norway during the second half of the 12^th Century. If they came to Scotland soon after, they are likely to have travelled by sea in a Viking/Norse ship. Some Viking ships actually survive to this day and can be viewed in a museum in Oslo.

Barbara's books are published by Cranachan. They are available from bookshops and online retailers.

 

Barbara Henderson

For more information about Barbara's books visit barbarahenderson.co.uk

Follow Barbara @scattyscribbler