Enough Oldies for a While..Back to Blogging

[Peg Herring]

I'll still take more oldie stories if you've got one, but I'm back to ruminating on writing. I'm doing research for a sequel to Macbeth's Niece, and it reveals what a quagmire I've gotten myself into. You see, there's the real Macbeth, who lived and died a king and never murdered anyone that we know of, and there's Shakespeare's Macbeth, the character that most of us know. After he died (not killed by Macduff or anyone else at that battle, which was not at Birnam Wood), his stepson Lulach took over but was defeated by Mael Comin, the man called Malcolm in the play. After that things get really crazy, with nephews and brothers allying and betraying until it comes out more like Greek tragedy than history.

The question is does anyone care. I'm afraid, looking at recent "docu-dramas" and "tell-all" fantasies, that people prefer a good story to history any day, and I may as well tell my story my way. Only a few who really care will delve into history looking for the real Macbeth, and he, like the real King Arthur or the real William Wallace, is difficult to find among all the wisp-of-glory dreams of what we want them to have been.