On doing one's research.
My Dearest Scarlett,
I love information, I absorb it and I carry it around with me. Which explains why I know how many tablespoons of sugar are in ketchup and how a differential on a car works and have a basic understanding of the off-side rule in soccerfootball. I go giddy when something happens in a book that makes so much complete sense to me. For example any character reactions to something only the reader would know if they had a full and complete understanding of the situation presented to them. I only like what I like, and if I'm force fed information on a subject I don't like, then I don't retain it.
I didn't like history at school. There are only so many times you can have someone tell you about crop rotations, different inventions throughout the industrial revolution and then ask you to list of the dates of birth, death and reign of every king and queen of England/Great Britain since the year dot. It gets tiring and yes, I'm sorry Mr Chinnian I did cheat on my Year 9 exam on that last part. I wrote it all on my hand.
I still can't believe that worked.
One thing I did love in history was the studying of World War One and Two. The strategies, the successes and the mistakes, the conflicts and the inventions (some, admittedly, far better than others). I inadvertently collect memorabilia from that era. I made my Music partner in Year 10 wear a WW2 Warden helmet during a presentation about music from the 1940's. They're made of steel by the way and have next to no padding and that presentation was nearly an hour long.
I still maintain that the greatest war movie ever is All Quiet On The Western Front (sorry Year 9 history class for making you sit through that).
I really put my classmates through a lot it would seem. I need to stop apologising.
All this is leading up to the movie, Inglourious Basterds. As you well know I love Quentin Tarantino, so it was a surprise that the first time I saw the movie was when you and me went last autumn. Saying that, it is an hour to a decent cinema out here, but now I'm making an excuse. Let's move on.
It was World War 2 and it was Quentin Tarantino. I really had no idea what to expect, but it blew my mind in a way that only QT can do. It makes me giddy talking about how he makes a film, with scene cuts, chapters, how he introduces characters and music. My God his music choices. I would go back to school and study film just to get into his head more if I didn't think film was such a drop out subject to study at university. Any way!
I was reading some fiction the other day and decided I wanted to have a go at writing something from the point of view of Major Dieter Hellstrom. QT doesn't give much in the way of back story for characters unless they're spelt out in front of you in the form of giant yellow letters and Slaughter by Billy Preston. Even less so for Dieter, in fact I am certain there is nothing in the movie for his character, apart from a handful of scenes.
So when I saw something about him being Gestapo I decided to follow it through. I wanted to at least have a time line for the character before I started building a plot around him. And with him being Gestapo I could start to understand how other characters would react to him.
But he wore a black uniform. And this threw the Gestapo idea out the window. You were there when I was all weepy eyed about the fact QT could have dropped the ball on this one. I was worried. Really, worried.
The uniform that you see Colonel Hans Landa wearing is correct (never mind some interesting introductions to certain medals that may or may not have been awarded). The black uniform as far as I could see at that time had been “thrown out” and replaced with the grey even before the war, so I was confused as to why this one character had the black uniform.
I had a look down the Gestapo route and if they wore uniforms (which was next to never) they didn't have regiment or rank insignias on them at all. They were blacked out for reasons that are quite obvious. If you wanted to 'have at' a Gestapo officer, you wouldn't know if they were an officer.
Conclusion thus far? Hellstrom was not Gestapo.
The black uniform was then introduced once more just for one particular group of people. The Leibstandarte. Hitler's personal bodyguards. After a quick look at a picture of Hellstrom in the bar scene I could see on his left wrist cuff he has a patch. I couldn't see it completely clear but the squiggles indicated it could only be the words 'Adolf Hitler'. Which confirmed it.
Hellstrom was NOT a Gestapo officer, but an officer in the Leibstandarte, that later became a Panzer regiment in the later years of the Second World War but kept their black, double breasted uniforms.
A Major in a very elite group of people. Definitely tells you a lot about Dieter Hellstrom, much more than him just being a Gestapo officer? Suddenly quotes of his from the movie make a lot more sense. Take the 'blink and you miss it' comment in the restaurant from Goebbels.
Maybe Hellstrom has a bee in his bonnet about constantly being called Gestapo (I'm looking at you Bridg)? Maybe QT meant for this to happen?
Oh how he twists and turns!
But this does leave me with one very huge problem.
I'm going to have to research the hell out of every other character before I start writing them. Which technically would leave me with no time left to write about them. For the time being then I shall stick with Hellstrom and I shall be happy in the knowledge I got it right.
In conclusion, research is very important. Even in something as basic in the fic-world as PWP. Everything about the character is their history, it is how they are shaped and gives the outside viewer (you and me) ideas as to how and why they react to different people.
I like PWP as much as the next person but there are just some things two people will never, ever do together. It then becomes a piece of fiction about two characters called Hans and Dieter, and no longer about the two characters in the movie Inglourious Basterds.
I research everything, place names, people, military titles and even machines. Because nothing gets my goat more than a supposed German original character called Candice, who joins the SS under the guise of a man called Bob who is a Lieutenant who walks from Berlin to Munich in a day with no rest who also drives a military Jeep.
I don't want to have to list what is wrong with that, so I shall leave it here, and hopefully my point is well made.
