{"id":2371823,"date":"2016-10-06T16:31:21","date_gmt":"2016-10-06T21:31:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/clearwaterpress.com\/oneyearnovel\/?p=2371823"},"modified":"2023-01-06T22:18:53","modified_gmt":"2023-01-07T04:18:53","slug":"secret-historical-fiction-wont-make-historians-cry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/clearwaterpress.com\/oneyearnovel\/blog\/secret-historical-fiction-wont-make-historians-cry\/","title":{"rendered":"A Secret to Historical Fiction that Won\u2019t Make Historians Cry"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"oyan-blog-historian-pinterest\"<\/a>Writing Historical Fiction miniseries<\/em><\/p>\n

by Rachel Garner, Staff Writer<\/strong><\/p>\n

I moderate the One Year Adventure Novel<\/em> Student Forum<\/a>, and there are three things that get\u00a0my immediate attention: rumblings of drama, anything to do with Robin Hood, and history. As it\u00a0is a writing forum, the history topics are almost always Pleas for Help. These tend to come in\u00a0two kinds:<\/p>\n

One: I\u2019m writing historical fiction. How do I research??<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Two: I\u2019m writing a book set in [really broad span of time, no specified locale] and I need to know\u00a0about [really specific thing]. Explain please??<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

A third problem becomes evident from reading early chapters of some historical fiction, where\u00a0opening scenes can go something like this: There are carriages. And a market. Some people\u00a0have fancy clothes, but I am a lowly thief. We are living in approximately the year 1000\u20131850.<\/em><\/p>\n

This is a Plea for Help as well, although the writer may not be aware of it yet.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In this first post, I want to stick to the second two Pleas for Help, as they illustrate similar\u00a0problems.\u00a0Before suggesting historian-approved ways of actually finding the information you need (next blog post) and exploring philosophies of writing historical fiction (third blog post), I want to explain what the discipline of studying history is<\/em><\/strong> and why, when answering writers\u2019 questions, I constantly want to say, \u201cYou\u2019re asking this question incorrectly.\u201d<\/p>\n

As a creative writer turned historian, I have a unique and fussy perspective on this.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m a writer of historical fiction who is simultaneously studying history. I have yet to find\u00a0someone else in this position, so I would venture to say that most historical fiction writers are\u00a0history buffs<\/em>, not historians<\/em><\/strong>. True, I am a couple months out from holding my degree in my\u00a0hands, and I haven\u2019t done postgraduate work (yet!), but I\u2019m in a position to offer fellow historical\u00a0fiction writers insights they need.<\/p>\n

My main interest as a historian is England from the period of 1066 (the time of the Norman\u00a0Conquest) to 1215 (the signing of the Magna Carta). Within that, I\u2019m most interested in the\u00a0collision of culture and languages<\/strong> (Norman French with Old English in a society that keeps\u00a0records in Latin), laws, and record-keeping<\/strong> (Doomsday Book, the Exchequer).<\/p>\n

I want you to take a look at that paragraph again, because this is part of the disconnect between\u00a0writers and historians. I\u2019ve noticed that writers\u2014especially young writers\u2014tend to think in really\u00a0broad terms<\/strong>. Let\u2019s return to Plea for Help Two, where a writer might, for example, ask about\u00a0marriage practices \u201cin the Middle Ages\u201d<\/em> and tack on \u201cAlso, how do you escape from a castle?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

The Middle Ages is usually defined as the 5th century through the 15th century\u2014that is, a\u00a0thousand years<\/em><\/strong>. Notice that the hypothetical writer has not specified a location. The experience\u00a0of this period in England is going to be very different from the experience in Spain or Italy.\u00a0People tend to default to English settings in both historical fiction and fantasy\u2014a rant for\u00a0another day\u2014but even if we assume the writer meant England, things are going to vary wildly\u00a0from 750 to 1100 to 1375 AD. \u201cCastle\u201d means something quite different in each of these three\u00a0\u201cexample\u201d years. Marriage practices definitely change.<\/p>\n

This may come as a surprise, but there is no such thing as a historian of the entire Middle Ages\u00a0in all of Europe who knows about marriage and castles<\/strong>. It doesn\u2019t happen. Medievalists\u2019\u00a0interests look more like this: plagues and purgatory (my English history professor), power\u00a0structures in French aristocracy (my senior capstone advisor), and Cistercian monks in Wales\u00a0(my professor in a class basically about that). As to this hypothetical marriage\/castle question,\u00a0any one of these medievalists may have a good general<\/em> idea, but a good general idea isn\u2019t\u00a0going to get you very far on the way to accuracy or even interesting facts.<\/p>\n

If I have overwhelmed you, I\u2019m sorry, but it gets more boggling. The Middle Ages is a period of\u00a0relatively slow change and comparatively scanty records.<\/strong> Some generalizations are an\u00a0unfortunate necessity, even by medievalists. So if a medievalist would be reduced to tears by\u00a0your generalizations, just consider with me how historians of more recent periods would feel. A\u00a0historian of the 19th century may find it hilarious that I consider myself proficient in 150 years of\u00a0English history. They could well be restricted to a decade.<\/p>\n

