Justin, A Leap in the Dark is a historical novel set in the criminal underworld of Edinburgh. Why did you want to write it?
I grew up in Scotland and spent part of my youth in Edinburgh, which had and still has a strong hold on my imagination. A Leap In the Dark is based on the life and crimes of Deacon William Brodie, Edinburgh’s most notorious resident who lived in the latter half of the eighteenth century. There’s a pub called ‘Deacon Brodie’ on the Royal Mile, which I used to frequent as a youthful drinker. Later, I read about his life and thought it would make a fine novel. I wasn’t the first: Robert Louis Stevenson was also fascinated by his tale and used it as the template for Jekyll and Hyde. We are all essentially two people. The person we demonstrate to the outside world and the person we truly are. I’m not saying the human condition is essentially schizophrenic, but we all have a light and a dark side. The point is that it should not be criminal and especially not fatal. Graham Greene describes his protagonists as being like ‘a broken reed’: usually good men who fail like the priest in the ‘Power and the Glory’. And yet there is always the chance of redemption.
Your hero, David Stoddart, is a gentleman thief but during the day a town councillor. Was council work in the late 18th century much the same as it is today – one assumes it does not attract that many flamboyant characters?
David Stoddart is certainly more flamboyant than most, but he uses his position as a cover for his crimes. Surely a town councillor cannot be responsible for the spate of robberies in the city? In one meeting he even demands that the price on the thief’s head be doubled and they all agree. His social status and name mean that when he does get stopped by the town guardsman at night, they don’t even bother to search him. As for its similarity to today, council work involved much drudgery and appealed only to the civic-minded.
It seems as though the Georgians loved their gambling, with all sorts of strange wagers being taken e.g. competing raindrops descending a window and Barry Lyndon shows the grip of cards over many. Was this an era when we see the rise of betting?
Gambling and betting have been popular since the dawn of humanity. It’s been a common factor in all cultures and societies. In Asia they bet on anything, whether its cards or cockroaches and the same is true of the western world. The curb in gambling in Britain came with the rise of the Puritans, when Cromwellian England prohibited dancing and even the celebration of Christmas. Unsurprisingly, it included gambling. This changed with the Restoration and continued until the Victorian era when gambling was frowned upon by the aspirational middle classes, but not amongst the working and upper class. Hence the enduring popularity of racing, the sport of kings but also of the people.
What sort of man is David Stoddart?
David Stoddart is an everyman. We are all David Stoddart. He is a man who wants to inspire respect and emulate his father who started the shipping company in which he works. Stoddart is good at his job and a diligent partner. He also loves his wife and daughter, even though they are separated because of his addiction to gambling. Yet he provides a home for them and often stays. He desperately wants to quit his vice but realises he’s addicted, which is why he robs houses so that he can pay off his debts. The problem is that he loses far more than he can ever steal. To offset his losses he forms a gang and that proves his nemesis as he is then betrayed.
Edinburgh in this period was at the heart of the Scottish Enlightenment. Do we see characters of the age appearing in your book?
I thought about that and decided against. There’s a danger of signposting and also if you do introduce historical characters like Robbie Burns or Adam Smith, they must have something to do with the narrative and not used as mere props. This is why my hero is called David Stoddart and not Deacon Brodie, it meant that I could take more liberty with the story. I don’t think Dickens used real life characters in his novels either, or if he did it was only in passing and a mention of ‘the Queen’ or the ‘Prime Minister’.
This is your fourth book, but first of the 18th century. Do you have plans to write more Stoddart tales?
In a word ‘no’. There seems to be a trend in publishing to have a series in historical fiction like ‘Sharpe’ or Patrick O’Brien’s seafaring tales, even though some are standalone. I understand why authors like to mine certain periods of history and concentrate on one character, but it’s not for me.
What comes first, character or plot?
Good question. It’s also hard to answer, like the proverbial chicken and egg. With A Leap In The Dark it was definitely character, but that’s not always the case for me. In my first novel Under The Sun it involved two specific characters, the RAF pilot who is shot down and taken prisoner in the South Pacific and the Japanese officer in charge of him. In my previous novel ‘Codename Edelweiss’ it was plot. What if Hitler and a pregnant Eva Braun had escaped the Fuhrerbunker and she had given birth to a son at a secret camp in the Amazon jungle? Then roll the plot forward 30 years to the discovery of that son and what happens to him. So, a bit of both.
Were there particular historians or books that you found most useful when writing the book?
There were: in particular Boswell’s Life of Samuel Johnson and TC Smout’s A History Of The Scottish People 1560-1830. There were several other sources, but those are the two main ones. I studied history at Newcastle University and have a good grounding of the era. I also discovered a late eighteenth century map of Edinburgh in the British Library. This was useful as my characters navigated their way around the Old Town. Although little has changed, some of the street names have and you want to get it right, not have some don at Edinburgh University tutting and shaking their head. But an author of fiction needs less research than you might imagine, after all you’re not writing a history book. You should have enough to set up base camp and anything else you can check as you climb the mountain.
Was Robert Louis Stevenson an inspiration, and if so which is your favourite novel and why?
Yes, he was and is. He’s one of my favourite authors and sadly less popular than he used to be. But these things are cyclical. I’m sure he’ll be back in fashion, he is such a brilliant and original writer. My first encounter with him was A Child’s Garden Of Verses, which is a great introduction. The poetry is sophisticated enough for adults, but its simplicity also appeals to children who love rhyme. Later, I read Treasure Island, an exceptional story that is usually devoured in one or two sittings, as good fiction often is. Then of course my favourite, Kidnapped. Stevenson never forgot that he was first and foremost a poet and his observations of nature, topography and use of metaphor are impressive. Here’s the second sentence of the opening paragraph: ‘The sun began to shine upon the summit of the hills as I went down the road; and by the time I had come as far as the manse, the blackbirds were whistling in the garden lilacs, and the mist that hung around the valley in the time of dawn was beginning to rise and die away’. Only a poet could write that. I’m not alone in my admiration for Stevenson, he was also a favourite of Graham Greene who referred to him as ‘the master’ and returned to his work when he needed inspiration to write a certain scene.
Justin Kerr-Smiley is a writer and journalist, and author of A Leap In The Dark, published by Chiselbury.
