a question for historical writers and readers

[erastes]

It's a pretty solid tradition for writers to invent members of the aristocracy and pass it off as historical—there are thousands of counts and earls and lords etc.

But what about royalty?

I mean, if you can invent counts and earls, some of whom are likely to be in the line of succession, why not a Richard IV or a John II? Or princes of wales (or lesser) that didn't exist?

I ask because I've just seen a review on Elisa Rolle's blog of a made up Japanese Prince and my first thought was "oh that's not historical, so I can't put it on Speak Its Name" but now I cometo think of it, why not?  WHY Are earls and lords not AU and yet Kings and princes Who didn't exist AU?

HELP ME please. my head is about to explode. I need to ask the same question of the Historical Novel Society.

Comments

[elisa-rolle.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure there was an historical novel with an ipotetic King of England that in reality never exists. Now I don't remember the author or novel (I think it was about the alternative reality that one prince didn't die as an infant but grown up to inherit the throne), but I remember it was judged as being one of the best on historical setting.

I think that is the different between historical essay and historical novel, an Historical Novel has to respect the historical details but then it has more freedom than an historical essay. So yes, if you can "invent" all the level of aristocracy, why not also the Kings, Queens and various princeling?

[aishabintjamil.livejournal.com]

This is purely a personal definition, but my feeling is if you want to claim something is a purely "historical" novel, you need to stick pretty close to reality. I want the invented characters to be people who I can reasonably think might have existed, but just didn't make it into the history books.

So I can believe inventing minor nobles, simply because there were a lot of them, and many of them never did anything very important that would get them noted as existing except for in obscure local histories.

I can also believe giving someone of importance extra bastard offspring, who might well have been edited out of the official histories.

I can believe that minor people, unrecorded by history, might have had major, behind-the scenes influence on the known historical figures actions and decisions.

However, as soon as you start talking about someone who, if they existed, should be in the history books, or add major events that should have been recorded if they happened, I think you've left the fold of historical novels and are starting to drift into alternate histories. I enjoy those too, but they're a different genre.

[vashtan.livejournal.com]

Seconding this.

[semioticwarrior.livejournal.com]

What s/he said.

[lee-rowan.livejournal.com]

Yes, EXACTLY. Kings and Queens are major political figures on the landscape, and when you change those, you're writing alternate history. It may be a FANTASTIC AU, but it ain't history.

[gehayi.livejournal.com]

There were a LOT of do-nothing minor nobles who had zero impact on history. That's plausible.

However, any king or queen (or emperor or empress, rajah or rani, prime minister, etc.), even a do-nothing one, is going to have significant impact on a country and its history. And by inventing a new king, you're effectively changing everything that did happen during that period as the result of that ruler being in charge, the people in opposition to that ruler.

Don't get me wrong. I like alternate histories. But I want the author to acknowledge that the history is alternate.

Because, as I've said before:

1) Most people do not like history and did not get the best education in history at school.

2) Most people think that they are exceptionally well-educated when it comes to history.

3) Most people believe that the history that they read about in historical novels is accurate. And they remember and repeat the errors. (If you don't believe me, just check out all the books that feature witch-burnings during the Salem Witch Trials. Never mind that the nineteen people convicted of witchcraft were hanged and that one man was crushed to death by heavy stones during a legal torture employed to force him to enter a plea. Never mind that the deaths were well-documented and that the facts are in plenty of books and on plenty of websites. Romances and teen novels keep blethering on about witches being burned in Salem--and they keep being labeled "historical."

That, to my mind, is much worse than a fictional earl or baron.

So I won't have a problem with, say, a fictional guard or noble or commoner. But I will have a problem with, say, a supposedly accurate historical that has, say, a fictional emperor ruling Russia instead of Catherine the Great, or a fictional pope in the Middle Ages or with a fictional inventor or author inventing or writing all the works of Ben Franklin or Jane Austen...using the famous person's name as an alias, of course.

I don't have any problem with those stories if they're marketed as alternate history. But if the author was passing off the altered version as what really happened...then I would not consider it a historical. A story that takes place in a past that bears no resemblance to the actual past has nothing to do with history.

[lareinenoire.livejournal.com]

gehayi has said more or less what I'd planned to say -- that it's not unreasonable to assume that there are members of the aristocracy who didn't turn up in recorded history because they didn't do anything especially noteworthy.

