The tingling traveled up my arms, lifting my skin into tiny goose pimples … Shaken by my response, I stepped away from the library table. A mild shock made me withdraw my fingers quickly, but not quickly enough. … I reached out, touching the brown leather. In a Discovery of Witches, Bishop, a historian and witch who has rejected her deep, Salem, Mass., roots, encounters the enchanted manuscript during the course of her research into alchemy texts: The manuscript is the main impetus behind their adventures. Set in the present day, the manuscript brings together researchers Diana Bishop and Matthew Clairmont in the majestic, gothic Bodleian Library. In the series, Harkness casts Ashmole 782 in a central role, imagining what magic it may contain. As a novelist I get to say, ‘OK, imagine this is what’s happening.’ ” “I get to go where the historian’s craft would force me to stop because there’s no evidence. Harkness, professor of history in USC Dornsife, breathes life into the mysterious text by filling in gaps in the historical record through the magic of fiction - one of the great perks of being a writer, she said. Watch a July 2019 interview with Deborah Harkness as she discussess adapting her novel A Discovery of Witches for television > It was designated “Object 782” in the collection and bore the description: “Anthropologia, or a treatis containing a short description of Man in two parts: the first Anatomical, the second Psychological.” Harkness surmises that the manuscript was lost due to an incorrect catalogue entry or shelving error. Ashmole 782 does in fact exist outside of Harkness’ fictional world, though its whereabouts are currently unknown.Īshmole 782 was originally donated to the Bodleian Library at Oxford University in 1858 as part of chemist and bibliophile Elias Ashmole’s extensive book, coin and natural object collection. Take Ashmole 782, the enigmatic manuscript that became the jumping off point for A Discovery of Witches (Viking Adult, 2011) and Shadow of Night (Viking Adult, 2012), the first two installments of her uber-successful All Souls Trilogy. And where records of their pursuits sometimes lead to dead ends, Harkness finds fuel for fiction. Like clues to a mystery, they hold the key to unraveling the chronology, ambitions, failures and successes of those who lived before us. USC-Huntington Early Modern Studies Instituteĭeborah Harkness believes the pages of centuries-old manuscripts are enchanted. Shinso Ito Center for Japanese Religions and Culture
Max Kade Institute for Austrian-German-Swiss Studies Huntington-USC Institute on California and The West Casden Institute for the Study of the Jewish Role in American LifeĬenter for Islamic Thought, Culture and PracticeĬenter for Latin American and Latinx Studies
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