A Madrigal

Zine
Title:	A Madrigal
Publisher:	Nut Hatch
Editor:
Author(s):	Jane
Cover Artist(s):
Illustrator(s):	JJ
Date(s):	1987
Medium:	print
Size:
Genre:	slash
Fandom:	The Professionals
Language:	English
External Links:
Click here for related articles on Fanlore.

A Madrigal is a historical slash AU Professionals 160-page novel by Jane of Australia.

See List of Professionals Fanworks by Jane of Australia.

one cover version, despite the remarks in the editorial that this issue contains art by JJ, there is no interior art

another cover version

From The Nut Hatch flyer

A lush historical romance/adventure set in the time of Francis Drake. With the war between England and Spain about to begin, a young Spanish Irish mercenary is sent to England to the court of Elizabeth I, as a bodyguard for his Uncle, the Spanish Ambassador. And while he is in England, in the turbulent days just before the sailing of the Armada, he will meet the young man about whom his life will pivot.

But war will separate Philip Bodie and Raymond Doyle for long, bitter years, and they will meet again only amid danger and struggle, as Drake is dispatched to seize the Spanish gold ports of Panama.

Based on historical fact, 'A Madrigal' is meticulously researched and written with the lush style that made it a favorite in 1987 and has kept it so ever since.

Illustrated with a set of plates by JJ. 160pp. A4, photocopy.

Editor's Foreword

How do you introduce a story like A MADRIGAL? Well, honestly. I think you'll love it, which is why 'The Nut Hatch' decided to take the plunge and do it as a zine. It languished in the back of one of Jane's old notebooks for so long that she had forgotten about it. Later, when Barb Jones was going through the book in search of the epilogue to the third Kin/Bran/B/D story (Dark Dreaming), she found it. And screamed.

Only a writer as distracted as Jane could manage to forget that she had even written a B/D historical set in the world of Francis Drake (or write Dark Dreaming and then wait six months to ask for typing help). What Barbie found was an original short story that ran the odd thirty pages or so. The novel woven around it while Barb was still screaming is in your hands now.

Editing this novel was a source of great pleasure; reading it should be an even greater pleasure. Graphics and art (by JJ) have added to the text to make a thing of beauty of A MADRIGAL, if indeed any such help was needed.

Thanks go to Barb for helping with the typing; to JJ for art, graphics and use of the computer (whose name is Saavik, and who can be a bitch when she wants to be); to Angie for help copying and collating; and to the good people who invested in the previous Nut Hatch zines. Financial returns from them went to print this.

Finally, a message from Jane: please, nobody try to use this novel as a reference work. The research is pretty accurate, but I've taken liberties everywhere with — um, gay abandon. It's about as accurate as your average Errol Flynn movie, which is to say, fine up to a point and a fantasy thereafter! Just enjoy.

Republished as Original Fiction

cover of the novel as "Fortunes of War" - a fan in 2008 said: "(Pay no attention to the lads on the cover, who appear to be rent boys hired off some London street and bear no resemblance to the book's characters!)" --

In 1995, "A Madrigal" was reproduced as an original fiction novel by Filing Off The Serial Numbers. This was with some revision, an expanded ending, and the names changed, published by the Gay Men's Press as "Fortunes of War" by Mel Keegan.

Fan Comments Regarding the Pro Book

Pros AU (with the serial numbers filed off, of course) with Bodie the-Irish/Spanish-impoverished-noble-mercenary (later turned privateer) and Doyle the Irish/English-small-abused-virgin (later also turned privateer). I can't say this was my favorite Doyle characterization ever (I think I would've enjoyed it more not knowing this was Bodie and Doyle), but I did like the story. It is very engrossing, a real page-turner. I liked it better once they were away from Elizabeth I's court (I hate political intrigue) and out being pirates (not coincidentally, that is when Doyle became more competent and less dependent upon Bodie). I would love to continue reading about more pirate-y adventures they would have after book's close!

I also really hate m/m books where [one of the characters is married -- with children! -- but perfectly happy to abandon his family because he never really loved them. Ugh. That is so not Doyle, either.

