As a child, I loved the old movies of the swashbuckling variety. Even then, I knew the stories were not real and the history likely to be wildly innaccurate. Romance and adventure did not wait behind every tree. Magic, though, had its own reality.
With a family who told me a closer-to-true version of the histories portrayed on the screen, I learned early the difference between fantasy, fact and fiction. What was produced for entertainment was never supposed to be a history lesson. I learned not to believe in what I saw… except for the duration of the film, when I could lose myself in make-believe.
The over-the-top acting, the swordplay and implausible heroics delighted me, and that has never really changed as I have grown older. A more mature eye sees the flaws with clarity, but I can still choose to ignore them and daydream about flashing steel, wild gallops through the night and the elaborate gowns of a bygone era. But, let’s be honest, the days when I could even dream of being the romantic, blade-wielding heroine are long gone. Or so I thought, until last weekend.
Fair bristling with concealed weaponry, this Elizabethan lady was not happy when her betrothed attempted to discard her in favour of a rarer prize. Mine was really not supposed to be the role of heroine. But, just for a moment, with ‘Lord Essex’ on his knees, and a wicked blade poised over his heart, all my daydreams came true. (Which might be why my younger son asked if I should be ‘looking so cheery’ with a knife aimed at someone’s chest.)
Continue reading at the Silent Eye
You and Garry would make great viewing buddies. He can suspend disbelief way better than I can. I love just letting the fantasy wrap him up in its folds. I tend to get picky about history — which is stupid because these things aren’t really historical. I just can’t help it!
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I pick afterwards… but I can set it aside, unless these things are trying to portray themselves as accurate. Then I get snarky.
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HE loves letting the fantasy wrap him up … Not I. Him.
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😀
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Pingback: Shades of the Golden Age… – The Militant Negro™
Thank you 🙂
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Reblogged this on Die Erste Eslarner Zeitung – Aus und über Eslarn, sowie die bayerisch-tschechische Region!.
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Thanks for sharing, Michael 🙂
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Reblogged this on Viv Drewa – The Owl Lady.
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You certainly are looking … gleeful, about the whole thing! 😀
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A girl needs a little fun 😉
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