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Questions and Answers (continued): As I scrambled among fallen stones and clambered over broken walls, I imagined Jane exploring the site in 1842. At that time, she was tormenting herself with worry over what her avowed enemy, the unprincipled John Montagu, would be doing in England — though she could hardly imagine how vindictive he would be. That’s when I glimpsed it — a distinction that had previously eluded me. Jane made mistakes, some of them grievous, but she did not behave with sickening malevolence. Jane Franklin was no John Montagu. On Sarah Island, as I stood in the ruins of a once-terrible prison, gazing out over Macquarie Harbour at the dark green rainforest on the distant shore, I contemplated this distinction. In mistreating John Rae, Jane had done something I could not excuse. And yet, even there, she had not acted maliciously. She had erased the accomplishments of the peerless explorer because he had got in the way of her reconstruction of Arctic history — and Jane could allow nothing to stand in the way of that project, not her dwindling resources, not her precarious health, not even her relationship with the father she loved. Unlike John Montagu, Jane Franklin made her worst mistakes while serving an honourable obsession. As I realized that, I felt a barrier come crashing down inside me. I felt released, somehow, from the confines of my original perception. In retrospect, I think that’s when, as a biographer, I forgave Jane Franklin for being human. I felt free to look at her through fresh eyes, and to appreciate the magnitude of her accomplishment — free to write Lady Franklin’s Revenge. 8. What books were most useful to you in writing this biography. If readers wanted more background on this historical period, what would you recommend? Readers looking for background might begin with Women in England: 1760-1914, by Susie Steinbach; The Victorian House: Domestic Life from Childbirth to Deathbed, by Judith Flanders; Off the Beaten Track: Three Centuries of Women Travellers, by Dea Birkett; and The Fatal Shore, by Robert Hughes. They might also check out Fatal Passage: The Untold Story of John Rae, by yours truly, and Frozen in Time: The Fate of the Franklin Expedition, by Owen Beattie and John Geiger. Lady Franklin’s Revenge contains a longer bibliography. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 |
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