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Hallo, friends!

This week’s Notes from a Science Historian:

• A new book in the works

• Musings from museums

• Monster-adjacent movies

• Smol news / in case you missed it

A new book in the works

Last month I sent my literary agent a draft book proposal for a nonfiction adventure story, a monster-inflected tale from the age of European maritime exploration. The gargantuan document weighed in at 14,997 words — plenty to cut to get to a more typical 10,000. Once I’ve written some sample chapters and re-built it all a few times (always be revising! Always be re-writing!), we’ll see if there’s any interest from presses.

The goal is to magick up a 20,000-ish word submission package in which All The Things reinforce one another and make editors, publishers, and PR and marketing all say, “I waaannnt this one!” The task feels like making the spectacular French dessert known as a croquembouche: profiteroles balanced in a conical tower, gently held together with spun sugar. (The photo in the Guardian recipe linked here looks timid and tame rather than tottering and terrifying: imagine this in Eiffel tower dimensions instead.)

I was in the throes of this book proposal when Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey came out. There are parallels.

Perilous sea voyages.

Eaters of human flesh.

Monsters in form and in behaviour, humanoid and not.

And then there’s a character transformed by his adventures, who returns home to find that he can’t peel from his eyes the lenses of the people and places that changed him. Things that were once familiar now seem strange, digested through memories of what he saw, heard, smelled, touched, and tasted elsewhere. And time didn’t stand still at home while he were busy having (mis)adventures. This (arguably) universal story arc transcends fact and fiction, fantasy and mundanity, and the specifics of time, place, and embodiment.

Sixteenth-century European travel accounts about the Americas were among the original sources for my PhD dissertation and first book, Renaissance Ethnography and the Invention of the Human: New Worlds, Maps and Monsters. Returning to these years later it’s clear that I’ve been on a journey and returned home as someone different: someone who asks different questions, notices new things, and has fresh ideas to chase up.

Musings from museums

There’s been much chatter about whether or not Nolan’s Odyssey was authentic, and whether it matters. Does it even mean anything to invoke authenticity when the thing began as a spoken poem with many tellers, was then written down by Homer, and was finally turned into a movie a couple of thousand years later? Each generation metabolizes the past and its artforms and makes new meanings that resonate for their own time.

In the Musée Jacquemart-André in Paris I noticed this late fifteenth- or early sixteenth-century painting by the Venetian Vittore Carpaccio:

It portrays the embassy of Hippolyta, queen of the Amazons, meeting Theseus, king of Athens, an event about which are wildly varying stories. (The pair eventually marry.) Check out everybody’s outfits! Don’t they just look like Renaissance courtiers, not ancient Greeks or Amazons, whatever they may have worn? No historical authenticity here!

Monster-adjacent movies

Whalefall, the movie. If you’ve been reading my newsletter for a while you may have noticed that I can’t stop thinking about sea monsters: wonders of marine life that have entranced humanity for millennia. Here’s an essay I wrote on Jaws; another on miscellaneous sea monster bones, myths, and a novel; and an essay in Aeon about why sea monsters are like black holes.

Back in 2023 I read Daniel Kraus’s Whalefall (the book), a thriller and coming-of-age novel about a teenage scuba-diver swallowed by a sperm whale. He has until his oxygen tank empties to figure out how to exit the whale. The book is terrific, and the movie comes out on October 14.

The Incomer. Two siblings have lived alone on a Scottish island for almost thirty years. A goofy local government office worker is sent over to evict them. What could go wrong? I loved this horror-ish, magical-realist comedy that grapples with the stories people tell about who counts as normal. John Hannah, who has the funniest role in the now-classic goofy horror film The Mummy (1999), has a thrillingly chilling supporting role as a merman.

The Rivals of Amziah King. This is a modern sort-of-Western with a plot that blends bluegrass and beekeeping. Justice — or perhaps revenge — takes surprising turns. I was so immersed that when I left the movie theatre the real world looked made-up. Angelina LookingGlass (who was magnificent) and Matthew McConaughey star.

Smol news / in case you missed it

I was elected a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society last week!

The previous issue of Strange and Wondrous: spooky season reads and teaching with HUMANS: A MONSTROUS HISTORY.

Upcoming event: A book event in Amsterdam, Friday 13 Nov, at 16:30. Official announcement coming soon!

Latest podcast episode: Challenging Histories.

Are you a history nerd? Do check out Drafting The Past, a podcast featuring conversations with historians about the art and craft of writing history! The pod has been running for four years. An expanded version of the publication, with book reviews and feature essays, goes live on Tuesday October 13. There will be an Instagram Live Launch Party on that day at 8:30pm ET.