Besides proving that I\u2019m excellent fun at parties, what am I trying to get across here?<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re going to write historical fiction, you need to do something that historians do naturally:\u00a0be specific<\/strong>. This may sound exaggerated, but specificity is the number one secret to writing\u00a0strong historical fiction<\/strong>\u2014stories that are not only compelling, but plausible.<\/p>\n

You need to pick not only a country, probably, but a region within that country<\/strong>. I don\u2019t mean you\u00a0have to pick a place that absolutely existed\u2014although it can help\u2014but you should know what\u00a0kind of land and towns generally surround your fictional manor. You should probably pick a\u00a0particular year. Why? Even in the Middle Ages, a year can make a lot of difference<\/strong>. The King of\u00a0England in 1199 is different from the one in 1200. 1207 and 1208 are also going to be quite\u00a0different\u2014in 1207 England has religious business as usual, and in 1208 England is under\u00a0interdict, which prohibits the English clergy from performing most religious services.<\/p>\n

Even if your book is all about little William Nobody who wants to become a knight, and the story\u00a0doesn\u2019t really touch on religion or the dispute between the king and the Pope, this situation is\u00a0still going to affect William and those around him.<\/p>\n

My own historical fiction tends to be about very \u201csmall\u201d people\u2014they\u2019re not in contact with the\u00a0greats of their world, the people we know enough about to write their biographies. But what the\u00a0greats are doing will still have impact on what the normal people can do<\/strong>, much as President\u00a0Obama\u2019s decisions affect your life (whether American or not!). If the country is under interdict,\u00a0William will probably not marry his true love at the closest cathedral (perhaps cathedral\u00a0weddings weren\u2019t what was done in his area anyway, but I haven\u2019t researched that).<\/p>\n

Being specific also will help clear your mind of clich\u00e9s<\/strong> like those employed in the hypothetical\u00a0\u201cchapter one\u201d in Plea for Help Three. If you pick a specific town, you\u2019re more likely to discover\u00a0things like this: Nottingham is in a part of England with lots of sandstone, and so people carved\u00a0many spaces (including parts of the castle) out of the stone and used them as living spaces or\u00a0places for animals. Maybe that won\u2019t change your market scene, but it might suggest ditching\u00a0the market altogether because Cool, caves!<\/em><\/p>\n

History\u2019s little-known secret is that the more specific you are\u2014the more you narrow your\u00a0search\u2014the more interesting it becomes.<\/strong> In fiction writing, another craft driven by detail and\u00a0curiosity, this sadly neglected truth can be your friend. I once read a really thick book called\u00a0England under the Norman and Angevin Kings<\/em> (I even enjoyed it), which contained a very brief\u00a0mention of the fact that people both kissed saints\u2019 shrines and left coin offerings; and so\u00a0sometimes, thieves would pretend to kiss shrines to pick up coins in their mouths. I ended up\u00a0writing a short story about someone who survived in this way<\/strong>, and I made a whole list of other,\u00a0similarly interesting and lesser-known facts for future stories!<\/p>\n

It is so sad that this isn\u2019t better understood. Many writers stay in the shallow end, aware enough\u00a0of what they don\u2019t know that they fear writing in all but the broadest strokes. Or they think they\u00a0know enough and lean heavily on cultural perceptions, films, and other books even though\u00a0these sources can be inadequate if not (frequently) factually wrong. If they could realize that no\u00a0one, least of all historians, expects them to know \u201ceverything about the Middle Ages,\u201d<\/strong> they\u00a0would be free to study a specific place and time. The details that would result from a narrow\u00a0research topic would make their stories so much richer and more interesting.<\/p>\n

Now that I\u2019ve got you tracking with\u2014or at least interested\u2014in a historian\u2019s perspective, next\u00a0week we can jump right into how to find the information you need<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

Have you ever tried to write historically accurate fiction?<\/em><\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>About Rachel<\/strong><\/p>\n

Rachel was one of the seven students\u2014or self-labeled \u201cguinea pigs\u201d\u2014who took part in the pilot class for The One Year Adventure Novel<\/em>.\u00a0Known as \u201cNairam\u201d in the extended OYAN community, Rachel is an example of dedication to her craft and a gifted editor. She is also a kind and forthright writing mentor to students at every level of the program, and a Story Coach<\/a>.\u00a0A homeschool graduate, she is now in college studying history. When not hiding out in the medieval England section of her school library, she edits her Robin Hood retelling and pretends that ten\u00a0years is definitely not too long to spend on a single writing project.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Rachel Garner, Staff Writer<\/strong>
\nBefore suggesting historian-approved ways of actually finding the information you need (next blog post) and exploring philosophies of writing historical fiction (third blog post), I want to explain what the discipline of studying history is and why, when answering writers\u2019 questions, I constantly want to say, \u201cYou\u2019re asking this question incorrectly.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11881,"featured_media":2371825,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,11,223,40],"tags":[16122,16120,16121],"post_series":[],"class_list":["post-2371823","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blogging-the-culture-war","category-writing","category-world-building-2","category-writing-tips-and-tools","tag-historical-accuracy","tag-historical-fiction","tag-how-to-write-historical-fiction","entry","has-media"],"yoast_head":"\nA Secret to Historical Fiction that Won\u2019t Make Historians Cry -<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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