Writing Historical Fiction - Do you get paralyzed by the details?

Laurie said:

I've got two stories going on now, one a novel and the other a short.
But I am finding myself so afraid of making a historical mistake that I've become paralyzed.

How do others deal with the details?

Do you read volumes beforehand, become so familiar with the times you could live it, teach courses on the period?

Do you focus on the story and fit the people into the times?

What's your method?

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I usually read two volumes beforehand, and that's it. I find two good books on the time period in question, read them front to back, inserting numerous bookmarks as I read.

Then I start writing. If I come to a place where I need more research, I jot down a not at that point and continue writing. When the novel is done, I go back and fill in the missing research.

I also remember that it's only a mistake if I put something in that isn't factual. If I leave something out, it's usually fine.

Laurie said:

Do you read volumes beforehand, become so familiar with the times you could live it, teach courses on the period?

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That was my plan, but it's left me utterly paralysized. The more you know, the more you know you don't know!

When I approach a historical (next project, I think), I'm vowed to put in no more period detail than one would find in modern chicklit. What really matters is getting the mentality right.

Laurie, I know exactly what you are talking about. It's hard not to get mired down in the details when they are so interesting. I think James' comment really has merit. There is a point where you've got to draw the line with just how deep you go. I've found that I get more done by working details into something I've written rather than trying to write around the details. I'm into my first attempt at historical fiction. It sure is fun, but it is a lot more work!

Quite often what I do is, if I don't know the term for something, or the specific date for an event, I'll just type in XXXX for the noun or the date. Later, when I'm finished and need to do the detailed research, I'll use WORD's search and replace function, typing in 'xxxx' and i'm taken to the first item I need to go and find a correct name/date/value for.

Obviously this only works for fine detail....you do need to have a fair overview of the historical period to, as you say, have an understanding of the attitudes.

One thing to remember is that background research is just that--background. The most important part of your story is the story itself, development of interesting characters and putting them in unusual and interesting circumstances. Do thorough, but non-exhaustive background research, and then just let the story fly. You can rely on your beta readers to catch any too-modern parts. To me, the easiest place to slip up is in dialogue. It's also the easiest to fix. Get the story down with the research you've done. Once you've progressed to the next draft, you can agonize about the subtle historical details. I bet you'll find it isn't an overwhelming problem.

I did tons of research on Vikings, and medieval life and castles, and the like.


Then I realized that my story couldn't take place in the real past because I wanted to create events, such as a coup de'tat, a murder of a king, the accension of a cousin to the throne, all the while the King's daughter was in exile accused of her father's murder only to finally return leading an army of Vikings.

Since those events never even vaguely took place (that I know of), I made it a simple fantasy "loosely" based on reality. All the research I did did help though.

I write stories based contemporary history. Early on, I made friends with the Director of the historical Society for the city of which I was researching. I interviewed her when I had my outline complete to authenticate several pieces of information. At their research museum there were tons of resources for me to sift through. Also, you will find that the people involved with the historical Societies are happy to in verbal forms of the interested eras. Were I writing about other periods of time, I would find a local club or society (it seems every subject has one) and interview important back-stories with them. I find that they are thrilled to show off their knowledge.

If anyone is interested in the mid-to-late 1800s, a good way to get a view of the scientific enterprise (and thus a window to the times) try consulting archives of three multidisciplinary journals:

Nature (UK) - first issue in 1869

Science (US) - first issue in 1880, I believe

Scientific American (US) - oldest continuously published magazine in the US - first issue 1848.


Consulting these journals will give much more than science, particularly Scientific American. I believe all three have advertisements, letters to the editors, commentary articles, and tons of other interesting stuff. If you want to find out about the technological status of the times, these are good places to look.

Contemporary subject writing would be about those things which we see or utilize today. The computer in front of us is a good example. We either have the latest and greatest computer or a recent generation of them since today’s Internet is not friendly with older, slower, memory and chip challenged machines.

