Marié Heese on The Double Crown (Plus: Book Excerpt)

December 23rd, 2009 by Ronel S

Marie Heese Marié Heese presents the conceptualization of her most recent published work, The Double Crown, which functions as a kind of self-interview. She begins with why she chose to write about ancient Egypt and moves to discuss her main character Hatshepsut and the use of language:

1. I am often asked what made me write this story.
As a writer, I find the historical novel a particularly attractive genre, perhaps because I have also been an academic and the research element intrigues me, while the relative freedom of the fiction mode is creatively stimulating. But why this particular story? Well, I have been interested in ancient Egypt for many years. One day I encountered the outline of the Hatshepsut story in a book by Evelyn Wells about Nefertiti. It struck me as extraordinary. Just enough is known to have made me wonder about the parts of the story we do not know and probably never will.

The same article contains an excerpt from the novel:

Having been vouchsafed this vision, I knew that I had to make my destiny manifest to all. I would have to make my move and make it decisively. At once it was clear to me what I should do. I would make offerings directly to the gods. This is traditionally the task and prerogative of the Pharaoh, which he delegates to his priests but which no other mortal may carry out. It is the Pharaoh’s sacred duty to satisfy the gods with divine offerings and to bring funerary offerings to the transfigured dead. I was well acquainted with the prescribed steps of the morning ritual, since I had been the God’s Wife of Amen for several years, attending on first my father and then my husband when they as the divine sons of the sun-god acted as the link with the spirit world. Now I would carry out these steps in person.