Video from Sharon Kendrick’s Appearance at the Cheltenham Lit Festival
15 Comments October 21st, 2009 in author appearances, heroes Posted by Amyby Amy Wilkins, Harlequin Digital
Couldn’t jet over to England to see Harlequin Presents author Sharon Kendrick at the ‘What Makes a Literary Hero?’ panel at the Cheltenham Literature Festival? Me neither 
Lucky for us, Mills & Boon has posted some videos from the event we can watch online!
First up is a clip from the video about key qualities in a hero:
Next is a short interview with Sharon after the event — where she also reveals who her perfect hero from literature is….
And here’s a quick highlights video from festival:
Sharon also has her recap and some photos (including shirtless waiters…hel-lo!) here on her blog.
Another part of the event was a poll of Mills & Boon readers to name their favourite literary hero. Here are the heroes people could choose from:
The eventual winner was Mr. Rochester from Jane Eyre, followed by Bernard Cornwell’s character Richard Sharpe and Mr. Darcy in third (from The Telegraph).
Do you agree with the choice? What other heroes would you have added to the choices?
~Amy
Thanks for this Amy – what a brilliant job Sharon did! The festival looked amazing, and Sharon was obviously a fantastic ambassador. As for the list of heroes I’d have to add Daniel Day Lewis as Hawk Eye from The Last of the Mohicans..I know he’s an actor and not a fictional character but still…!
x Abby
Thanks, Abby – it was a fabulous day – and a great discussion (not to mention those waiters…..). As well as Rhett, I do actually adore Mr. Darcy and as for actors and fictional characters, well – Mickey Rourke in 9 1/2 Weeks LOOKS like a romantic hero – even if he doesn’t exactly act like one….
Sharon, you’re incredible. You should host one of those talk shows – Tonight with Sharon Kendrick. I’m a bit of a Rhett girl myself, too, but I agree with Abby about Daniel Day Lewis in Last of the Mohicans. I wouldn’t have slammed the door in the face of Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen) from Lord of the Rings either.
Amy, thanks for giving us this glimpse of Sharon in action.
“What other heroes would you have added to the choices?”
Well, it would have made the list of choices rather long, but I might have been tempted to add more of Austen’s heroes: Henry Tilney, from Northanger Abbey, Captain Wentworth from Persuasion and Mr Knightley from Emma. I suspect John Thornton, from Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South might have got quite a few votes now that he’s been played by Richard Armitage
And how about Baroness Orczy’s Scarlet Pimpernel and some of Georgette Heyer’s heroes?
Laura – they definitely should have consulted you – with such worthy additions to the list.
I get shivers down my spine whenever I hear: Is he in heaven? Is he in hell? That damned elusive Pimpernel…
You’re a fabulous ambassador, Sharon. I’m so sorry I couldn’t make it, but these clips are a great idea!
I woke up in the night and thought ‘the Marquis of Vidal’ (strange things come to me when I sleep) and then I see Laura has also mentioned Georgette Heyer. I have an ongoing debate with the historical author Nicola Cornick on whether we prefer the Duke of Avon in These Old Shades or Vidal from Devil’s Cub.
Georgette Heyer was featured (as a failed device to get a couple together) in an episode of Holby City on BBC 1 last night – couldn’t quite glimpse which one it was.
Ps. And Captain Corelli as a romantic hero? Are they MAD?
Think about it: he’s soft, thoughtful, enjoys a long chat, turns up like a vapid ghost year after year and makes (erroneous) assumption that heroine is married to another. AND THEY NEVER HAVE SEX.
Clearly, he’s gay.
LOL Sharon! I’ve never read Captain Corelli or seen the movie and now I don’t think I ever will, thanks for saving me the pain
@Laura, Big YES to Captain Wentworth from Persuasion! Even if just for the line in his letter to Anne: “You pierce my soul”. It’s one my favourite lines from literature.
Oh my. Mr Rochester? He’s up there with Heathcliff in my “Interesting to read about, but heroic- no way!” list of baaaaad Alpha heroes to avoid.
Laura and Sarah’s GH suggestions are spot on- I love all her heroes. Even the less overtly flashy and rakish ones are pure Alpha gold. My favourite- possibly Gareth from Sprig Muslin. I love the way that the plain and older heroine reawakens his belief in the possibility of love. Very low key, but superb.
Hmm Avon or Vidal, that’s a toughie! My first thought was Vidal, but then Avon, ah Avon. Much more the bad boy Alpha than Vidal, using her as a weapon in his personal vendetta, but somehow so much sexier than he should be!
Oooh Sharon– what a fabulous event to be part of and thanks for representing us all so elegantly and eloquently. Cheltenham isn’t that far away from me and I WISH I’d come down to cheer you on. It also happens that hot heroes are one of my very favourite topics of discussion. I was a Rupert Campbell Black girl at heart, having been seduced by him (not literally, to my eternal disappointment) at the age of 15 when he first appeared in Riders. However in the last book he revealed himself to be something of a racist so I have a vacancy to fill at the top of my list.
Can’t believe no-one’s (ie Abby Green) mentioned Edward Cullen. He’s definitely a contender for me.
“What other heroes would you have added to the choices?”
I would agree with the list posted so far, especially Henry DeTamble from The Time Traveler’s Wife. That’s high on my list of favourite romances. I would like to add Oliver Mellors, the gardener from Lady Chatterley. There have been a few tv and film adaptations, and Mellors was played by both Ralph Bates and Sean Bean (who also plays Sharpe in the tv films).
Closely related to him is Leonard Bast, from Howerd’s End. He didn’t come across that well in the Film4 adaptation, but in the book he has a similar kind of idealism/romanticism to Mellors.
But my favourite alpha male hero is Patrick MacGoohan’s portrayal of Number Six in The Prisoner. I believe MacGoohan was offered the role of James Bond before Sean Connery, but he turned it down because he thought it was misogynistic. So instead he devised his own version, Number Six, who was much more romantic. I always like the enigma about him at the start of every episode where he gets in his sports car, drives up to Whitehall, marches up the corridor and bursts into his boss’s office to tell him where he can stick his job(!) He even has a batchelor pad (like Austin Powers). But he has a severe mistrust of women, which makes him a challenge.
Lauren, I agree and disagree with you. I’m afraid I thought Leonard Bast was a weak and pathetic man in Howard’s End – and the antithesis of a romantic hero. And I couldn’t get on with Time Traveller’s wife at all.
But I agree about Patrick MacGoohan – I absolutely ADORED him and recently visited “The Village” in Port Meirion: http://www.portmeirion-village.com/ It’s fantastic! Literally….. I read that he refused the Bond part because he was strictly moral and completely in love with his wife and didn’t want to kiss another woman…..which is pretty heroic.
Hi Sharon, thanks for the reply. Yes, thinking about it Leonard is a wuss of the first order. I think I was thinking (?) about how Mellors and the idea of D H Lawrence had some potential and influence on those writers, which could be explored. Charles Ryder from Brideshead is another one, in that the hero has educated himself and worked his way up instead of being born into money.
I always feel uncomfortable with the aristocrats because, like Lord Chatterly, and like Lord Craven in Secret Garden, they are impotent, weak men in positions of power. (cf. Peter Sellers as Doctor Strangelove.) So I suppose I was saying that I like the hero to be driven, even progressive.
I also went to Portmeirion earlier this year. It really has to be experienced to be believed, doesn’t it?