Happy Presidents Day

This is the day (third Monday in February) that we in the US celebrate our two greatest Presidents, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, with a Federal holiday. The holiday used to take place on February 22, which was Washington's birthday, but in 1971, it was combined with Lincoln's birthday, Feb 12. Lincoln's birthday used to be noted, especially in school lessons, but we didn't get off work.

By combining the celebration of the two birthdays into one Monday holiday, we got a three day weekend and a perfect time for stores to offer great sales. We also improved the opportunities to hold formal celebrations of the Presidents themselves.

One wonders what people in the Regency thought of George Washington, who by then was a memory, having died in 1799. The British people had two close examples of populous rebellion, the American and French Revolutions, and both were still coloring their lives with the Napoleonic war and the War of 1812.

Napoleon and George Washington had two different takes on leadership.

Napoleon seized power whenever and wherever he could, declaring himself Emperor and invading other European countries. There was no doubt in the people's minds that Napoleon wanted to conquer Great Britain, too.

Washington, on the other hand, provided a model of refusing power. Even though he had promised to resign his commission as Commander of the Continental Army at the war's end, there were several of his generals who had pleaded with him to seize civilian power and declare himself king. He discouraged the Newburgh Conspirators from attempting a coup de tat. He refused a third term as President.

Mason Locke Weems, the first biographer of Washington, wrote of why Washington was greater than George III or Napoleon or other leaders. His The Life of George Washington was the best-selling book in the USA for 100 years, second only to the bible. Of course, several of the incidents related in Weems's book are known to be fabrications even though some achieved the status of legend, like the story of the cherry tree in which the boy George tells his father, "I cannot tell a lie. I cut down the cherry tree."

When hearing that Washington intended to resign his commission after the war instead of seizing control of the new nation, George III said to artist Benjamin West, "If he (Washington) does that, he will be the greatest man in the world."

Napoleon seemed to agree, although in a characteristically competitive way. He said, "Posterity will talk of Washington as the founder of a great empire, when my name shall be lost in the vortex of revolution."

Lord Byron contrasts Napoleon and Washington in his Ode To Napoleon, written after Napoleon's defeat.

Of Napoleon he begins:

'Tis done---but yesterday a King!And armed with Kings to strive---And now thou art a nameless thing

Near the end of the poem, he mentions Washington:

Where may the wearied eye reposeWhen gazing on the Great;Where neither guilty glory glows,Nor despicable state?Yes---One---the first---the last---the best---The Cincinnatus of the West,Whom Envy dared not hate,Bequeathed the name of Washington,To make man blush there was but one!

Happy Presidents Day!
Do you have a favorite quote or story about Washington? What are you doing this Presidents Day?

One Naughty Night Winner!

Diane D--Florida, you are the winner of the ARC of One Naughty Night!! Check your email for details...

Novellas, Covers and Giveaway!

Maybe I shouldn’t admit this, but I'm kind of lukewarm about the covers put on the old Regency anthologies.

Here’s one for an anthology in which a friend, Patricia Bray, had a story. The kittens on the cover are adorable, but they don’t say “romance” to me and the stories inside focused more on the paranormal than the cuteness.

I have mixed feelings about the Christmas anthology covers that seem to imply that the season itself somehow guarantees a happy ending. But a lot of Christmas novellas don’t actually use the holiday as a gimmick. In fact, the title of this one, with Risky Amanda as one of the contributors, actually refers to paranormal elements in this anthology. Much more fun.

I’ve only participated in one anthology myself, HIS BLUSHING BRIDE, with Alice Holden and our good friend and occasional Risky guest, Regina Scott. When I first saw the cover, I knew that though the Valentine-y treatment wasn't my thing, it would appeal to a lot of readers. (The book sold pretty well.) Still, I went for a different look for the cover for the reissue of my story from that anthology, The Wedding Wager.

What do you think? Do you go for anthologies or novellas with the cute covers, or are there other types of covers you prefer?

I’ll be giving away 5 Kindle or Nook copies of The Wedding Wager to commenters chosen at random. If you win, you can also nominate a friend to receive a free copy. Void where prohibited. You must be over 18. No purchase necessary. Post your comment by midnight EST on February 24th. I will post an announcement on Saturday, February 25, so please check back to see if you have won.

Elena

www.elenagreene.com

www.facebook.com/ElenaGreene

A chocolate experience

I went to a historical program this week, but it was much better than Diane's and also appropriate to Amanda's on Valentine's Day (and Carolyn, sigh. Carolyn, do try and get your mind out of the gutter). I've finished my chocolate--I ate half of them at five minutes after midnight and the other half that evening of the 14th and here's the evidence.

But I digress. I went to a chocolate program at Riversdale House Museum and although I was volunteering I didn't spill anything on anyone and I managed to eat a fair amount too. There were some awesome chocolate fans there who ate their way through four centuries of chocolate and probably would have been good for more.

You can find the recipes at Cooking Up the Past, the FB page that Riversdale's Food Historian runs, and which has some great stuff on it.

