dreamer_easy: (Chevalier de Saint-Georges)
[personal profile] dreamer_easy
Between The Girl and the Fireplace and The Shakespeare Code, I think the makers of Doctor Who are aware that there have been people of African descent in Europe for centuries, and that they hope to gently correct our usual lily-white idea of the past.

Black people have been present in Britain and on the Continent for hundreds of years, in every walk of life: from the brothel to the royal court, in service, in all sorts of professions. But, until the Casanova miniseries and Girl in the Fireplace, I had no clue this was the case. (Casanova really did have a Black manservant.) My former ignorance disqualifies me from judging anyone else who just didn't know, and angrily blamed "political correctness" (or, more gently, said they weren't worried about historical accuracy in a fantastical show).

While reading up on the history of Blacks in France, I encountered the remarkable Chevalier de Saint-Georges, who reminds me a lot of Casanova, and about whom I hope to learn a lot more. Reading through fannish discussions online, he's been mentioned more than once as an example of a real-life Black man present at the court of Versailles. That's him in my new icon, to be used for postings and comments about race.

Date: 2007-04-23 03:33 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] lordshiva.livejournal.com
My brain is like a steel seive, but I'm pretty sure the author of the 3 Musketeers was black, or from the islands, or descended from. And I'm so embarrassed I can't remember his name I am now googling it so I can write it here...aha! Alexandre Dumas!

(God. I hope this isn't a symptom of menopause.)

Date: 2007-04-23 03:59 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] redstarrobot.livejournal.com
Dumas pere was the grandson of a black woman, and Dumas fils the great-grandson. (Pushkin was also the great-grandson of a Paris-educated African, who was Peter the Great's attempt to show that black children had all the educational ability of white children, and ended up doing rather well in the Russian civil service.)

Date: 2007-04-23 03:41 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] angriest.livejournal.com
I seem to recall reading that Shakespeare's Othello is the first recorded instance we have left that uses the word "black" to indicate someone with darker than Caucasian skin.

Date: 2007-04-23 05:17 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] murasaki-1966.livejournal.com
Did you know that one of the First Fleet Convicts was a very large strong black man by the name of John "Black" Caesar? He was one of the first "bolters" (early bushrangers). The colony was near starvation at the time, and he was so hungry (the available rations not being unable to sustain him), that he stole a rifle and bolted. He was shot of the Liberty Plains (somewhere in the inner west of Sydney).

Date: 2007-04-23 05:41 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] ashamel.livejournal.com
And there was a similar character in Prismatic. That was not based explicitly on John Caesar, but just a reflection of the presence of black convicts.

Date: 2007-04-23 05:54 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] murasaki-1966.livejournal.com
Yes. I remember that. I was impressedthat you included such a character in the novel.

Date: 2007-04-23 06:45 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] the-cockfighter.livejournal.com
This is fantastic, this is what this TV Show does! It gets people thinking about their own world and oneself, one's prejudices, as much as the subject matter itself. Though one has to wonder whether RTD's method of provocation is exactly ethical?

Ethical? Is that the right word? There are all those sexuality based dialogue sight seeing moments and then those religious and spiritual punctuation marks that make their pressence known. Never really the subject matter itself.

There was some comment about Rose's Aliens of London "that's so gay" line. If I recall (and I don't have the reference source) that RTD would prefer to irk the left minded rather than makiing this a choral tune for the converted. Is it RTD wanting us to think about broader social issues in the show? Or is that he just enjoys shaking his spear?

Date: 2007-04-23 08:29 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] kateorman.livejournal.com
I still don't quite know what to make of that Aliens of London line. I take RTD's point about representing peoples' real prejudices and real language, rather than pussyfooting around them (if only Daleks in Manhattan had done so). OTOH, isn't having one of his heroes use it normalising it?