With the fondest of regards,
Quinn
I love information, I absorb it and I carry it around with me. Which explains why I know how many tablespoons of sugar are in ketchup and how a differential on a car works and have a basic understanding of the off-side rule in soccerfootball. I go giddy when something happens in a book that makes so much complete sense to me. For example any character reactions to something only the reader would know if they had a full and complete understanding of the situation presented to them. I only like what I like, and if I'm force fed information on a subject I don't like, then I don't retain it.
I didn't like history at school. There are only so many times you can have someone tell you about crop rotations, different inventions throughout the industrial revolution and then ask you to list of the dates of birth, death and reign of every king and queen of England/Great Britain since the year dot. It gets tiring and yes, I'm sorry Mr Chinnian I did cheat on my Year 9 exam on that last part. I wrote it all on my hand.
I still can't believe that worked.
One thing I did love in history was the studying of World War One and Two. The strategies, the successes and the mistakes, the conflicts and the inventions (some, admittedly, far better than others). I inadvertently collect memorabilia from that era. I made my Music partner in Year 10 wear a WW2 Warden helmet during a presentation about music from the 1940's. They're made of steel by the way and have next to no padding and that presentation was nearly an hour long.
I still maintain that the greatest war movie ever is All Quiet On The Western Front (sorry Year 9 history class for making you sit through that).
I really put my classmates through a lot it would seem. I need to stop apologising.
All this is leading up to the movie, Inglourious Basterds. As you well know I love Quentin Tarantino, so it was a surprise that the first time I saw the movie was when you and me went last autumn. Saying that, it is an hour to a decent cinema out here, but now I'm making an excuse. Let's move on.
It was World War 2 and it was Quentin Tarantino. I really had no idea what to expect, but it blew my mind in a way that only QT can do. It makes me giddy talking about how he makes a film, with scene cuts, chapters, how he introduces characters and music. My God his music choices. I would go back to school and study film just to get into his head more if I didn't think film was such a drop out subject to study at university. Any way!
I was reading some fiction the other day and decided I wanted to have a go at writing something from the point of view of Major Dieter Hellstrom. QT doesn't give much in the way of back story for characters unless they're spelt out in front of you in the form of giant yellow letters and Slaughter by Billy Preston. Even less so for Dieter, in fact I am certain there is nothing in the movie for his character, apart from a handful of scenes.
So when I saw something about him being Gestapo I decided to follow it through. I wanted to at least have a time line for the character before I started building a plot around him. And with him being Gestapo I could start to understand how other characters would react to him.
But he wore a black uniform. And this threw the Gestapo idea out the window. You were there when I was all weepy eyed about the fact QT could have dropped the ball on this one. I was worried. Really, worried.
The uniform that you see Colonel Hans Landa wearing is correct (never mind some interesting introductions to certain medals that may or may not have been awarded). The black uniform as far as I could see at that time had been “thrown out” and replaced with the grey even before the war, so I was confused as to why this one character had the black uniform.
I had a look down the Gestapo route and if they wore uniforms (which was next to never) they didn't have regiment or rank insignias on them at all. They were blacked out for reasons that are quite obvious. If you wanted to 'have at' a Gestapo officer, you wouldn't know if they were an officer.
Conclusion thus far? Hellstrom was not Gestapo.
The black uniform was then introduced once more just for one particular group of people. The Leibstandarte. Hitler's personal bodyguards. After a quick look at a picture of Hellstrom in the bar scene I could see on his left wrist cuff he has a patch. I couldn't see it completely clear but the squiggles indicated it could only be the words 'Adolf Hitler'. Which confirmed it.
Hellstrom was NOT a Gestapo officer, but an officer in the Leibstandarte, that later became a Panzer regiment in the later years of the Second World War but kept their black, double breasted uniforms.
A Major in a very elite group of people. Definitely tells you a lot about Dieter Hellstrom, much more than him just being a Gestapo officer? Suddenly quotes of his from the movie make a lot more sense. Take the 'blink and you miss it' comment in the restaurant from Goebbels.
Maybe Hellstrom has a bee in his bonnet about constantly being called Gestapo (I'm looking at you Bridg)? Maybe QT meant for this to happen?
Oh how he twists and turns!
But this does leave me with one very huge problem.
I'm going to have to research the hell out of every other character before I start writing them. Which technically would leave me with no time left to write about them. For the time being then I shall stick with Hellstrom and I shall be happy in the knowledge I got it right.
In conclusion, research is very important. Even in something as basic in the fic-world as PWP. Everything about the character is their history, it is how they are shaped and gives the outside viewer (you and me) ideas as to how and why they react to different people.
I like PWP as much as the next person but there are just some things two people will never, ever do together. It then becomes a piece of fiction about two characters called Hans and Dieter, and no longer about the two characters in the movie Inglourious Basterds.
I research everything, place names, people, military titles and even machines. Because nothing gets my goat more than a supposed German original character called Candice, who joins the SS under the guise of a man called Bob who is a Lieutenant who walks from Berlin to Munich in a day with no rest who also drives a military Jeep.
I don't want to have to list what is wrong with that, so I shall leave it here, and hopefully my point is well made.
With the fondest of regards,
Quinn