I'm sure I'm not the first (and I won't be the last, I believe) who has debated how much artistic license to take when writing our novels. For example, I agonized whether or not to move a real life kidnapping up two years in my novel, "The Conference House." But thinking it over, I believe I won't use the actual kidnapping but create an attempted one instead. It wouldn't be much of a stretch to believe the Patriots may have tried to kidnap this person before 1778.

How about you? Have you had any times where you debated whether to preserve the historical events or use artistic license?

Definitely debated, although I'm much more likely to make my story fit in with established history than alter history to fit my story idea.  I find established history pretty interesting as it is, so I don't personally see the need to alter it for my own writing.  If I'm likely to change anything with regards to historical accuracy, it would be along the lines of having a character being able to do something that maybe society wouldn't allow him or her to get away with.  For example, at the end of my pirate novel, a former slave ends up as captain of his own ship.  Given the racial attitudes of the time, I'm not 100% sure how plausible that is, but this is where rule of drama and character development override historical accuracy.

Sometimes I'll lampshade something that's historically inaccurate, such as a character using a particular type of sword that's no longer in fashion simply because the character finds it an effective weapon to fight with.  (I'd assigned him this particular weapon before I knew it was out of style by the time the book takes place, and rather than change the weapon, I came up with a justification for why he uses it.)

The story is what matters, in the end, and some people aren't going to expect 100% historical accuracy in a novel (and a number of people won't even know if you're being historically accurate or not).  However, it depends what you're changing and how drastic it is - you don't want to look like you either made a mistake or didn't bother doing your research. Also, very often, history is interesting enough that it pays to be accurate.

As for your own example, I think you're making the right call by creating a new kidnapping rather than moving the year of an established kidnapping.

--edited by Ian Nathaniel Cohen on 6/25/2013, 7:57 AM--

Personally, I always feel very, very self-conscious when I write historical fiction--as if one day, a very informed reader is going to sit down and fact-check my work and then give me a report on all the things I got wrong.  It makes me wary of changing any dates around.   A reader really has to trust you in order to make the time commitment to reading and thinking about your book; I feel like you really risk losing your credibility--and the authority of your narrative voice--if you start changing around the facts, especially if those facts are well known (such as start and end dates for wars, dates with a lot of significance that people remember very well).  For this reason I definitely think Alexandria was right to create an attempted kidnapping rather than try to shoehorn recorded history into her story. 

That said, I also feel that a lot of fun things can happen in a story when historical events are played with--I love those novels with big "What if this had played out differently in history" scenarios.

And I can say that, as a reader who loves "novelizations" of historical events, I don't actually mind at all when authors take a lot of creative license with historical accuracy.  I am thinking of writers like Philippa Gregory, Tracy Chevallier, even Joyce Carol Oates--I've been happy to read their version of how they imagine things happened, and no, I don't go fact-check them after finishing their books!

One problem I have, because I can get so nitpicky with myself about making sure my fiction is backed up by historical research, is finding a way to bring it in without that research sticking out as really "researchy."  Sometimes you're so proud of all the research you've done, your fiction starts reading like a middle-school social studies report!  I find I always have to dial it back to so that the second and third drafts are more subtle.

I believe in authenticity in historical fiction: personae, events, dates, geographies, nomenclatures, outcomes... all these should be faithful to the accepted truth. As fiction writers, one should limit our imagination to weave into tales the many blanks of the past, providing credible stories for plausible situations, and in these use our creativity to entertain our readers in a manner that will not distort proven history itself. Otherwise, it should be categorized as plain fiction or literary fiction...

As a reader, I'm pretty forgiving. As long as you tell a good story and put enough authenticity to convince me--or fool me!--that you've done a reasonable amount of homework, I'll let stuff slide.

The problem is, every writer and reader of historical fiction has their own standard! Some people are far less willing to give writers the benefit of the doubt, and they'll go searching for anachronisms. Sometimes, they'll even question things that are, in fact, accurate!

For example, in my YA historical mystery, set in Victorian England, a couple of my beta readers had a long back-and-forth about whether a character would use the word "dense" as a synonym for "dumb." It turns out that particular use of "dense" had, indeed, been in use for centuries by that point. But even so, that was a scary moment for me! I began to realize how many readers would be looking at my book with skepticism, questioning the authenticity even of things I'd done my homework on!

