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Obligations of H.F. Writers to be Factual

For discussions of historical fiction. Threads that do not relate to historical fiction should be started in the Chat forum or elsewhere on the forum, depending on the topic.
Russ Whitfield
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Post by Russ Whitfield » Wed September 29th, 2010, 8:46 am

[quote=""gyrehead""]I think an author should feel the obligation to be up front with what is fact and what is fiction. But if they don't feel such, there really isn't anything to do. Especially when most readers simply do not want to be burdened with facts I suspect.

What I do find annoying is that many authors throw in the historical notes at the end and show off what they researched but I tend to find is a smoke screen so they can shrug off criticism. I've found some really odd recent novels that have such but then have huge gaping historical inaccuracies that a true level of research to correctly find point a would have included the grossly inaccurate point b (and in these cases nothing about distorting point b makes sense fictionally and actually is a bit of a joke historically).

Another aspect I find annoying is that some historical research seems to be the excuse for authors using or employing certain elements. Authors that use the extreme exception to the rule to justify using that as the rule in their work.

Or even two books this year where the author essentially says "I couldn't find anything to prove this wrong so I went ahead and used it'. Never occurring to the authors apparently that no one bothered to record a non-event. Or even more important, the reason there was nothing that said such-and-such couldn't have happened was because it was so far from what did that it didn't occur again to someone recording that it didn't happen that way. The justification for some of the most ridiculous plot points is getting rather weird and self-serving. These people write fiction after all. Just admit it is fiction and not pretend there is some six degrees of possibility going on.[/quote]

But if they don't add these notes then they're attacked for inaccuracy and not knowing what they're on about. Its hardly a smoke-screen - its just saying what you say at the end - "this is fiction. I changed this, this and that."

I also think that someone's huge gaping historical inaccuracies are often not as huge and gaping as they might appear. Proper research often reveals a lot of conventional historical wisdom isn't quite correct. But then you get the would-be savants who come along and attack an author for being inaccurate when in fact he or she is bang on the money.

Or they may not be: there are always cases when people just ignore the facts - as I say, Conn's "Empire" was way off the mark in certain aspects. I know a little bit about Roman History, but still this didn't bother me at all. It was more David Gemmell than Wallace Breem, but you know - so what. I read novels to be entertained. I read text-books to be informed (and often entertained - Philip Matyszak...I love you, man.)

And I think that six degrees of possibility remark is a little skewed. I would guess that its more about plausibility - this could have happened. And there's nothing to say it didn't - unless as you say - it goes totally against the grain (I don't know - Julius Ceasar spent his early years in Japan being trained by ninjas or something) then I can't see anything wrong with this sort of hypotheses in fiction writing.

Like - what if we say that Hitler used to go and see a prostitute on a regular basis. What would her story be? That'd probably make a decent novel right there set against the back drop of rising and falling German Reich - there's nothing to say that Hitler didn't have a regular prostitute (I'm guessing - this is just something I'm making up for this thread - I'm not a WWII expert or anything like that) so there's a whole life-story based on something that a writer might postulate: "The Furher's Whore" - or something like that.

So yeah - I think these notes are ok. I've read all sorts of fascinating stuff in them - I remember one of David Gemmel's novels - I think it was the "Ghost King" - about King Arthur. He addressed the fact that arrows were being "fired" which I liked but on a broader level he just said (paraphrasing) "this story is nothing like what it is was. Its how I dreamed it should be." OK, he's writing historical fantasy in the case of "Ghost King" but I admire the sentiment.

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Post by Misfit » Wed September 29th, 2010, 11:46 am

But if they don't add these notes then they're attacked for inaccuracy and not knowing what they're on about.
OK, so let's take this a step further. You have Carrolly Erickson who writes what she terms *historical entertainments*. I.e. her book on Mary Queen of Scots which among other things has her meeting up in private with Queen Elizabeth, Bosworth dressing up as a peddler and sneaking into the home she was imprisoned in (even making the horizontal mumbo jumbo), escaping to Italy and conspiring with the pope to invade England.

