Maren begins reading A Flemish Flame, which she wrote during a production of Verdi’s Don Carlo. She also talks a bit about unfinished artwork, procrastination, and briefly about the sociopolitical landscape in the USA right now.
The music played during this episode:
- Excerpts from Giuseppe Verdi’s String Quartet in E minor
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Transcript
(orchestra tuning)
Hello and welcome to The Bodice Ripper Project, an exploration of sexuality, feminism, and the journey to self-empowerment through the lens of romance novels.
I’m Maren Montalbano, opera singer, coach, and writer.
In this episode, you’ll hear me begin reading A Flemish Flame, which I wrote during a production of Verdi’s Don Carlo. I will also talk a bit about unfinished artwork, procrastination, and very briefly I’ll touch on what’s going on in the world right now.
So make yourself comfortable, loosen your bodice, and let’s begin!
(intro music plays)
Welcome back. And thanks so much for pressing play.
I’m really excited to get back to the stories. Just a reminder, I’m alternating stories with interviews every other week. So this week you get a story.
And this week’s story was written during a production of Verdi’s Don Carlo. Now, Don Carlo is actually not done as often as some of the other operas that I’ve covered – Magic Flute, Carmen – oh, I haven’t done Carmen yet. Um, La bohème – oh, I haven’t done La bohème either! Oh, so anyway. It’s not as, um, well-known, especially as far as Verdi’s operas. And probably one of the reasons why it’s not as well known, um, is he wrote a couple of different versions of it. So there’s not really one, seminal version that everybody knows and loves.
The other reason is that it’s a little like Shakespeare’s history plays. Don Carlo is based on a historical story of the Prince of Spain, the, uh, son of King Phillip the Second of Spain.
And like Shakespeare’s histories, it’s full of political intrigue, which can get a little bit dense when it comes to storytelling.
And to be honest, I actually ran across this problem myself as I was writing this story. In fact, I’m still having that issue because I’m not done with the story. You’re going to get chapters one and two today. Um, and I will try to finish it up for the next time I read the stories.
But, yeah, it’s difficult to write a story with the backdrop of really serious and complex political intrigue. Because as a writer, I can get sort of stuck in the weeds, explaining all of the different factions and things, that historical stuff that actually went on. Which is all very interesting, but it’s way, way, way more complicated than one can tell in a, in a romance, certainly, but really in any short form tale.
Some of the reasons I think that we, as a society, have a hard time speaking to each other is that we’ve stopped paying attention to nuance and are so attracted and perhaps addicted to a simple story. You know, the headline: reading the headline and reacting to it before actually reading the entire story, is something certainly all of us have done. I’ve done it for sure. And I think I’ve learned a little bit better to take some time and think critically about the news that I consume.
And I don’t want to get too off track here, but I do think that it’s important to just point out that media companies, journalists, they’re all storytellers, right? They’re all there to tell the story of whatever it is that’s happening, whether it’s a news story or, history, which is essentially news that happened a long time ago or fiction, which is what I write.
The act of telling a story means you have to take certain elements and put them together so that they make sense in the reader’s or the listener’s mind. And sometimes that means you have to take away certain nuances for the sake of the story.
You see this all the time when it comes to movie adaptations of books, for example, where it’s always like, oh, the book was better, because there’s more nuance to it. You know, there are more pages that kind of explain a character arc or, you know, different scenes that just don’t work when it comes to making something that’s only two and a half hours long, or, in the case of an opera, three and a half hours long. But I think I’m digressing here. The point was that I’ve had difficulties writing the story that I started during Don Carlo.
Part of it was that I didn’t want to go too far down the rabbit hole of explaining the political intrigue. And the other part was that, just from a practical perspective, we did have some time backstage, but we didn’t have a lot of time backstage. And I also, in that production, I got caught up in a whole bunch of card games. So I wasn’t writing. And the costumes they had us in were really difficult to get into and out of. So there was a lot of time taken, just putting the costumes on. Talk about tight corsets!
And then the last reason I had some writer’s block was a friend of mine asked to be written into the story, and I always have a hard time writing friends into romances. So, what I ended up doing was instead of making it that sexy, I turned her into a bad-ass warrior spy, which was actually kind of fun, but not really romance.
So anyway, I ended up only writing one chapter. But then I thought, “Hey, I’m in a pandemic. I can finish this story.” So over Christmas break, I started picking it up again.
And I only got one chapter done. Writing is hard! Anyway. So I’ll take the next two weeks and I’ll finish up the, um, six chapter story format that you’re used to.
This all makes me think about all of the unfinished works of art that are out there that are still famous. I’m sure this won’t be famous, but you know, I am in good company, right?