Summary of Original Fiction Version: Fortunes of War

From Mel Keegan's website:

FORTUNES OF WAR is a gay romantic adventure set between 1588 and 1595, in England and the Caribbean, involving the Spanish Armada and buccaneers on the Main. If you like your gay heroes macho, sensitive, muscular, sensual and intelligent (gee, we don't ask for much, do we?!) then FORTUNES OF WAR is the place to begin. There is a wide vein of the deeply exotic, the technicolor daydream. Little wonder, this has long been our Reader's Choice gay historical. FORTUNES is currently in its third edition, and available as both hard- and softcover.... (First published by GMP in 1995.)

Fan Comments

In 1588, two young men fall in love; Dermot, an Irish mercenary serving the Spanish Ambassador in London and Robin, son of an English Earl. Seperated by seven years of war, the two meet up again in the Caribbean, where Dermot now commands a privateer. The couple's adventures on the Spanish Main make a swashbuckling romance in the best pirate tradition. A rip-roaring yarn...

Pros AU (with the serial numbers filed off, of course) with Bodie the-Irish/Spanish-impoverished-noble-mercenary (later turned privateer) and Doyle the Irish/English-small-abused-virgin (later also turned privateer). I can't say this was my favorite Doyle characterization ever (I think I would've enjoyed it more not knowing this was Bodie and Doyle), but I did like the story. It is very engrossing, a real page-turner. I liked it better once they were away from Elizabeth I's court (I hate political intrigue) and out being pirates (not coincidentally, that is when Doyle became more competent and less dependent upon Bodie). I would love to continue reading about more pirate-y adventures they would have after book's close!

I also really hate m/m books where one of the characters is married -- with children! -- but perfectly happy to abandon his family because he never really loved them. Ugh. That is so not Doyle, either.

One Comparison of "A Madrigal" and "Fortunes of War"

A close comparison of a text published both professionally and fannishly reveals that at least one of these differences is in the amount of gender blending that is permissible. Although, Fortunes of War, the professional version of the fan novel A Madrigal madrigal, name for two different forms of Italian music, one related to the poetic madrigal in the 14th cent., the other the most common form of secular vocal music in the 16th cent. , is a longer but virtually identical story, the editorial changes are telling. Fortunes of War certainly does offer the reader gender blended heroes, for Channon is "gentle" and "tender" even though he is a "soldier" (196) who loves his partner Robin as much for "his courage as for his gentleness and affectionate ways" (271). In contrast, the fannish version is considerably less masculine particularly in intimate moments. In both stories, after their first meeting Doyle/Robin dreams of the kiss of Bodie/Channon; in A Madrigal Keegan writes of "one unforgettable point at which he had literally felt a hot, wet mouth bruising his own with a kiss" (18). In Fortunes of War a further masculine image is added and the description becomes of "one unforgettable moment when he felt a man's strength crushing him, and a hot wet mouth bruised his own with kisses" (50). A similar difference occurs when they make love. In A Madrigal: "Bodie slid two fingers inside him. It was difficult to breath and he froze, gasping with the strangeness, the terrible intimacy" (40). The same sex scene in Fortunes of War reads, "He cursed softly as one finger became two and he felt a sting of pain. Strange sensations as Channon had promised" (89). In the fannish version intimacy is highlighted while the professionally published version masculinizes the scenario with the addition of terms such as "curses" and "pain." Indeed, the question of masculinity is directly raised in the professionally published text when Robin asks of penetrative sex, "Is it seemingly for a man?" (88). In the fan fiction version Doyle asks simply, "if you will permit me?" (39). Quite possibly within the community of slash fiction writers and readers, the possibility of feminine associations attaching themselves to a passive sexual role need not be addressed; they are either unimportant or accepted as part of the overall acceptance of gender blended images. Within the more masculine community envisaged by the Gay Men's Press, however, such associations do need to be addressed, perhaps denied, and dealt with. It is possible that in the professionally published text the addition of masculine images may occur because the projected reader is not considered likely to accept such feminine heroes, but it is also important to recall that the professional version of A Madrigal is unable to import, via appropriation, the existing masculinity of Bodie and Doyle.

Reactions and Reviews

1997

In "A Madrigal", Bodie is an Irishman, brought up in Spain, who's at the court of Elizabeth I in attendance upon his uncle, the Spanish Ambassador. He meets an 18-year-old Doyle, they fall in love, but it's 1588 and the war (Spanish Armada time) separates them. Doyle grows up thinking Bodie's dead. Years later he goes to sea on family business and they meet again - Bodie is now a pirate and it gets very swashbuckling from there on in. Great fun.