Meanwhile ENIAC, the first functional albeit primitive digital computer, is part of the history leading up to the science and research intrinsic to the result of today.

Contemporary history would be the chain of important unbroken events that follows the story from a basic beginning to the end chapter.

I think.

I think you need some research-oriented road trips. That's what I keep telling my husband about some short vacations and museum trips I'd like to make but so far, it's a tough sell!

I'm interested in the Jacksonian era and Civil War era which seems pretty accessible. Museums, historic sites, family history, reading web-sites and going to re-enactments all help fire up the imagination. That makes it easier (for me at least) to write on and not get stuck.

Good luck!

Ann

NeuroFizz said:

One thing to remember is that background research is just that--background. The most important part of your story is the story itself, development of interesting characters and putting them in unusual and interesting circumstances. Do thorough, but non-exhaustive background research, and then just let the story fly. You can rely on your beta readers to catch any too-modern parts. To me, the easiest place to slip up is in dialogue. It's also the easiest to fix. Get the story down with the research yo'uve done. Once you've progressed to the next draft, you can agonize about the subtle historical details. I bet you'll find it isn't an overwhelming problem.

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I do not retell important bits of history but interweave a story about fictional characters into a historical setting or events. The problem with this is that the events important enough to be well-known have a tendency to subvert the fictional events, so I have to be careful not to let them take over my story.

I am of the opinion that history is written by the winners and therefore might be almost as fictional as what I write. You can't argue with artifacts but the written word is less reliable. If you get the artifacts right, at least that part of your story will ring with authenticity.

Language, values, and understanding of the world they live in are also tricky things to write. If you are too authentic, modern readers may not be able to relate to your characters, but if they are too modern-seeming, your story suffers. I try to cast my characters into a believable mindset for the time and make it clear that this is not so much a reflection of their individuality as the way most people thought. For instance, in the seventeenth century, people were very superstious and class conscious by law. I do not deal much with superstition, but class barriers are important to my story. A different story could have had a different balance. Even more important, in fact an essential theme, is religious conformity. I could not downplay this and make any kind of true picture of the times.

Laurie said:

How do others deal with the details?

Do you read volumes beforehand, become so familiar with the times you could live it, teach courses on the period?

Do you focus on the story and fit the people into the times?

What's your method?

Click to expand...

To me, the history is every bit as the story. But I don't want my research to interfere with the writing process. So before I typed a word, I spent months doing research on what people did, wore, ate, said, thought, etc., until I got to a point where I could write confidently, without thinking about it or needing to go back into my notes. So now I can just write without having to worry about the historical details. I also do something similar to what some others have mentioned, in that I'll mark things that I need to double-check later in brackets within my text. It doesn't stop my flow of writing, but sets my mind at ease, as accuracy is very important to me. However I do stop writing to do more research if the answer to the question is something that could impact the story. Just recently I had a question about steamboat travel, and I couldn't just go and fill in the details later, as the route that my characters took and the length of their trip had an impact on some of the scenes that I was writing. It was a pain to step away from my writing to do the extra research, but those scenes are much more vivid now and the story is more solid with the facts behind it.

I thought that doing so much research beforehand was also helpful in that it gave me ideas. I'd read about some of the odd or interesting things that people did and I would get ideas for certain scenes. Even just reading about the commonplace things that seem to come up over and over again give me ideas about things that really should turn up somewhere in the story.

I think that reading a few primary sources (diaries, letters, etc.) from the period that you're writing about really helps. Not only do they give a good picture of the everyday life of that period, but they also let you know how people from that time perceived things. I think that diaries and letters really help to humanize a period in history the way that a textbook and scholarly work just can't do, and I find this helpful for a writer who has to present human characters who are more than just figures in history. Just reading scholarly works, it's easy to forget that these people farted, cried, got jealous and had bellyaches in addition to starting revolutions or whatever.

I use the JamesRitchie method now.