Mozart didn’t finish his Requiem. Of course he died. So I guess that’s, that’s a pretty good excuse. Schubert, Franz Schubert wrote the Unfinished Symphony. I mean, he didn’t, he didn’t call it the Unfinished Symphony. Uh, he just didn’t finish the symphony.
And, um, he, he lived for like six years after he stopped writing that piece. So I think he just sort of got to a point where he was like, ah, I don’t know. That’s sort of how I see it, anyway.
Jane Austen, her last novel, uh, is also unfinished. I think it’s called Sanditon. I’m bringing her up because there’s a slight nod to Jane Austen at the beginning of this story, which is called A Flemish Flame.
I know that Jane Austen also died before she could finish it. She was, um, very, very ill while she was writing that. So she has an excuse too. I am not ill, thank goodness. My excuse. I don’t know if I have one, I guess there are several excuses. One is I do have a tendency to put a lot of things on my plate. Then I always have an excuse to not do something, right? It’s a little bit of a procrastination technique.
And also, you know, there have been some serious things happening in the world and I’ve, um, been kind of distracted by that. Um, our democracy hangs in the balance right now and, um, I’m not unaffected by that.
I don’t want to bring too much political talk into this podcast, but you know, this is real, this is happening. And, um, I don’t want to ignore it either. I’m recording this on January 16th. I know that this is going to be dropped on the 18th, which is two days before the inauguration of President Joe Biden.
And I am worried about what will happen on that day or even the day before or the days after. And I know that I can’t control any of it and all I can do is make good wishes for the safety of all the people involved in the inauguration.
But all that to say that, you know, I’m not the only one who has been a little bit distracted recently. And I think that’s okay. It’s okay to give myself a break. It’s okay for all of us to give ourselves a break. We don’t have to be perfect.
I created this podcast as a place for me to get vulnerable and show my flaws. So here they are: unfinished, half dressed. And still beautiful.
With that, let’s get on with the story.
A Flemish Flame
Chapter 1
There is nothing so heartbreaking as the parting of good friends under the orders of a jealous husband.
Marguerite de la Marck, Countess d’Aremberg and best friend to the queen of Spain, swore softly under her breath as she watched El Escorial disappear into the distance. Her pale cheeks were still wet from the tears she had cried with her friend not two hours ago when she first learned of her banishment, but now she was angry. Angry at men, for their jealousy. Angry at Spaniards, for their hypocrisy.
But most of all, she was angry with herself, for failing her mission.
She had been sent to Spain as a spy to find out what King Philip’s plans were for the people of Flanders. Her friendship with the queen helped open doors that were closed to almost everyone else…and thanks to her late husband, Jean, she had been trained to defend her secrets, even to the death.
Someone in the monastery must have figured out that she had been snooping around, because while she was trying to wait discreetly in the garden for the queen to meet with the crown prince of Spain (at the proper distance to give them both privacy and legitimacy), someone had pulled her violently into the shrubbery.
She had immediately fallen backwards, her voluminous skirts cushioning her fall while also tripping up her attacker. She looked up and noticed two more figures in the shadows, approaching with menace: monks, all three, with their hoods pulled up to hide their faces.
“Kill her,” seethed the first one, still struggling to free himself from her skirts.
“No,” said the one on her left. “Our orders were to take her alive.”
All three monks had paused, and Marguerite used their momentary confusion to leap onto her feet, pulling a small dagger from her boot in one swift movement. She had lunged to her left and threw the dagger, and the blade had landed in the second monk’s throat. He silently crumpled to the ground, a surprised look on his face.
The third monk had launched himself at her, but she had twisted away at the last second to avoid his grasp. She had pulled another dagger out of her bodice and hurled it at him; this one missed his neck but hit him in the shoulder, and he cried out in pain.
The first monk had been watching this exchange warily, looking for his opportunity to attack again, which came when Marguerite lost her balance and fell again to the ground. He had pulled a rope off of his waist and was ready to strangle her with it, when all of a sudden, a large rock flew out of nowhere and hit him on the head.
The third monk was still writhing on the ground, clutching his shoulder in pain, when another man, this one dressed all in black leather, wearing a leather mask to hide his face, had stepped out from behind a tree and grabbed him in a sleeper hold until the monk fell unconscious.
As Marguerite stared at this masked man, he had flashed her a grin and put his finger to his lips.
Just at that moment, she heard the young page Tebaldo announce, “The king!”
She had left her post. She had left her queen alone with the crown prince. And she had failed.
Chapter 2
Carriage wheels hit a pothole, and her thoughts were jostled back to the present.
The sun was beginning to set, and El Escorial was now a mere dot on the horizon. She realized that her carriage was slowing to a halt, even though she knew there was still at least a half hour’s ride left until they reached the inn.
