Several years ago in the SCA I started writing original poems, both Viking and English. Their objective was usually for use in some competition I'd seen. I started writing Viking poetry because other people said "how easy it is!" and since I'd already written some English poetry, I figured "how hard can it be?"
Well, it was pretty hard.
From there, I'm not sure when or how exactly, I branched into written storytelling. I'm fairly sure that I had started before War of the Wings I, but it's safe to say that War of the Wings was one of the main vehicles I used to write stories. The purpose of those stories was simply to raise interest in attending War of the Wings.
The first year was simply, frankly, schtick. In other words, the original excuse for WOW was Sacred Stone vs. Windmasters Hill, and the storylines there were completely fantastic. "How the Birdy got her Flame On," "How the Kitty Got her Wings", et cetera. They were strictly for entertainment, although my main plot was "the excuse for the War". The thing I concentrated most on was using easily identifiable elements from modern day, ie, things like the Duke Blue Devils, the Carolina Tarheels, the town of Hiddenite, Kill Devils Hill, and the like. Obviously I have no idea how much of an effect the stories had on attendance, but I do know that during the 3rd year someone said "oh we don't need any more storyline, everybody knows about this event" followed less than a week later by "where's the storyline???"
So I kept writing. I did take a five year hiatus while I was Baronial Warlord from actually writing the stories, but when I stepped down as Warlord there was apparently a need for the storyline to be revived, so I did.
By that point I had already written stories such as "We Better Get Back by Dark" which were well recieved, and I had already started to write storyline for Baron Marc and Baroness Alianor. (War of the Wings III). The main difference between the earlier storylines and these that came later were that instead of completely fantastical story elements, I used Alianor's actual persona as the basis for much of the storyline.
It is important to realize, at this point, that everything I write that involves an actual person gets seen by them before it is published, so that a) I have their permission and b) they know about it before it goes live.
I don't remember the first time Alianor told me, while we were on the phone, laughing, that somebody had either called or emailed her or walked up to her at an event wanting to know when she and Marc were getting divorced, and when she looked puzzled, said that they had figured it out because of something I had written for the storyline.
We laughed about it at least three or four times over the last several years, simply because Marc and Alianor weren't married. When they actually DID get married at the last WOW (2019), I had to write both of their alternate personae into the storyline because it simply made sense to have the two previous personae split up due to the entire "when are you getting divorced?" inquiries from years past. This generated much amusement.
What I never realized was how much, and how literally, art was imitating life imitating art.
Those of you who have never heard of the "blood libel" story, don't feel bad. Basically there is a medieval story told (http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2014/08/06/blood-libel-the-short-history-of-a-dangerous-myth/?hpt=hp_t2) about the "fact" that Jews kill non-Jewish children and bake their blood into matzoh for Passover. It has been repeatedly quoted as fact even though there is absolutely no historical basis for it. The only place it has ever existed has been in stories dating back to 1144.
"The blood libel originated in medieval England with the death of William of Norwich. William was a 12-year-old tanner’s apprentice who was killed in 1144. At the time of his death, his parents accused the local Jewish community of responsibility, but investigations revealed nothing.
Six years later Thomas of Monmouth, a Benedictine monk, decided to investigate and sensationalize the murder."
And so, dear reader, without ever really having intended to do anything other than tell an entertaining story, I have literally recreated an actual medieval activity, to wit, art imitating life imitating art.
All the stories I've ever written that name an actual person (which has been quite a lot of them, as it turns out) have been used at one point or another as part of what has previously been called SCA Mythology, which is the term I have adopted. Stories like the "You Know You're In The SCA When " (YKYITSCA), "No Shit There I Was" (NSTIW), and now, stories written to advance the storyline of an event. ("I Was King Henry's Fool", "War of the Wings", multiple Coronations, Crown Tourneys, et cetera).
Every scrap of it was an authentic recreation of a completely medieval activity.
Unintentional? Sure. But just as effective as the original, without a doubt.
Baron Jonathan Blackbow
1/6/2020