CSotD: Treason’s just another word for nothing left to lose
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In Big Nate, Nate has decided to cash in on the market for romance novels by writing a bodice-ripper set in the War of 1812.
By coincidence, yesterday I got to see the printer's dummy for my historical novel, aimed at middle-school kids like Nate, which is also set in the War of 1812. And I only feel a little shame in introducing this blatant plug because Lincoln Peirce has a new book, "Big Nate: What Could Possibly Go Wrong?" which was released Tuesday and so I can reciprocate by blatantly plugging his book, too.
And unless you teach middle school, have a middle schooler in your family or, as in my case, edit the work of middle schoolers, you have no idea how big Big Nate is. When we put out a list of new books to be reviewed two weeks ago, Nate's latest was one of the first snatched up.
Yes! Ahead of the dozen or so books for slightly older kids about lovesick vampires in dystopic societies. If Nate really wants to cash in, there's the target: Winston Smith meets Anne Rice. In Pandora.
Meanwhile, let me tell you a little about what Big Nate has stumbled into in this current story arc, because Ben Franklin being dead is hardly the biggest hurdle he'll face.
"Freehand," which I wrote and Christopher Baldwin illustrated, is one of a half-dozen or so serial stories we've collaborated on for newspapers to run one chapter at a time, in hopes of attracting young readers and also to please teachers who can use them to teach mythology or history.
With the 150th anniversary of the Civil War and the bicentennial of the War of 1812, we had two projects under contract and the question was, which to tackle in 2012 and which to take on in 2013?
From the point of view of the anniversaries, you'd do the Civil War first, since there are many interesting events of which this is the 150th anniversary, while the War of 1812 barely started in 1812 and there won't be any 200th anniversaries of anything significant until 2013.
But it's called "The War of 1812," and so we decided we'd better run the serial in 2012 or people would think we had missed the boat. Having thus gotten ahead of the actual bicentennial, we'll be selling it in book form at the Sackets Harbor battlefield where the main action takes place. (And elsewhere. We'll let you know. Trust me.)
Having handled the perceptions of the general public, however, we faced a different matter.
Back in the 1960s, there was a big deal made over the centennial of the Civil War, somewhat set up by a comic strip called Johnny Reb and Billy Yank that ran a few years earlier. (Here are a whole bunch, from which I swiped this example:)
Frank Giacoia had done some serious research before doing the strip, but the bulk of stuff that everyone else was putting out for the actual anniversary was pretty perfunctory: Gray stuff for the rebs, blue stuff for the Yanks.
However, the centennial touched off a new phenomenon: The re-enactor.
Not only did local history buffs know that, for example, the unit from their town had worn butternut, not just "gray," or were zouaves, but, as the commemoration went on, they began to come up with the specific buttons for their uniforms and to delve into a level of historical nerdiness that grew into a hobby, not just for that war but for the French & Indian Wars, the Revolution, the War of 1812 and others.
And there is genuine ownership and jealousy at work, not just in military uniforms but across the board: A woman in 1812 might wear a mobcap, but she wouldn't have in 1776. And it matters. A lot.
Everybody gets into the act, as this daughter of a Voltigeur can attest.
Dragging in Ben Franklin a dozen years after his death would be problematic, but Nate's got another one right in that first panel. In my initial plan for Freehand, the young boy ran off to join the war because he was wrongly accused of theft, and, in the course of the war, not only discovered the thief but uncovered treason as well. A fairly standard but effective plot for this sort of book.
Then I discovered that there really wasn't any treason in the War of 1812, because we were so divided on the topic that there wasn't a solid basis from which to trease.
For example, when the British raced across the ice of the St. Lawrence and drove the American troops out of Ogdensburg, the city fathers petitioned Congress not to re-establish a military presence there.
It was interfering with their business of selling supplies to the British army.
And it's not so much that they had the nerve to make the request as it is that Congress more or less agreed to it.
And you thought Schuyler and Stark had problems with those yahoos. Or maybe you didn't. But if I got it wrong, I'd sure hear about it.
Check your sources, Nate.
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