My first novel I spent 5 years in research, read over 40 books on the subject, some out-of-print material that cost me mucho deniro in used bookstores and even visited Germany to examine the castles, museums and curators in the area, and historical texts first hand to be as sinfully accurate as possible.
:the result?
Most of my submittals were returned with the standard form back but one editor took the time to pencil in the sidelines and tell me that my research was flawed, and German this and that wasn't this or that and such and such. Basically went against the grain of what I'd spent years working on...
:my conclusion?
Braveheart was a bestseller. And is full of so many historical, and time-period flaws that I wonder how some of it slipped by into print. I'm convinced its the story that sold. And is probably what most of these editors are looking for.

A.REX said:

I use the JamesRitchie method now.


Braveheart was a bestseller. And is full of so many historical, and time-period flaws that I wonder how some of it slipped by into print. I'm convinced its the story that sold. And is probably what most of these editors are looking for.

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I like historical accuracy in a novel, but history doesn't sell novels, story and characters sell novels. You could write that George Washington was really a woman in disguise, that we actually lost the Revolutionary War, and that most most of the soldiers at Valley Forge spent their nights in a Holiday Inn, and if the story and characters are good enough, the novel will sell.

Agents and editors alike are looking for a story and characters that will enteratin readers enough to make them give up some of their hard-earned money.

I usually try to be historically accurate, but historical accuracy is not what sells novel.

Historical fiction.

May I suggest for everyone in your pickle, Laurie, that whilst everyone agrees that you should just write it does hamper one so not being sure of those little details.

First you need some pictures of the people and places in your time period.
Museums, history societies, children's books and the internet may provide you with some. Surround your writing place with visual reminders so you know if your heroine can really run fast in those shoes or skirts or on that street of cobbles.

Go and haunt a good children's library and look at the history books. Children aren't supposed to know anything so you get answers there. I had to hunt for a children's book until I had a good picture of a 17thC tinder box. If you can immerse yourself in children's books with pictures it will help. Keep thinking what would it smell/taste/look/sound like to be there.

There's a BBC series now on DVD - Tales from the Green Valley - where 5 'practical archeologists' lived for a year in a 1620s farmhouse as if it were 1620. It's serious TV, not infotainment, and just watching that gives you a huge amount of detail, details that span from the Middle Ages right up to the early 19thC because what you wore, ate, and had to do on a farm and in the garden and in the house didn't really change radically until the early 20thC. (Yes, that is stretching it and generalising but for Laurie and others new to historical writing it's a fair generalisation.)

What helped me early on writing historicals was to ask myself this simple question - If there's no ...? about everything. And write down the answers as they would affect my main characters.
E.g.
If there's no supermarket how do people get their bread, beer, meat?
If there's no town water supply how do people get water?
If there's no electricity how do people get light or heat?
If there's no petrol or cars how do people travel?
If there's no telephone how do people get to hear things?
If there's no TV and radio how do people learn things?
If there's no doctor how do people heal themselves?
If there's ...
And so on until you feel you know enough to write.
Then concentrate on the characters and their relationships in the story.

If you are going to write historicals you have to read widely absolutely everything from popular novels set in the same period you're writing in, children's history books, adult history books and University texts and collections of letters and diaries.

Do you know http://www.pikle.demon.co.uk/diaryjunction/ where some kind soul has linked many original dairies, letters, geological and university theses using diaries and letters so that you can access the sites and read the originals?

You'll never know enough no matter how much history you study but you will absorb enough to imagine the feel of the clothes and the smell and the weight of them and a little of how your characters might think and react. Then you can write more easily always acknowledging that you will make mistakes and that someone will gleefully correct them for you.

Right now just go for it but do use the XXXX system so that you can go back and fill in the details as you acquire them. It is a question of confidence and having some of that writer's arrogance!
Good luck
pdr

P.S. Many readers of historical fiction want historical accuracy and say so loudly. They like the little details and the main facts to be correct. However you can give an explanation of why you deviated from the known facts and if you've written well enough you can carry those readers.

