What 'Floating Worlds' does draw on is Holland's artistry in bringing the past to life in her historical fiction and depicting the people who inhabited that past.
When I was working on a Victorian-era novel, to get in the mood, I read several historical novels set in approximately the same period and place, and really enjoyed the detective novels of John Dickson Carr.
One of the things I enjoy most about writing historical romance is researching inspiring backgrounds and settings.
The same historical development that turned the citizen into a client transformed the worker from a producer into a consumer.
I didn't want to be an actor. I wanted to design historical movies like 'Ben-Hur'. I saw this as my life.
Learning to read the Bible in the light of the times in which it was written is critical. Reading it uncritically, without understanding the cultural and historical setting of the text, leaves us forced to accept scientific and sociological norms of the ancient Near East from 3,000 years ago.
I don't mean to burst anyone's bubble, but there is no scriptural or historical basis for December 25th actually being the day that Jesus was born.
The historical importance of a composer does not always go hand in hand with the quality of their work.
The Islamic tradition does show some areas of apparent incompatibility with the goals of women in the West, and Muslims have a long way to go in their attitudes towards women. But blaming the religion is again to express an ignorance both of the religion and of the historical struggle for equality of women in Muslim societies.
It can be a long gap between the emergence of fully researched historical biographies.
The truth is that the history of Mexico is a history in the image of its geography: abrupt and tortuous. Each historical period is like a plateau surrounded by tall mountains and separated from the other plateaus by precipices and divides.
I would like to be in tons of different types of movies and do different things. I like action movies, and with 'Mr. Peabody and Sherman', I got to see a historical movie, too.
The problem of forgetting might not torment us so much if we could only convince ourselves that remembering isn't important. Perhaps the things we learn - words, dates, formulas, historical and biographical details - don't really matter. Facts can be looked up. That's what the Internet is for.
I invented the historical spy novel.
Europe's fragmentation puts the wider historical picture beyond reach.
Who would think it possible to redirect historical scholarship by explaining what Thomas Jefferson said in the Declaration of Independence?
When I was in high school, I looked for the black presence in a British historical tradition - before too much slavery and empire - that would not cost me my self-respect.
One of the great things about being an older person is that I am very aware of the scope of the work and the historical sense of it. It's bigger than me.
My hypothesis is not so much that the court is the natural expression of popular justice, but rather that its historical function is to ensnare it, to control it and strangle it, by re-inscribing it within institutions which are typical of a state apparatus.
I'm a big fan of historical fiction stuff. Historical battles - 'Gladiators,' 'The Patriot.'
I'm a huge historical fiction and non-fiction fan.
When historical relationships are taken into account, it is difficult to ascribe the house price bubble either to monetary policy or to the broader macroeconomic environment.
Jesus walking on water is an allegory, not fluid mechanics. God destroying the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah is a warning, not a historical battle. Doubting Thomas is an example, not a person. The story of Noah, with all of its scientific and historical impossibilities, can be read the same way.
I remember when I was in school I had this teacher give me this E.L. Doctorow quote: They asked him how much historical research he does for his books and he said, 'As little as possible.' So I try and adhere to that.
Even if you're playing the most well-known repertoire under the sun, I still believe you have a responsibility as an artist to tell the audience why you're playing it, what are the key aspects to it, and then throw in a bit about its historical context.
I've just written a very gritty, non-magical take on the King Arthur legend, 'Here Lies Arthur,' and I'm currently toying with some other historical ideas, as well as working with the illustrator David Wyatt on some sequels to my Victorian space opera 'Larklight.'
The historical novelist has to consider what has actually happened, while the SF writer is dealing in possibilities, but they are both in the business of imagining a world unlike our own and yet connected to it.
I have a fondness for historical fiction, something wondrous like 'Wolf Hall,' but I'll read most anything as long as the story grabs my mind or my heart, and preferably both. You would be hard pressed, however, to find science fiction on my shelves.
There is a constant ebb and flow in art historical reputations. The reputation of even the greatest figures like Picasso are in flux.
At the Museum of Roman Art, the logic of the forms is very much modern. But in spite of that, the idea of the construction could be related to a historical time.
The idea of making a film - a film that I had certainly never seen before - about the slave experience was a huge responsibility. It's a project that requires a wider understanding of the geopolitical nature of the slave trade, of historical and modern-day racism.
I wasn't an academic looking in books for ideas. But I educated myself about historical work that was similar to mine, to provide a frame of reference that wasn't the usual frame of reference of the New York art world and Europe.
It's something I'd find rather distracting in a historical piece, looking at characters that have obviously just gotten off their Ab Blaster. You see a piece set in the 1300s or the 1800s, and you've got characters who have perfect abs and are incredibly well-groomed, not a hair out of place, and it just doesn't make sense.
The historical debate is over. The answer is free-market capitalism.
The very action of the proletariat is a determining factor in history. And although we can no more jump over the stages of historical development than a man can jump over his shadow, nevertheless, we can accelerate or retard that development.
There are very few critics who have historical context or authority.