I don't think most audiences are like this, though. I'm comforted by the recent success of the television show Downton Abbey. I've heard that the dialogue and the way the characters behave is extremely anachronistic and inaccurate. But no one seems to care! All that matters is the show tells a good story, it gets the big details right, and it creates an atmosphere that allows you to imagine yourself into that historical period.

--edited by theyounger on 7/29/2013, 1:09 PM--

I  just came across an amusing quote that made me think of this thread, and I had to share:

“There’s a saying in historical fiction: You can make a lot of stuff up, but Lincoln has to be tall.” -- David Stewart

@Ian--you are posting great stuff today (per usual, I am learning . I want to tweet this out, too!

Love it!

Lucy

Does Historical Fiction have to reflect an era of the past?

If a writer decides to write about the history of a period in the future, how does one judge the authenticity of the events he depicts?  I'd imagine readers will compare their future expectations with those in the novel.  If something pops out as grossly improbable, the writer is writing fantasy.  If the events make sense, readers will likely accept the "history" as having taken place.

I don't write Historical Fiction. I write Historically-flavored Fiction, fantasy, in fact. I am very comfortable deciding which situations to adhere to and which to twist out of shape. The only thing that I have to get right, my plot hinges on it, is the timeline leading up to the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots. Everything else I feel entitled to mess with, and I do.

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I do do an extreme amount of research to get the details right for a few pages of nonsense. 

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I guess that the point I most debate with myself about is whether Robert Dudley would have been able to lure Elizabeth to Kenilworth Castle in 1585 for a grand entertainment, similar to one which had actually taken place ten years before. (Anyone got an opinion on that?) I've made it that he tweaked her pride: had the fun-loving monarch grown too old for a marathon frolic? At that point Dudley was no longer her favorite, and she was hunkered down in her own properties due to the many attempts on her life. I think that John Dee will have to have a say in it, with Walsingham pulling the strings. Hmmm . . . that might work. Back to the history books. 

--edited by Mimi Speike on 10/19/2013, 8:16 PM--

@Mimi--do you read Philippa Gregory's books at all? They are a guilty pleasure of mine.

I ask because almost everything I know about Elizabeth I and Mary, Queen of Scots (NTM Henry VIII and his six wives!) comes from Gregory's highly readable novels. They aren't fantasy, and, in fact, they are quite well-researched, with each book concluding with a long bibliography of historical references, but I admire Gregory's willingness to create plot and story arcs inspired by the historical record, without worrying too much about how easily refuted her imaginings could be by academic historians.

You might check those books out (THE VIRGIN QUEEN, THE OTHER QUEEN)--they'll give you "permission" to follow your imagination wherever it will please your WIP!!

Happy writing!

Lucy

@John--your post made me think of the book THE PASSAGE, by Justin Cronin. It's a dark vampire/post-apocalyptic saga. The point of telling is far, far in the future, and the book is relating the story of "the passage" from the not-so-distant future to the more-distant future. Cronin does an incredible job selling the "history"as it happened in the book. It's an amazing novel, and I am about to start reading its sequel, THE TWELVE.

Basically, what it seems like Cronin did was he figured out a timeline of events, the same way you would if you were writing the past. Then he subtly laced those details into the narration, the way you would when you need to give the reader information but you're trying to avoided the dreaded infodump. But it definitely seems to have taken careful planning--really making a lot of decisions about what happened in his made up future, and then making sure that he sticks to the accuracy of his own story.

Thank you RC, you've made me a bit more comfortable. In such cases I tend to lean heavily on psychology, and I often restrict certain behaviors to the planning stage; it almost happened, but the stunt fell through. 

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Lucy, I  don't know if I've read Philippa Gregory. I'll look to see if I have anything by her here among my thousands of books. I have read Carolly Erickson, and I am not a fan of her fiction. Not that it's not well written, but it's certainly not the least bit literary, which is what I expected. It's damn bland, compared to her superlative biographies. Frankly, I find her prose style uninspired. And it lacks the deluge of fascinating itty-bitty detail that I so admire in her non-fiction, which made her name. 

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Now she's going for the bucks, on the basis of her scholarly reputation. There's nothing wrong with that. But I miss the marvelous intricacy, I wish there was some of that in her popular fiction.

--edited by Mimi Speike on 10/20/2013, 9:36 PM--