PastMidnight said:

Just recently I had a question about steamboat travel, and I couldn't just go and fill in the details later, as the route that my characters took and the length of their trip had an impact on some of the scenes that I was writing. It was a pain to step away from my writing to do the extra research, but those scenes are much more vivid now and the story is more solid with the facts behind it.

.

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I had the same probolem, only with a cross country horseback ride. But why step away from the writing? I think it took a matter of half an hour or so to answer the problem. Steamboat travel is just as easy to research. Probably easier, since there are numerous records of steamship travel.

The only real problem I have with your method is that the moment you rest easy and think you know enough to write without worry, errors creep in by the dozen.

I'm not sure I've ever read an historical novel wherein I didn't spot at least a couple of errors, and the more history and detail put into a novel, the more errors I usually spot.

Which is not to say research isn't important. It is. But too much research can be worse than no research. When a writer researches something to death, there's the tendency to want to put too much of it into the novel, and research is just for background. When the bakground moves to the fore, the novel stops working.

pdr said:

Many readers of historical fiction want historical accuracy and say so loudly. They like the little details and the main facts to be correct. However you can give an explanation of why you deviated from the known facts and if you've written well enough you can carry those readers.

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There seems to be two main camps of historical fiction readers (and writers). Those who value historical accuracy and detail above all and those who don't mind if the history is deviated from for the sake of a good story. I'm with PDR and in the first camp, which is probably why I do more research. It bothers me to read a book that tampers with history to fit the story, but I know that there are plenty of readers who don't mind this and actually prefer it. I will adjust my story to fit in with what really happened in that time period. The way I see it, a story can be changed, but history is static.

But I don't think that either method is correct. I see plenty of published novels written both ways and there is obviously an audience for both types of novel.

Jamesaritchie said:

But too much research can be worse than no research. When a writer researches something to death, there's the tendency to want to put too much of it into the novel, and research is just for background. When the bakground moves to the fore, the novel stops working.

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You're right about this being a danger. It's hard to come across a fascinating fact and not include it in the writing (unless there truly is a need for it). I don't see these extraneous facts in published novels often, but when I do, it is pretty obvious. But, honestly, it doesn't bother me. I find it funny, as it is obvious that the writer read something cool and couldn't resist sharing it, and I'm usually just as drawn in as the author was.

Jamesaritchie said:

I had the same probolem, only with a cross country horseback ride. But why step away from the writing? I think it took a matter of half an hour or so to answer the problem. Steamboat travel is just as easy to research. Probably easier, since there are numerous records of steamship travel.

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Yes, it was easy to find info about steamboat travel, but the problem was a little more difficult than that. The route that my characters took was very important, and it took a little more digging to piece together a route for them that was open at that time. And then timing was important down to the day, so I had to figure out how many days the trip would take them. It wasn't a straight steamboat travel, and they had to take a train part of the way and a stage part of the way as well. I'm sure that many people are shaking their heads and thinking that it is unnecessary, but it was important to me.

Laurie said:

Yep, I’m an old Conservation Major and worked in Natural Resources.

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Farmer here ... all that sounded nicely familiar.

Ann

I was convinced that to write a historical novel, I had to read every single book ever published on the subject. You soon get overwhelmed with the details, because there really ARE so many of them, and most of them should just be relegated to background information. On the ms I am shopping around right now, I read everything I could find on the battle of Culloden in Scotland. I spent WEEKS reading up on it and jotting down notes.

And in the end, it turned out that all I used was the fact that it was a rainy morning in April and that the battle lasted about half an hour. The rest of those two pages were all about the characters, and how they were wounded, and how they snuck off into the fog to escape British soldiers.

So now I pretty much used the method described by James and others above. Write what I know, and when I get to a point where I need a particular fact, I either go look it up (if I know the information is nearby and easy to find) or I mark the spot and go back to it later.