Re-writing the Past - Untold Stories ... by Miriam Halahmy

Bletchley Park

History has always been my great passion, underpinning my whole life as a reader and a writer. As a child I was desperate to know what it was really really like - then.... it didn't matter when to me. I wasn't interested in being present at the great moments of history - the Battle of Waterloo; Florence Nighingale in Sebastopol. I was interested in ordinary people - little girls like me - or teenagers or adults. What did people think, feel, how did they cope without any real medical input, or if they couldn't read and what would it actually smell like in a town where no-one ever took a bath? I would stare for long hours at old photographs of people and try with all my might to get a glimmer of who they really were.

Last month I was asked to speak on Re-Imagining the Past at the LSELitFest on a panel with Philip Womack and Monica Vaughan. For me, it is untold stories which inspires me to write historical fiction.
In HIDDEN, I write about a journey to Dunkirk to rescue British soldiers trapped on the beach. I discovered that five little ships left Hayling for Dunkirk. I actually found one and was invited to go over it and take photos.

The boat above is the Count Dracula, a little ship which went from Hayling Island to Dunkirk and rescued over 200 men in May 1940. It was originally the Admiral's barge for a German battle ship sunk at the battle of Jutland in 1916. The barge was raised and restored between the wars.

 One of the questions I was asked on the LSE Panel was how I could imagine the ending to a novel based on true events from the past.

The Emergency Zoo  (Alma Books, May 2016)  is based on the untold story of the killing of the pets at the outbreak of WW2. It asks the question,When the war breaks out, who will save the animals?

My answer to the question is that no matter how much research I do, when I come to write the book, it is all about the characters. You can't have a plot on an empty stage. Before I start a novel I do quite a lot of work on my cast list. For each character I do the usual age, name, physique, etc but then I break into free writing, letting my imagination wander and it is this writing which leads me into plot lines and the heartbeat of the novel. If I know my characters well - and I always do - then they will lead me through their journey and I will know the ending. In fact, I usually write the final chapter around Chapter 3 and it doesn't  change very much.

I love doing research and have piles of notebooks, artefacts, photos, etc. But at the end of the day, if we are going to re-write the past, then our imaginations must be filled with inspiration, our characters must stand up and stand out on the page and our notes put firmly away, so that we enter the fictional dream and make sure we don't end up writing an essay or lecture about the past. The journey of our characters is the heart of story no matter whether set in the past, present or future.

What inspires you to Re-Write the Past?

http://www.miriamhalahmy.com/

Thinking aloud by Miriam Halahmy

Meg Rosoff observed that writing is 80% day dreaming and 20% writing and I quite agree with that. But I would also add into the mix my speciality - saying it out loud, preferably to someone listening. I really find that actually saying the thoughts tumbling through my mind helps both inspiration and organisation. Even if the audience is the poor old better half who is trying to have a quiet coffee up the road in our local Cafe Nero.

Of course if my audience is one of my experienced writer friends then that's really helpful. I have long suffering friends who meet me for nice literary coffees,long walks on the heath and even too many margaritas. Talking over a plot line or character development with experienced writers can of course help to keep me on the straight and narrow and avoid the pitfalls of the whimsical and outlandish.

But the better half, listening with only half an ear, allowing me to whitter on to my heart's content ( even as he yells, GOAL!) also works for me.



I also need to do my 'thinking aloud' when asked to give a talk. The thing about giving talks - well I find this anyhow- is that each one is slightly different, according to the audience, time factor and many other variables. I don't really have set talks, its more like themes which I can return to.

This month I have been invited onto a panel for the LSE Literary Festival, together with Philip Womack. We have to talk for 15 minutes on Re-writing the past vs Re-imagining the future.

This is a nice one for me because history is a great passion of mine and I've spent practically all my life imagining the past. But as my very first historical novel is due out in May and I am currently writing a second one, both set during WW2, then my thinking aloud currently focuses on how I have brought this era alive and made it relevant to 9-12 year olds.

The Emergency Zoo, (Alma Books, May 2016) asks the question, When war breaks out, who will save the animals? My characters are children aged between seven and fifteen, with the main cluster being four twelve year olds - 2 girls and 2 boys. Imagining their lives, clothes, setting, food, interests, worries and concerns was a mixture of research - my main character Tilly wades through streams and climbs trees all in a dress, usually tucked into her knickers - and quite simply thinking back to when I was twelve and how I viewed the world.

My imagination likes to soar when I am alone and fuelled up with coffee but it also likes time to bounce ideas off someone else and I think it is the very action of saying my words aloud which helps me to focus and develop my stories.

www,miriamhalahmy.com