She rapped the roof with her cane. “What is going on out there?”
“Some trouble with the wheel, your ladyship,” came the reply. “We should be…” the coachman’s voice drifted off, and there was the sound of scuffling feet as the carriage rocked violently.
A musket went off. Then silence.
Marguerite’s pulse raced, and she opened her eyes wide as she readied herself for the inevitable intrusion. She had dealt with highwaymen before, she thought with contempt. They wouldn’t know what hit them.
She gripped her cane and positioned herself in the corner farthest away from the door, crouching in wait.
When the door finally opened, she hurled herself at the fiend, using her cane to deliver a blow to his abdomen.
He grunted in surprise and stepped back, causing them both to tumble to the ground. She took control of their descent and landed on top of him, straddling him while she pressed her cane horizontally against his chest. “Not tonight, Satan,” she hissed.
He coughed, stared at her…then began to laugh.
Confused, she looked around to gauge her situation. Her coachman and footmen were unconscious, trussed up like pigs on the side of the road. But instead of the gang of highwaymen she had imagined, the only culprit was the man beneath her.
She turned her gaze back to him. He was not squirming or resisting; in fact, he was still chuckling, his chest and belly shaking between her legs with laughter.
He was masked, but his full lips were turned up in a grin, and she could see his brown eyes twinkling with recognition at her.
This was the masked man from earlier, who had saved her from the monks!
Not willing to give up her position of power, she pushed a little harder on his chest with her cane. “Who are you? What do you want?”
The man continued to laugh.
“Answer me!” she cried in frustration. She raised her cane to deliver a blow to his head.
In the blink of an eye, he flipped her over, using her momentum to throw her off balance. Suddenly, his body was pressing down on hers. “Do not ask too many questions, señora,” the man murmured, that charming grin still on his face. “I am a friend, that is all you need to know. But we must make haste if we are to escape your pursuers.”
He paused, his face mere inches away from hers. Their breaths mingled, and for a moment she lost herself in his dark, chocolate eyes. She could hear her heart pounding in her ears.
Hoofbeats sounded in the distance. He glanced away, then back at her. “I apologize again for startling you. But I will need your cooperation if we are both to leave without a trace.”
Bosoms heaving, she looked again at those beautiful eyes. Something inside her trusted him, so she nodded.
In a few swift movements, he pulled her off the ground and deposited her on his horse, bounding into the saddle behind her. In the fading light, they galloped away from the bustling inn only a few miles down the road and towards a dark, forbidding forest.
And I will leave it there.
Join me next episode, in which I interview director, writer, and actor, Vanessa Ogbuehi.
My idea of what success is might not look like a traditional idea of success. And that’s going to be fine. Maybe I only put out three works that I really like in my life and the rest of it is dedicated to, like, living on a farm. And that’s a perfectly fine artist’s career. I can whip it out, my creativity, in any scenario I want. But you have to define what success is for yourself and what you’re willing to sacrifice or not.
So as I said before, my intention is to write the rest of A Flemish Flame, at least in its six chapter form, for the next story episode, which will be in two weeks. So it’ll be fresh off the presses!
Also, obviously this coming week is going to be a little nuts. So if I end up not finishing the story in two weeks, I’ll have something for you and I’ll give myself a pass. It’s all a part of the creative process.
Speaking of the creative process, I am currently enrolling students for an online course that starts on February 1st. It’s an eight week course called Inspiration to Implementation, in which you’ll get trainings and coaching from me on how to self-produce your own performance.
There are live trainings, worksheets, interviews with industry experts, and a supportive environment in which you can test your ideas out without any pressure to get it perfect. So if you think that you might be interested in this program, or if you know someone who might fit the bill, go to askmaren.com-forward-slash-inspired for more information and to book a call with me.
Also do not forget to subscribe to my newsletter. I send out love notes and exclusive content to my subscribers. So head over to bodiceripperproject.com and sign up.
I absolutely love hearing from you guys. So if there was something that particularly struck you about this or any of the episodes, please reach out to me.
I’m on Instagram at supermaren, that’s S U P E R M A R E N. And I promise that I will write back. Instagram is the easiest way to get a hold of me.
The Bodice Ripper Project is a production of Compassionate Creative, and was conceived, written, and edited by me, Maren Montalbano. The background music during the story was excerpts from Giuseppe Verdi’s String Quartet in E minor because for some reason I couldn’t find a public domain recording of Don Carlo. Get it together, internet – and the theme music was written by yours truly. If you liked what you heard, I invite you to give this podcast a 5-star rating – when I see those I get all tingly inside – and I’ll see you next time.