When is the fiction in Historical Fiction too much?

[Lummel]

What bothers me about criticism of historical novels is mostly the anal nitpicking. "Oh this prince couldn't be gay" or "oh, he couldn't have said this to his wife, monk X specifically recorded that he said Y".

Once again, let's not get into extremes.

It depends. For example if there was a historical novel in which Horatio Nelson has his one arm about Emma Hamilton, gazes at her with his one good eye and says I love it here in Naples, the music of the organ grinders up lifts the soul all the better to appreciate the chaste nature of the southern italian women then that novel would be a fraud, Nelson is on record as having extremely low opinions of pretty much all non-English people (except for Danes).

If a novel set in the historical past is offering up a person from history with views and opinions that are not in line with what they said or can be fairly assumed to be their opinions then it's not a work of historical fiction but rather of speculative or alternative history. That's fine but the author should at least have the grace to be upfront with the reader about where they have taken liberties.

[Grack21]

It depends. For example if there was a historical novel in which Horatio Nelson has his one arm about Emma Hamilton, gazes at her with his one good eye and says I love it here in Naples, the music of the organ grinders up lifts the soul all the better to appreciate the chaste nature of the southern italian women then that novel would be a fraud, Nelson is on record as having extremely low opinions of pretty much all non-English people (except for Danes).

If a novel set in the historical past is offering up a person from history with views and opinions that are not in line with what they said or can be fairly assumed to be their opinions then it's not a work of historical fiction but rather of speculative or alternative history. That's fine but the author should at least have the grace to be upfront with the reader about where they have taken liberties.

:agree:

[Liadin]

Because the conditions are different. Writing a work about a contemporary event is different from writing one about a historical event becuase the nature of the sources are different, the nature of the reaction to the event (eg. hindsight) are different, and so on and so forth.

Someone writing a contemporary novel has no idea how the historical events they are involved in are going to unfold. Someone writing a historical novel has the benefit of hindsight in that case, but also suffers from different problems.

Historical writing just isn't like contemporary writing for the same reason ice-cream isn't like waffles.

I can see how they would feel very different to a historian. To me as a reader it doesn't really make a difference, certainly not enough to place them in entirely different genres. But, many of these definitions are probably coming from historians, which would explain a lot.

[Gargantuanjon Old Chap]

Painting a non gay historical figure as gay or vice versa is pretty extreme.

Could be secretly gay!

[Grack21]

Could be secretly gay!

Ah. Obvious troll is obvious.

[The Iceman of the North]

How can you prove a historical figure wasn't gay?

[Talleyrand]

Usually Historical inaccuracies really annoy me in some cases like Iggulden i enjoy the book enough to overlook it

[Grack21]

How can you prove a historical figure wasn't gay?

Well, how can you prove they weren't from outer space?

[wolverine]

Doesn't bother me at all. As far as I'm concerned, there is no "historical accuracy" at all.

No one source is reliable. Sure, there are writings of some random monks that may coincide with others, but who says they are reliable too?

To say there is "no historical accuracy at all" seems extreme to me.

[Grack21]

To say there is "no historical accuracy at all" seems extreme to me.

It's how conspiracy nuts try and explain that they're not nuts. I mean, you can't prove aliens DIDN'T build the pyramids, etc. Just ignore it.

[imladolen]

My historical fiction reading has been limited to Colleen McCullough's "Masters of Rome" series and a some of Stephen Saylor's Rome stuff, as well as Neal Stephenson's historical science fiction series "The Baroque Cycle." Outside of certain cultural attitudes and sexual proclivities of certain figures (Julius Caesar namely) McCullough's stuff matched up well with what was taught by my Early Western Civ professor. So I figure as long as a writer can keep what they produce in line with what could have happened and we just don't know about it because it wasn't recorded, then thats good HF. But if they start putting in events and such that we know never happended, or did not happen that way, then they are going too far. With Stephenson I didn't mind the divergences because it already had a strong fantasy or SF element to it (Enoch Root, the Philosopher's Stone, etc).

