Beth Anderson Shares Writing Wisdom with Digging Deep to Uncover Deborah Sampson–Plus a Giveaway!

Before I introduce today’s guest blogger, I want to apologize for my delay in choosing the winner of free access to all my webinars. I had to take some time off after the sudden death of my youngest brother. Because of the delay, I’ve decided to offer the giveaway prize to two faithful blog followers. Char Dixon and Tara Cerven. Congratulations and thank you for taking time to comment on my post. I’ll be in touch. 

Today, Beth Anderson shares her kid-lit writing wisdom gained from life and nonfiction writing experiences along with writing her latest picture book CLOAKED IN COURAGE: UNCOVERING DEBORAH SAMPSON, PATRIOT SOLDIER. Beth is also giving away a copy of CLOAKED IN COURAGE. To enter the drawing comment on this post, please state that you would like to be entered in the drawing, and please help Beth out by sharing the post link in social media.  The deadline for the drawing is February 20. A big thank you to Beth. And now for her . . .

 

Digging Deep to Uncover Deborah Sampson

 By Beth Anderson

When Alayne asked if I’d do a Writing Wisdom post for CLOAKED IN COURAGE: UNCOVERING DEBORAH SAMPSON, PATRIOT SOLDIER, I was feeling terribly lacking in the wisdom department. But if wisdom is knowledge gleaned from life experience, no problem!  I learn more with every manuscript attempt, and I’m happy to share some of what this book taught me.

Deborah Sampson’s story is a lot about capableness. She was more capable than society expected, and I suspect early on she learned she was more capable than she thought. The strengths and self-knowledge she gained from life’s challenges pushed her forward, past fear, and into uncharted territory—serving as a man in the Continental Army!

You can’t judge a book by its cover.

(Well, in the case of CLOAKED IN COURAGE, please do because the cover is amazing! 😊 )

But let’s take this in the sense of the character. Years back, I ran across Deborah Sampson and read just the basics. The story didn’t grab me. Though interesting, she came across as lacking integrity.

[In the meantime, I researched and wrote Tad Lincoln’s Restless Wriggle. At first look, he appeared to be a spoiled, undisciplined troublemaker of a child. What I learned from that manuscript led me back to Sampson.]

In 2019, an article came out about a found diary that mentioned Sampson’s failed attempt at enlisting. This was intriguing. It made me think about motivation, risk, and stakes. I dug in. WHY would she do what she did? As always, it wasn’t as simple as it first appeared. Understanding her was impossible until I understood the risk. That cracked open the door to her character. And the driving question of the book became: What makes us who we are? And the more specific idea for Deborah that emerged was her ability to see possibility in challenges throughout her life.

Wisdom: Dig for motivation, risk, and stakes. (A lesson I need to revisit over and over!)

There are unexpected experts out there!

Researching Sampson, I hit all the usuals – books, scholarly articles, Library of Congress, National Archives, museums, official records, historical societies, and local libraries. I was fortunate to find an expert through a historical society, and another expert on the war online. But with CLOAKED IN COURAGE, I had one different kind of source—a woman who does a historical interpretive performance of Deborah Sampson. (The connection came from a person I consulted when I researched REVOLUTIONARY PRUDENCE WRIGHT.) Judith Kalaora, founder of History At Play, was a tremendous resource. She answered many of my questions, and she shared resources I hadn’t encountered. All that took me deeper and wider. But it was her re-enactment of Sampson that helped bring this historical figure to life in my mind. Seeing the pieces of clothing and equipment involved, and hearing someone give voice to her affected me differently than text sources and reinvigorated my efforts.

Wisdom: Search past the usual sources; consider different modes of input. While print is indispensable, finding real live experts is huge.

Research widely into all aspects of setting.

This bit of wisdom has broadened and deepened with every manuscript. Setting is basically time and place, right? But if you think about it, there’s a lot to explore in a time and place, many factors that impact a person and events. I devoted a section to setting in the back matter piece “The Challenge of Being a History Detective” because so many aspects of setting affected motivation, stakes, and risk; as well as providing answers to questions like, “how did she manage to hide her gender in the close quarters of the Continental Army for seventeen months?”

The area that really opened up Sampson’s story was digging into media of the time. She was an avid reader, so…what would have been available to her? Gulliver’s Travels, Robinson Crusoe, Almanacs—ok, tales of adventure and information about the world could make her long for more than indentured servitude. Chapbooks, especially one called “The World Turned Upside Down”— cheap, readily available stories for common people show attitudes. And then…wait for it…varied versions of Joan of Arc’s story and Hannah Snell’s story—two women who dressed as men and held their own in a man’s world! Oh my! It turns out that ballads, poems, and stories of “warrior women” had been all the rage for a century! Eureka! Plenty of inspiration for young Deborah Sampson! That information was crucial because it allowed me to understand what she did in the context of her time.

If you’re interested in more on this, check out my blog post “Mining for Heart: Setting as a Window into Character” here: https://bethandersonwriter.com/2022/11/11/mining-for-heart-setting-a-window-into-character/

Wisdom: Research widely, into all aspects of setting—ten times wider than you think you need for the parameters of your story.

And lastly,

Patience!

My initial draft of Sampson’s story was a dud, dead in the water. I didn’t know how to make it meaningful. So it sat a while. Then the pandemic hit. And anxiety. After a couple months, I knew I had to try to work on something, so I took it out again. I turned off the alerts on my computer and dug in again.  I reread my research, went wider and deeper. (That’s when I found Judith.) With more information and richer understanding, the story came together. It still took more than thirty revisions.

Wisdom: Hang in there and keep researching as you write. Like Deborah, you too can discover your capableness in the challenges!

About Beth

Beth Anderson, a former educator, has always marveled at the power of books. Driven by curiosity and a love for words, she writes untold tales, hoping to inspire kids to laugh, ponder, and question. She’s the award-winning author of CLOAKED IN COURAGE, FRANZ’S PHANTASMAGORICAL MACHINE, REVOLUTIONARY PRUDENCE WRIGHT, TAD LINCOLN’S RESTLESS WRIGGLE, “SMELLY” KELLY AND HIS SUPER SENSES, LIZZIE DEMANDS A SEAT!, and AN INCONVENIENT ALPHABET. Beth has more historical picture books on the way. To learn more about Beth and her books click here.