She freely admits in the notes it is all *whimsy". Since she does that, is it still *OK* to reinvent known history like that?
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Post by boswellbaxter » Wed September 29th, 2010, 12:34 pm

[quote=""Misfit""]OK, so let's take this a step further. You have Carrolly Erickson who writes what she terms *historical entertainments*. I.e. her book on Mary Queen of Scots which among other things has her meeting up in private with Queen Elizabeth, Bosworth dressing up as a peddler and sneaking into the home she was imprisoned in (even making the horizontal mumbo jumbo), escaping to Italy and conspiring with the pope to invade England.

She freely admits in the notes it is all *whimsy". Since she does that, is it still *OK* to reinvent known history like that?[/quote]

I don't particularly enjoy such "historical entertainments." (I'm reading one now, and though it started off promisingly, it's getting too far-fetched.) But I have a lot more respect for an author who freely admits to tampering with known facts than for one who tampers with known facts but who refuses to admit it.
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Post by Ludmilla » Wed September 29th, 2010, 1:15 pm

I think the big issue with a lot of people (and with me as well) is when a novel is advertised or hyped as being a factual or realistic portrayal of history, and it turns out to be something else. It doesn't do what it's supposed to do on the tin. Sometimes this isn't the author's fault, especially in the case of hype where our own view of accurate history does not align with others (and who is to say what is accurate, as many times it can be debatable).

I think another issue is that HF cannot be boiled down to one type that is realistic and strictly adhering to known facts. There are as many sub-categories for it as there probably are for Romance or Fantasy.

That said, good storytelling is much more important to me. I can forgive a lot when I'm in the hands of a good storyteller, and I'm not without a sense of humor or the occasional mood for pure escapist fun. I can also appreciate imagined scenarios by an author wanting to play with a theme or an idea. I do often hope that in HF, the author makes the effort to capture something of the spirit of the times which quite often can't be pinned down by rigid rules and widely accepted facts. Usually, I read books in the spirit they are intended, as far as what an author intended can be known. These days it's easier, given how many authors publicize about completed works and their works in progress.

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Obligations of HF writers to be factual

Post by wendy » Wed September 29th, 2010, 1:17 pm

This is an interesting question I have recently grappled with as a writer. I am currently working on a novel set against the Lancashire Witch Trials of 1612 and originally stayed very close to the known facts as documented in the trail transcript (allowing for the necessary bias of the clerk). My agent felt I needed to include more fiction because the characters were pretty awful and tended to wallow in their own misery. She added that no one would want to read such a joyless tale! So I am rewriting from the pov of a more sympathetic (imaginary) character - but now risk being held accountable for historical innacuracies and manipulation of the facts. So what is the answer? I look forward to hearing your suggestions. Thanks -

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Post by Misfit » Wed September 29th, 2010, 1:30 pm

[quote=""boswellbaxter""]I don't particularly enjoy such "historical entertainments." (I'm reading one now, and though it started off promisingly, it's getting too far-fetched.) But I have a lot more respect for an author who freely admits to tampering with known facts than for one who tampers with known facts but who refuses to admit it.[/quote]

I saw a review for that on Amazon today. A 3.5 from that reviewer generally works out for one-two stars from me.
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Post by Russ Whitfield » Wed September 29th, 2010, 1:40 pm

I don't hold with totally re-inventing things myself, but as I've stated earlier, some authors do this to great effect.

Let's say in the case of Carolly Erickson that she hadn't added any notes at all? What would you have thought in that case? I think you might be justified in commenting on that in a review for sure, because the writer has given you no indication that she's applied levity with the facts.

I don't think its an excuse or a smoke screen when an author puts notes in the back - I just think its someone explaining why they did or didn't do something or why they changed the facts to suit the story. As I say, to me, novels are entertainment - I'm not expecting them to be 100% accurate.