I have no objections whatsoever to people inventing illegitimate royal offspring, so long as it's plausible (unlike that awful trilogy about Henry VI's sparkly, anachronistic, Mary Sue daughter, written by someone who clearly knows nothing about Henry VI), but the historical record as we know it would probably change too much if someone else was actually sitting on the throne of X country.

All is is being said with the caveat that I adore alternate histories and am planning to write one someday where Richard III wins the Battle of Bosworth and everything changes, but it requires such vast quantities of research that I will need more time. ;)

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Richard should have won. much malignedyoung man.

[lareinenoire.livejournal.com]

I admit, part of the fun I'm having is imagining what the world would have been like if he had -- and it's markedly different. (Also, my inner fangirl is all a-squee about Richard meeting Machiavelli.)

[gehayi.livejournal.com]

I'd enjoy reading that immensely. But then, I know that I can count on you to research all the ways in which the world would have been, and would continue to be, different.

[lareinenoire.livejournal.com]

When I first conceived of the project, I had no idea of the ramifications, and it's really staggering how a different person on the English throne (with different ideas about alliances and enemies than Henry VII had) would have altered events at the end of the fifteenth century. Just as an example, I cannot possibly imagine Richard III waiting too long before invading France, which, in turn, would throw off the French invasion of Italy in 1494. Not to mention the fact that he'd certainly have married again, and it's fascinating to think of the kind of alliance that might have formed (most likely not France, but possibly Spain, Portugal, or one of the Italian city-states).

It makes my head spin a little!

[stevie-carroll.livejournal.com]

I think it's all to do with how great a role they played in history. If I write the story of events a generation before Searching for Julia I'd have to give a lot of thought to whether it was really historical or not (which wouldn't have any effect on the huge amounts of research I'd need to do). Is the fact that the area of my fictional estate is really a reservoir enough to make it not historical? Eventually I'll have my Dukes and their ancestors positioned in history all the way back to 1066: is the fact that everyone after 1071 is based on a non-existent illegitimate son having made good enough to make it not-historical?

My Dukes were at a lot of historical events, but doing sneaky behind the scenes stuff like spying and backstabbing. Except the Victorian ones. They were busy being respectable farmers, which explains why the Edwardian and later Dukes were broke.

So if a fictional prince was the youngest of nine, only three of whom did something worthy of being recorded and all the other facts were accurate, then yes it could probably count as a historical. I think...

[markprobst.livejournal.com]

Look at all the TV shows and movies (contemporary) that feature fictional Presidents, governors and congressmen. Technically these are AU, but nobody thinks of them as such. I think that for historical material, creating a fictional role in place of the real person who is actually in the history books relegates it to AU.

For example in my novella about Custer's last stand, I invented several soldiers who were the main characters in my story. As far as I know, history didn't record the names of all 700 soldiers who died in that battle, so I felt I was at liberty to invent a few.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Yes, ordinary people, certainly--and even fictional squadron leaders--but you wouldn't change Custer for Joe Bloggs. I don't think I could list anything with a fictional president, either. as Gehayi says--it's all to do with the impact that the person had on perceived history, i suppose.

[enolabloodygay.livejournal.com]

If you want to be historically accurate in your fiction, want to use the right words and have the right things happen at the right time, you can't invent a prince, earl, lord, count or anyone else. You can have a minor figure who didn't exist see what happens at the time and feel the impact of what really happened in their day to day life.

If you want to invent a completely new member of the aristocracy (or any other level of society) and make them have a major influence on What Happens Next, then it's fantasy, not a historical novel.

Just my opinion.

[antychan.livejournal.com]

I understand "historical" as something that takes place at a certain point in history (as we know it). We know the names of kings and of their age/era; we don't know the names of all people at court, so we can make these up without creating (as far as we know) an anachronism.

Of course, that strict definition can rather take the fun out of things so let the academics have a go.

[lee-rowan.livejournal.com]

I have a long-running alternate history novel that may never see the light of day because of the research involved in trying to figure out how changing ONE THING back in the 1500's would affect world history 500 years later.

A different king would be ...

Well, put it this way: what if the people of Florida had kicked Jeb Bush's ass and forced a re-vote in Dade County? How would things have been different with President Gore for just 8 years?