So, chocolate. First it starts off as a tree with a fruit, with seeds (pods), from which you extract the nibs (the things that look as if a mouse has visited). It's a very labor intensive product and you can see a video made by the foodways historian at Williamsburg on a site devoted to the history of chocolate in North America, American Heritage Chocolate. There are some more recipes and also products if you wish to try some authentic cookery.

Chocolate is NOT sweet. You have to add sugar and I found that the historic recipes had a bitter kick to them rather like coffee--cacoa does have a high caffeine content. This is why chocolate was a popular breakfast drink--we used a latte machine to froth up spiced and (slightly) sweetened chocolate in hot water and added in milk to taste just as you would with coffee. This 1731 chocolate pie, one of the delicacies served at the chocolate event was deliciously bitter.

Into the nineteenth century, things got sweeter. Here's a whole plateful of chocolatey thrills, including ice cream, a layer cake with chocolate icing, chocolate pudding, a heart-shaped cocoa biscuit, a cake with chocolate icing and some chocolate candy.

We went into the twentieth century with tollhouse cookies, and into the twenty-first with white chocolate and chocolate flavored with chili. Yum. Then we kitchen staff did the dishes. If you're anywhere near the Washington, DC area, check out the schedule of events at Riversdale: there's a complete weekend of women's activities on May 5-6, The 1812 Woman, one of the many events commemorating the war of 1812.

So let's talk about chocolate!

And go visit The Bookish Dame who's given Jane Austen: Blood Persuasion a great review today and is giving away a copy!

eBook Giveaway PLUS Contraception (Frank Talk)

Stuff to Win Again!

Congrats to the winners of last week's giveaway of Not Wicked Enough. It was easy to give eBooks to the winners who preferred that reading format. In fact, it was so easy that I got to thinking that eBook readers don't usually get to share in the giveaway love.

So.

I have decided to giveaway 20 eBook copies of Not Wicked Enough. Visit my blog to enter and for details and rules. Entry closes at midnight Pacific on February 16, 2012, so get there quick!

And now, on to my second topic.

Contraception during the Regency

In Not Wicked Enough, the hero, Mountjoy, uses a condom in a somewhat unusual way, in that he is not using it to prevent STDs but to prevent conception. Only, actually, I don't believe it was all that unusual.

The common belief is that men used condoms only to prevent disease. This would not have been entirely effective of course, since many STDs would have passed through a condom made of gut. The history of condoms is a long one. There is evidence that the Romans used condoms, as did the Chinese and the Japanese. The fact that many of these early condoms covered only the head of the penis speaks rather loudly, I think, of the intention to prevent not disease but the transmission of sperm.

The point, really, is that humans the world over have made the connection between disease, pregnancy and intercourse, and that knowledge, however inaccurately they may have understood the underlying biological processes, is not new.

In Europe, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek "discovered" sperm circa 1677. The role of sperm in conception was well known by the Regency. The actual process of conception may not have been correctly understood, but one need only know that getting sperm into a woman was necessary for conception and that the penis was the sperm delivery system. Once you've figured this out, it strains credulity to suggest that no one then realized that if you inferred with the delivery system, you would vastly decrease the chance of conception. No sperm. No baby.

If a man wears a condom, he's going to notice that the sperm stays inside the condom. He may, in fact, not care even a little that he has just reduced the chance of knocking up his partner. He may have worn the condom for the sole purpose of preventing disease. But it's too obvious a connection for an educated, informed man not to make. In fact, there are historical mentions of the use of condoms as contraception throughout history.

Unquestionably, their use as a disease preventative is mentioned far more often. That makes sense. Men didn't want to get the clap and in the West, men tend to own the discourse. And spin it, by the way.

It's important to keep in mind the highly charged debate around contraception and female reproduction. This is NOT a subject people talked about frankly. As with references to access to abortion, the language is coded. And yet, throughout time and history, women have acted to control their reproduction through abstinence (which all women recognize is not always possible or even a choice they have) contraception, abortion, including self-mutilation once pregnant, and infanticide.

So, in Not Wicked Enough, Mountjoy is an educated man of means with access to other educated men of means. He has the money to purchase the very highest quality condoms. None of his peers would blink at his doing so. Men didn't want to get the clap, after all. When he embarks on his affair with Lily, he is aware he can withdraw and thus interfere with the sperm delivery system. He even does so. But he does not want to continue with that method. And being the sort of man with access to condoms and who would know that a condom would also prevent the delivery of sperm, it's impossible, in my opinion, for him not to also understand that if he wears a condom, he can finish inside and not put Lily at risk of conception. And that's what he does.

Some condom Facts

In the Regency, the best condoms were made from highly processed gut that required the use of caustic chemicals. They would stiffen (HAH!) when completed and therefore needed to be soaked in liquid to soften before use. They were typically fastened to the base of the penis by a ribbon.

Make of it what you will, but condoms were washed (one prays about the washing part) and reused.

In this 1779 painting by German artist Johann Zoffany (Self-Portait as a Monk) on the wall to the left of the rosary beads and beneath the bottle are two condoms.

Airing out, one supposes.

Think about the title of this painting: Self-portrait as a Monk and then consider the  presence of the condoms and all that is suggested by those two things.

Naturally a monk would also wish to avoid the clap, but oh, the coded images. A pregnant nun would be so awfully inconvenient.