I mean - Wallace Breem's "Eagle in the Snow" is widely regarded as one of the best historical fiction novels written. But his main character Paulinus Gaius Maximus is a fiction. Everything that happens around him is a fiction, save for the main fact (the Germans crossed the Danube). And, to my recollection, Breem hasn't added notes (though I stand to be corrected on that).

I just don't see the point in getting ariated about it to be honest. I think I say in another post on the forum that if you know the historical details and you know what you're reading is an extrapolation...or downright bobbins...then you know. In the Erickson case, I wouldn't know if her accuracy was off or on - as I don't know enough about the period.

I'd be more put off the writing wasn't to my taste and I didn't enjoy the story - as I say, I read novels to be entertained and perhaps informed, but I wouldn't read a novel and go on Eggheads proclaiming that I was an expert on the Elizabethan period. If the novel interested me enough, I'd go and find out about it, though. I saw a movie when I was a child - this sparked an interest in ancient history that has been lifelong. (As it turned out, that movie was pretty accurate though!).

And I think - no matter how meticulous the research is, someone will always disagree with it. I read on one forum that (the brilliant) Simon Scarrow getting a pasting because he uses modern vernacular in dialogue. His Roman soldiers swear a lot - someone got the hump because they didn't think that Romans would use those words. Well, clearly not those, they would have had Latin terms. But we don't have any documentation (as far as I know) of Caesar's profanisaurus - so having Roman soldiers cursing then isn't accurate.

To the letter of the law - no its not accurate. Does it read like great dialogue. In my opinion, yes.

OK - this is a small example, but it just goes to show that you can never please all of the people all of the time.

So for me - author's notes are great. Also, I always like to hear the voice behind the story voice too.

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Post by Russ Whitfield » Wed September 29th, 2010, 1:49 pm

[quote=""Ludmilla""]I think the big issue with a lot of people (and with me as well) is when a novel is advertised or hyped .....[/quote]

I think we're on the same page, Ludmilla! Wicked post, summed up my thoughts and feelings far more concisely that I did!

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Post by Misfit » Wed September 29th, 2010, 2:02 pm

As I say, to me, novels are entertainment - I'm not expecting them to be 100% accurate.
Yes, that is true. Unfortunately, Erickson failed to entertain, historically made up fluff or not. It was a dog IMHO.
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Post by M.M. Bennetts » Wed September 29th, 2010, 3:48 pm

Well, I've ripped out whole chapters, whole quarters of books and rewritten because I got one fact wrong or I found out something which they would have known, which had slipped out of general knowledge, and which would have changed their view of a thing.

And it's not that I hate doing it. I don't. I wish I didn't find these things out so late in the game, sometimes, but that's the fun of history...

I think it probably comes down to 'does the author do it well?' Charles Dickens, well...there was no Mme Des Farges. But she as a character was this embodiment of a whole segment of French society and to whom the likes of St. Just with his rivers of blood speeches appealed. So she works brilliantly. And she still scares the heck out of me--because she gave that blood-lust-madness a face and a name.

Recent books about the building of London in the early 19th century show Georgette Heyer's confection of Regency London to have been almost as mythological as Wodehouse's Blandings Castle, but again, she does it so well. She's utterly spot on about aunts and sisters and mothers. And she never fails to make me laugh.

I suppose, therefore, it boils down to is it done well? Does the thing, the language, the character, the emotional attitude stick out as unlikely, or does it seem to fit, to be all of a piece and work and add to the novel and our sense of that time period?

Though I must say, I was just reading manuscripts for my day job, and the fastest way to land one's MS in the reject pile is to put in wrong information that is so easily looked up on Google, into your first chapter. If the author can't be bothered to even Google Debrett's Peerage, for example, to find out how to use titles and how to have characters address each other, then they've just told me they can't be bothered to do any work and that's it...I'm done.

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