The untimely death of Heath Ledger led me to think about the one DVD I have in my possession which features this remarkable actor – A Knight's Tale. It is loosely based on one of Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. I had a small copy of the book, but couldn't wrap my feeble brain around the medieval prose.

That led me to think about another book that's been sitting around the house for a few years – The Hack's Tale. David Hughes attempts to tap into the minds and travels of three writers: Chaucer, Jean Froissart and Giovanni Boccaccio.

He attempts to illustrate how these three contemporaries heralded the beginning of the media age – forerunners to our news shows, newspapers and hordes of paparazzi following Britney all over the globe. He sees reporters. Hacks, if you will.

But I see three writers who traveled to new places, whether to escape the plague-ridden crowds in the big cities, to hole themselves up in villas to write in peace, or to sit in dark, damp drinking holes to observe the unwashed masses over a few pints.

Was it so different seven hundred years ago? Instead of our own feet or the hooves of some rented horse, we hop into cars, trains or planes in order to seek a place where we can find our muse. Those of us who are lucky enough to afford travel can use this method. For the rest of us, only a quiet corner of the dining room will do, or we must soak up culture from other sources – movies, documentaries or reference books. Or that recent and most efficient tool, the Internet.

How do you do your research? Do you travel? Do you sit unnoticed in a tapas bar in Spain to absorb the local flavour? Or do you use my method, gliding all over the world on a cyber surfboard, catching what I can with electronic fingers?

--Sandra Cormier

Labels: Chaucer, The Hack's Tale