Liebster Blog Award

Many thanks to my friend and Henry the Young King’s benefactor (I will never forget all the links and mentions of Henry blog) Kathryn Warner for giving me a Liebster (German for ‘favourite’) Blog Award! I cannot find proper words to express my gratitude, although the questions and the answers have given me many a sleepless night.

Here are the rules of the Liebster Blog Award:

1. Thank your Liebster Blog Award presenter on your blog and link back to the blogger who presented this award to you.
2. Answer the 11 questions from the nominator, list 11 random facts about yourself and create 11 questions for your nominees.
3. Present the Liebster Blog Award to 11 blogs of 200 followers or less who you feel deserve to be noticed and leave a comment on their blog letting them know they have been chosen.
4. Copy and Paste the blog award on your blog.

My answers to Kathryn’s questions:

1. What’s your favourite novel and what do you love about it? Definitely Devil’s Brood by Sharon Kay Penman. I love it for the absolutely complete and human portrayal of Henry the Young King (there was nothing in my research concerning the Young King that I wouldn’t have found in Ms. Penman’s novel- she is not only a writer, but first and foremost a historian). And on non-medieval note, Jill Dawson’s Great Lover. While reading the book I simply couldn’t get rid of the impression that Rupert Brooke himself was speaking to me in his own words (and actually he was, for the author brilliantly and masterfully interwoven the text with fragments of Brooke’s letters, poems and essays).
2. Do you have any pet peeves in historical fiction? Concerning the Angevin period generally anything that was not written either by Sharon Kay Penman or Elizabeth Chadwick gets on my nerves. As for the other periods in history, I cannot tell- I rarely venture out of the Angevin domains
3. What are you most proud of? Definitely of my two spoilt children, Emilia and Franek, of their equally spoilt father, Piotr (wonderful husband and musician) and of Henry the Young King’s blog (as for the latter, it took me a while to muster up enough courage to bring it to life).
4. Your favourite and least favourite people in history? Favourite: Henry the Young King, William Marshal, Marguerite of France, Eleanor of Aquitaine, Henry II, Geoffrey of Brittany, Walter Map and Gerald of Wales, King Stephen, Empress Matilda, Geoffrey le Bel, Henry I, Robert ‘Curthose’, Gervase of Tilbury, Otto IV of Brunswick, Richard I, Eleanor of Vermandois, Petronilla of Leicester, David I of Scotland, William I of Scotland, Philip of Flanders…Polish, Czech and Hungarian history: Gall Anonim (Gallus Anonymus), Bolesław II Śmiały, Bolesław III Krzywousty, Henryk Sandomierski, Kazimierz Sprawiedliwy, Władysław Łokietek,Władysław Jagiełło, Królowa Jadwiga, Królowa Bona, Anna Jagiellonka, Louis II of Hungary, Bohemia and Croatia and his wife Mary of Austria... Least favourite? None. I always try to excuse them all.

5. The country, city or other place you’d most like to visit? Martel, the little town in the Dordogne Valley where Henry the Young King died on 11 June 1183.
6. Which five people would you invite to your fantasy dinner party? Henry the Young King, Bertran de Born, Marie de France (I would end, once and for all, the discussion concerning her true identity), Gall Anonim (the same as with Marie) and- here I cannot decide- either Geoffrey Chaucer or Samuel Pepys (or perhaps I should choose between Will Shakespeare and Kit Marlowe?).
7. Facebook or Twitter or neither? So far neither, but I’ve been considering joining Facebook for some time to boost Henry’s popularity.
8. What’s one of your goals for the future? Write a trilogy about Gall Anonim, Władysław Herman, Bolesław Krzywousty and the latter’s sons.
9. What’s your favourite season? Definitely autumn. The Polish and Slovak castles are most picturesque in the autumnal scenery.
10. Dogs or cats or neither? Dogs and cats. It’s really hard to decide, for I love watching and playing with both my dog and my cat.
11. What’s your favourite hobby? Except for lingering on in the Angevin domains, castle haunting and reading-  birdwatching.

11 random facts about me:

I’m Polish and I love both Polish and British medieval history.

I’m Polish and I love both Polish and British literature.

Lingering over medieval chronicles mentioning Henry the Young King is probably my favourite way of spending time.

One day I intend to become a falconer (this will have to wait until my children decide to ‘fly away’ from home).

Best place to steady my nerves and stop the time for a while- St John’s Chapel, the White Tower.

Best place to stimulate my imagination and my creativity- Tudor Gallery in National Potrait Gallery, London.

Most beautiful place I’ve ever been to: the Mala Fatra, the mountain range in northern Slovakia.

Best friend(s)? My husband (I love our lingering over cup of tea in the evenings and “lecturing” each other on respectively music and the Angevins) and my three younger sisters.

I’m an amateur painter.

I love medieval illuminated manuscripts.

The turning point of my life was the discovery of Byron’s Completed Works on the bookshelf in my school library and the deep penetrating gaze of their author from the cover. Since then I love British literature (the literature lead me straight to the history).

11 questions to be answered by my awardees:

Who is your favourite author (either writer or poet) and why?

The worst book you have read?

Which eleven historical figures would you invite to the football team of your dreams?

The place you’d most like to visit?

The outcome of which battle- and therefore the course of history- would you change?

What do you like doing in your free time?

Your most precious childhood memory?

Your goals for the future?

Would you like to belong to the royal household and the household of which king would you choose?

Is there anything you would like to change in your life?

What makes you feel perfectly happy?

My Liebster Blog Award Winners are, in alphabetical order:

LE Williams

PillingsWritingCorner