[felice]

Well, how can you prove they weren't from outer space?

There are no proven incidents of an apparent human ever turning out to have come from outer space. There have been many, many proven incidents of humans being gay (and it's also common enough amongst animals). Given that for most of history homosexuality has been persecuted, it has been common for people to keep it a secret. It is statistically certain that many historical figures who aren't known to have been homosexual actually were. So there's nothing extreme about speculating that a specific figure could have been gay (depending on how much we know about them; I expect there are some whose lives are sufficiently well documented that it would be an unreasonable stretch, but they'd be in a small minority).

[Grack21]

There are no proven incidents of an apparent human ever turning out to have come from outer space. There have been many, many proven incidents of humans being gay (and it's also common enough amongst animals). Given that for most of history homosexuality has been persecuted, it has been common for people to keep it a secret. It is statistically certain that many historical figures who aren't known to have been homosexual actually were. So there's nothing extreme about speculating that a specific figure could have been gay (depending on how much we know about them; I expect there are some whose lives are sufficiently well documented that it would be an unreasonable stretch, but they'd be in a small minority).

Well I was being half sarcastic there. I know a lot of historical figures were in the closet, I was more poking fun of the "no such thing as historical accuracy" comment.

[Galactus]

Doesn't bother me at all. As far as I'm concerned, there is no "historical accuracy" at all.

No one source is reliable. Sure, there are writings of some random monks that may coincide with others, but who says they are reliable too?

Which is why historians try to not rely on any one source.

[Liadin]

Galactus, how do you feel about those books where an author takes a historical figure that's widely maligned and tells the story from his/her point of view, sticking mostly to the facts as they're known but making the character (in thoughts and intention if nothing else) maybe a leeetle too good to be true?

It rather irritates me when they do this mostly on the grounds that I don't want to read about characters who are candidates for canonization. But my question for you is more along the lines of how far you think it's appropriate for an author to stray from what the historical figure's most likely/most widely believed motives and actions were.

[The Iceman of the North]

Well I was being half sarcastic there. I know a lot of historical figures were in the closet, I was more poking fun of the "no such thing as historical accuracy" comment.

Being gay or not is hardly the best counterexample. As for obvious "historical inaccuracies" there's everything from anachronism to assigning a specific action to one figure when it's well documented that another figure were responsible. (For the latter, I can accept it if the author notes that the change was necessary for dramatical reasons.)

[Galactus]

Galactus, how do you feel about those books where an author takes a historical figure that's widely maligned and tells the story from his/her point of view, sticking mostly to the facts as they're known but making the character (in thoughts and intention if nothing else) maybe a leeetle too good to be true?

It rather irritates me when they do this mostly on the grounds that I don't want to read about characters who are candidates for canonization. But my question for you is more along the lines of how far you think it's appropriate for an author to stray from what the historical figure's most likely/most widely believed motives and actions were.

Hmmm, let me explain my position a bit: I don't use "historical fiction" as a value judgement per se, and reserch done for hsitorical fiction may ormay not be any good (usually it's not...). And whether the research is any good ends to have only an indirect link with the quality of the work.

Motivations are tricky things to ascertain in the first place. I tend to really quite enjoy those kinds of turnaround stories *if they are written in firs-person* or otherwise as a narrative of said person explaining his o her actions. (when it's described from the POV of another chaacter i works too)

Add to this the fact that most people tend to have pretty complex and shiting motivations. (real hard-boiled cynicism is rarer than you think, and most consider themseles as having, in their own minds, justifiable reasons for doing what they do)

I should note that historians tends to be really cautious with ascribing motivations: There are some instances where it can be ascertained (say, if you have protocols describing how a particular decision was come to) but that still only helps to show what people PRESENTED as their motivation, not what it actually was.

[Grack21]

Being gay or not is hardly the best counterexample. As for obvious "historical inaccuracies" there's everything from anachronism to assigning a specific action to one figure when it's well documented that another figure were responsible. (For the latter, I can accept it if the author notes that the change was necessary for dramatical reasons.)

Yeah that was baaad example I used there.