It isn’t easy to be entertaining, moving, and culturally subversive all at the same time. Shonda Rhimes has been doing it since “Grey’s Anatomy”—and “Queen Charlotte” is her latest.
I hope this works both ways and we can start inserting Europeans and white skinned people into the sociologies, literature and histories of black ruled nations. I'm sure they will love it just as much as white people are enjoying observing the finangling and corruption of our culture.
This is fiction. Not sociology or history. Are you opposed to Wolf Hall too? If you don’t want fiction to be inventive, I hope you apply that standard to all historical fiction not just those that have racial themes.
An extra note: I don’t consider British history to be “my” culture. My ancestors came from Poland and Russia. Jewish, not AngloSaxon. I find your use of the term “our culture” to be very simplistic.
That’s the language of the show, not mine. Do you know the difference between describing, quoting, and analyzing a TEXT and making claims about history, sociology, etc. It appears not.
Unless it is in the genre Science Fiction or Science Fantasy even fiction has to be anchored to a large degree in historical facts and reality or it becomes too uncanny for the consumer to make sense of. Julia Quinn did not write the Bridgerton series of novels including black people. The way BIPOC people have been incorporated into the Netflix interpretation is surreal and dissonant. I do not think Shonda Rhimes is brilliant and admirable at all, but that her primary intention is to advance Queer Theory through her “anti-racist” activism.
FYI, Julia Quinn is co-author of “Queen Charlotte.” As to fiction having to be “anchored” in historical fact, I don’t know where to begin. It’s absurd, and I’m not going to waste time listing all the great novels that aren’t “anchored” in historical fact. I don’t approve of fiction that tries to pass itself off as history (as, for example, The Other Boleyn Girl) but “Queen Charlotte” makes it clear from the beginning that it’s not history but fiction. As far as the actual history goes, are you an expert on race and sexuality in the Hanoverian court? Even respected historians hold differing views on that.
I am an artist. Not a historian or sociologist. A working class woman without higher education degrees, so you can feel comfortable dismissing my opinions as that of an uneducated and stupid plebian.
My opinion still differs from yours in that I believe Rhimes took the artistic creations of Julia Quinn and overwrote them with a political agenda that is more expressive of Rhimes ideologies and activism than an evocation of Quinns works.
However, within the definition of the Woke Folk, I am an expert on race and sexuality as I have lived experience of both.
Nice article. Jenny and I are enjoying Queen Charlotte for all the reasons that you mention.
I hope this works both ways and we can start inserting Europeans and white skinned people into the sociologies, literature and histories of black ruled nations. I'm sure they will love it just as much as white people are enjoying observing the finangling and corruption of our culture.
Corruption? Your attempt at sarcasm finds a different target.
This is fiction. Not sociology or history. Are you opposed to Wolf Hall too? If you don’t want fiction to be inventive, I hope you apply that standard to all historical fiction not just those that have racial themes.
An extra note: I don’t consider British history to be “my” culture. My ancestors came from Poland and Russia. Jewish, not AngloSaxon. I find your use of the term “our culture” to be very simplistic.
I find your description of some people as "white" equally simplistic, even nonsensical.
That’s the language of the show, not mine. Do you know the difference between describing, quoting, and analyzing a TEXT and making claims about history, sociology, etc. It appears not.
Unless it is in the genre Science Fiction or Science Fantasy even fiction has to be anchored to a large degree in historical facts and reality or it becomes too uncanny for the consumer to make sense of. Julia Quinn did not write the Bridgerton series of novels including black people. The way BIPOC people have been incorporated into the Netflix interpretation is surreal and dissonant. I do not think Shonda Rhimes is brilliant and admirable at all, but that her primary intention is to advance Queer Theory through her “anti-racist” activism.
FYI, Julia Quinn is co-author of “Queen Charlotte.” As to fiction having to be “anchored” in historical fact, I don’t know where to begin. It’s absurd, and I’m not going to waste time listing all the great novels that aren’t “anchored” in historical fact. I don’t approve of fiction that tries to pass itself off as history (as, for example, The Other Boleyn Girl) but “Queen Charlotte” makes it clear from the beginning that it’s not history but fiction. As far as the actual history goes, are you an expert on race and sexuality in the Hanoverian court? Even respected historians hold differing views on that.
I am an artist. Not a historian or sociologist. A working class woman without higher education degrees, so you can feel comfortable dismissing my opinions as that of an uneducated and stupid plebian.
My opinion still differs from yours in that I believe Rhimes took the artistic creations of Julia Quinn and overwrote them with a political agenda that is more expressive of Rhimes ideologies and activism than an evocation of Quinns works.
However, within the definition of the Woke Folk, I am an expert on race and sexuality as I have lived experience of both.