Today, we’re talking with Anthony Wildman about his book, In the Company of Knaves
Tell us something unexpected about yourself!
I didn't start writing until after I turned sixty, which was unexpected to me, let alone the rest of the world!
Why do you write?
I often joke that my writing is really only an excuse to do historical research, which is probably half true. But why do I write? Mostly because I have discovered that telling stories, whether true or completely made up, is a lot of fun.
Where did you get the inspiration for your current book?
As the third book in a series about the early life of Shakespeare, it is to some extent built on the two first two novels. But the specific plot in this book was inspired by a few slightly murky historical facts. One was the closure of two of London's major acting companies in 1589, apparently for some kind of transgression against public morality, though the nature of the actual offence is unknown. The other is the well-known enmity that developed between Shakespeare and another writer, Robert Greene, the reasons for which are obscure. The rest of my ideas for the book were hung from those two pegs.
What do you enjoy the most about your genre?
The wonderful thing about history is that it offers an abundance of great stories and intriguing mysteries, both of which combine to create a gold mine for a novelist. And where a historian has to say ‘well, this or this might have happened, or it might not', I can pick the story I like and just tell it. Exploring all those possibilities is great fun.
How would you describe your writing process?
It has evolved over the years. For my first book in the Shakespeare series, I just started with an idea and wrote, letting the story unfold as I went. But for ‘The Diplomat of Florence', my novel about Machiavelli, I had to be much more structured, since I was following very well documented events. More recently I have ended up being a kind of hybrid between being a ‘pantser' and a planner, spending a good deal of time working up the ploy in outline before writing the book itself, but also allowing the narrative to evolve without it being enslaved to the initial plot. Thank heavens I discovered a software package called Scrivener, which makes that kind of writing style very easy.
What do you think authors have to gain from participating in social media?
I do find social media a bit vexing. It often feels as if it is a kind of voracious beast whose appetites can never be satisfied, and if you aren't careful you can end up spending all your time feeding it. Like many, I feel as if its initial promise is slowly being subverted by crass commercialism. But having said all that, there is no denying that it is an important channel of communication if you use it to find the right audience.
What advice would you have for other writers?
I've often been asked this, and I usually decline to give much advice – I am very conscious that, though I have been at it for six or seven years now, I am relatively new to this game, with much to learn myself. If pushed, I would say that the most important thing for a writer to do is to write! Sounds simple, but creating anything is hard work, and we all put things off that are hard, don't we? But in my experience, just getting down to work and starting pretty soon opens the creative taps, and things start flowing.
How do you select your books’ titles and covers?
I choose the titles of my books to convey as succinctly as possible what the book is about. Anyone who knows anything about Shakespeare, for example, would recognise the words ‘What News on the Rialto?' as a line from The Merchant of Venice, and therefore would have some idea that the book is set in Venice and that it is related to Shakespeare in some way. Similarly, ‘The Diplomat of Florence' tells the reader the setting and general background of the book. So in most respects it is driven by the needs of marketing more than anything else. Much the same is true of my covers. I have an excellent cover designer who comes up with brilliant concepts, but the overall design is governed by marketing. It has to convey what the book is about and where it is set, and it has to stand out on the Amazon page and anywhere else it is advertised.
What's your next step?
I have a few more books lurking in my mind. My next project is likely to be a novel about Napoleon Bonaparte, specifically about his time spent on the island of Elba before he made the fateful decision to return to France and commence the campaign that ended with Waterloo and his final exile to St Helena. It is a curious interlude in his life, and one full of dramatic possibilities (not to mention real life events that, in all honesty, you couldn't make up!). After that I have in mind another series of books set in Renaissance Florence. By the time I've done all that, no doubt a few other ideas will have occurred to me!
How do you react to seeing a new review for your book?
It depends on the review. We all like positive feedback, so an approving review is affirming. But even positive reviews sometimes have little nuggets of criticism that can be a bit jarring when you first see them. I try and take such comments as feedback, unless they are plain silly, in which case I ignore them!