Date: 2007-04-23 12:59 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] the-cockfighter.livejournal.com
You're right it does normalise it, but it has to be one of your heroes for the lesson to be effective. If it was anyone else, would it have been noticed in the same way? Is it suppose to work because we know RTD's background? Or is it meant to be material to open up debate and wait for someone like Captain Jack to come along and settle the arguement. Yikes! too hard!

Date: 2007-04-23 01:21 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] dinosaurcostume.livejournal.com
Sorry, this began as a quick response and just got reeeally long:

Personally, I think the show has changed quite a bit since the early episodes of season 1. Rose and Aliens of London both feel a lot closer to the style of The Second Coming, which I think shares a theme in common i.e.: what if someone who represents all our ideals really did come back into our lives, wouldn't it be wonderful, wouldn't it be terrible, and how would it shake us up? Much as I love it, since the first season Doctor Who has been a lot less about that moment of shaking and more about what happens after - not simply being awoken to your ideals, but actually living with them and for them. I do believe that a certain edge has been lost, but that's in spite of the fact that Davies *was* ambitious and wanted an adventure show about adventure, an idealistic show about ideals. I really feel the crew are trying to get away from the so-called 'soap opera' style of the first series - think how muted the colours are in many of those stories, how cold it looks - and into the richer, more full-blooded world that was hinted at, just behind those doors, if you just step through, "so much madder, so much better." I don't think audiences really liked that contrast, between the Doctor's wonderful world and the awful mundanities of our human one, and I think Our World has become a more acceptable place to live - after all, that had to be the end of Rose's arc (sort of) - to bring her ideals home. But I do think those hints of a wider world, "so much madder, so much better" are quite conscious - just as the Doctor's world is perhaps more earthly than it was in season one.

Date: 2007-04-23 11:05 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] kateorman.livejournal.com
Yah - it started very grounded in the familiar everyday world, and once it was established, could move into more fantastical realms.

Date: 2007-04-23 04:37 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] gooofy.livejournal.com
So maybe the use of Black characters in Ruby in the Smoke is accurate as well?

Date: 2007-04-23 04:52 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] --kali--.livejournal.com
The Chevalier de Saint-Georges is ringing a very distinct bell for me. I'm sure there's been a documentary or something about him on the telly relatively recently.

Date: 2007-04-23 10:39 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] kateorman.livejournal.com
They're making a film about him!

Date: 2007-04-24 05:45 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] --kali--.livejournal.com
Maybe that's why then. It's either that or I caught a Schools history programme.

Date: 2007-04-24 01:39 am (UTC)
pedanther: (Default)
From: [personal profile] pedanther
The Chevalier de Saint-Georges also rings a bell for me, but in my case I think it's actually the bell marked "Viscount St. George", who is somebody else entirely.

Date: 2007-04-23 10:26 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] fred-god-of.livejournal.com
That's good to know, because every time I see africans in the New Robin hood I just get confused and blame politcal correctness.

Date: 2007-04-23 10:46 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] kateorman.livejournal.com
I think Robin of Sherwood got that started, with the inclusion of a Moorish character, which was then copied by Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. RH:POT probably was just looking for a way for Mr Costner to have a Black sidekick to please American audiences, but IIUC it's not an outrageous stretch. (Mind you, I've only been reading up a little on colonial times, centuries later.)

Date: 2007-04-23 11:16 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] fred-god-of.livejournal.com
I'm talking about the new BBC series, kind of smallvilleish but pretty good, so far they've had two blacks charecters (the Sherif's main sidekick who got killed and a conwoman fake abess, head of an abby) and a troop of middle eastern people who showed up a prisoners of war.

Date: 2007-04-24 12:19 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] kateorman.livejournal.com
Oh yes - I'm just filling in the precedents. :-) I haven't seen the new "Robin Hood" at all, but now I'm curious to research further back into history!

Date: 2007-04-24 12:28 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] kateorman.livejournal.com
... my guess is that if there were Black people in England in the Middle Ages, they'd be most likely to be from Spain.

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