Voices From the Twelfth-Century Steppe

A historical novelist explores the Secret History of the Mongols.If the Secret History is a communal memoir, who told its secrets? Did Temujin -- Chinggis Khan -- tell his own story? Whose voices are heard within the text?Voices from the Twelfth-Century Steppe has two strands. It practices interpretation of the Secret History of the Mongols from an oral and written arts standpoint ('literary') -- how does this differ from historical investigation? It exhibits ways a historical novelist engages with a primary source -- how does this tend to differ from a historian?'Voices' is a case study in close source work by a creative writer. Entangled with this, a case is made for arts criticism of the Secret History. Its artistry is integral to its sense. Bryn Hammond (she/her, and queer) lives in a coastal town in Australia, where she likes to write while walking in the sea. She grew up on ancient and medieval epics, the Arthur cycle original and modern, nineteenth-century novelists, particularly Russian and French, and out of fashion poets, namely Algernon Swinburne. Always a writer – to the neglect of other paths in life that might have been more sensible -- she found the perfect story in The Secret History of the Mongols, a thirteenth-century prose and verse account of Chinggis Khan.