British Columbia's first chief justice, Matthew Baillie Begbie, is the colourful subject of author and editor, Marlyn Horsdal's historical novel, The Judge and the Lady. Horsdal will read from this and other work at 8 p.m., next Saturday, May 4, at the Sunshine Coast Arts Centre in Sechelt.
Notoriously and erroneously known after his death as "The Hanging Judge," Begbie is the victim of what writer and archivist Ron Young calls "one part man, one part myth and an equal part legend."
Thanks to posthumous slurs, his gruesome nickname has prevailed. By way of offering another perspective, Horsdal promises via her reading and remarks to present "the real Judge Begbie and the uses of historical fiction."
Before choosing Begbie as one of her novel's characters, Horsdal edited a biography of the judge, and says that in her novel, "I have portrayed the real Judge Begbie as accurately as I can. Much of what he says in the novel is actual quotes, or drawn from his Bench Books, letters and other writings."
The Judge and the Lady also provides a sharp, detailed fictional portrait of Victoria and Interior B.C. before the British colony joined Confederation.
Horsdal's first novel, Sweet-ness from Ashes, was named one of the best fiction titles of 2010 by January magazine.
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