Hilary Mantel and Women in Historical Fiction

[Montero]

@Steve Harrison.
To clarify - if something is marketed as historical fiction I would expect it to be well researched and period accurate, allowing for the insertion of non-existent people who are the characters of the story.
If something is clearly a bodice ripper, then fine - I can see that and not read it as it is not to my taste. Each to their own.

Basically what I object to is stuff which takes liberties with period accuracy and is in some way pretending it doesn't - whether the marketing blurb, the cover or whatever. And "its fiction" or "we have to please the modern reader" doesn't begin to be an excuse. I read historical fiction in part to immerse myself in an as accurate as it can be historical experience.

 

[Dave]

My history professor from last year, who is an Social History professor at Oxford has been busy virtually waving his arms at Hilary Mantel on Twitter. He actually called her views "Horseshit" and suggested that she read a little more widely. There were oppressive structures in the past but there were certainly feisty women, and there are bookshelves full of academic work about female agency and negotiation. There are plenty of original documents, reports from criminal trials for example, that you can easily read yourself, where the female character is anything but demur and subservient.

However, I disagree with some of the comments above about Historical Fiction. You aren't writing an academic paper. You are writing fiction. You shouldn't read fiction to get an accurate historical experience. Even if you did want it to be historically as accurate as possible, you will never succeed in getting it correct, because there will always be disagreement on the history, even between historians. These historical fiction books will also often change dates and timelines of events, just to make a better story. That is surely allowed in fiction? There was another thread here about women being trained in combat where I tried to point out how unlikely that would actually be because of the oppressive structures. A list of examples of women was given to counter what I had said, but those examples are the exceptions. There will always be exceptions and we know about them precisely because they are unusual. There will also be exceptional households where roles were reversed and the man was a cuckold. I would draw my own line at some other different things, anachronistic technology for instance.

 

[Wruter]

For my own part, having written a novel about a woman in the Georgian period, all I can say is that it's something I was aware of and I did my best as a non-historian with the sources I had.

 

[Steve Harrison]

@Montero
Your tastes in reading historical fiction equate to mine

However, I don't expect historical fiction to be accurate. I prefer it to be accurate and I don't like people messing about with it unless they have a plausible reason to fiddle with what I think I know. And I have a number of authors I enjoy and a long list of others I plan to read who will satisfy my requirements.

We're fortunate to live at a time when there are more than enough books for every taste and it's a shame when someone like Mantel tries to impose guidelines on a made-up category like historical fiction. There's already more than enough ambiguity surrounding historical non-fiction!

 

[The Big Peat]

Surely if there's no guidelines, there's no category?

And if there are some guidelines, why shouldn't she express her view as towards where they should be?

Obviously historical fiction is not required to be completely factual; the clue is in the name. But equally it cannot be completely fiction either; again, the clue is in the name. It's a mix of the two.

Personally I'm happy to have some advice on the mix from someone who knows and shame is absolutely not the word I'd use here.

 

[Steve Harrison]

Surely if there's no guidelines, there's no category?

And if there are some guidelines, why shouldn't she express her view as towards where they should be?

Obviously historical fiction is not required to be completely factual; the clue is in the name. But equally it cannot be completely fiction either; again, the clue is in the name. It's a mix of the two.

Personally I'm happy to have some advice on the mix from someone who knows and shame is absolutely not the word I'd use here.

Precisely my (badly worded) point. It's a very broad category called historical fiction - both words clues to the content, as you say - not a narrow category called historical fiction that must be factually accurate.

I realise this thread would struggle to be classed as a storm in a teacup and Mantel has as much right to an opinion as anyone, but it's fun to discuss different views.

 

[Montero]

To be clear, it is less exact historical events, at least at the microscopic level, that I expect, but to get the broad social details and technological details right. All doom, gloom and wifebeating is no more accurate than everyone empowered and enlightened.
I greatly enjoy Lindsey Davis's books - and she does comment on her research and how there was an archaeological study carried out after she wrote her first Falco book that meant her description of lead casting was wrong. Fair enough.
@Dave, regarding the women in combat thread, where we crossed swords - as well as examples of real individuals posted by various people, I did also post a link to the Scythians, where about 1/3 of the women were warriors - as proved by archaeological studies.

 

[Montero]

Further to previous - as was I think commented on in the women in combat thread, novels are in general more about the exceptions to daily life than the daily grind. Heck, Pride and Prejudice is about a girl with no dowry getting to marry a rich guy - it did occasionally happen, but not often. It is also notable how the misbehaviour of Elizabeth Bennett's younger sister Kitty was whitewashed - social consequences.
For an example of an OTT real-life Regency romance, see the Gunning Sisters Elizabeth Gunning, 1st Baroness Hamilton of Hameldon - Wikipedia

 

[Brian G Turner]

I suspect we're moving away from the point raised in the opening post, which was less about the necessity of observing everyday details of the past, as much as trying to be respectfully true of the people in those periods.

While some degree of artistic licence is to be expected - and sometimes beneficial - too many modern values could make an historical fiction seem overly anachronistic.

There's also the sad point that history - being written by the rich, for the rich - has underlined that only the rich have ever been of importance. This is something I do not see challenged enough in either HF or even fantasy.

While the lives of some political figures can be a wonder to explore, they usually neither represent nor are typical of their times.

Additionally, too much reading of political history gives rise to the illusion - rarely challenged - that only those with links to the nobility can be important.

This commonly comes up in fantasy, where:

- heroes must have some hidden noble lineage, because ordinary people cannot be respected for succeeding on their own merits without a bloodline to justify it,
- a prince or princess must have their birthright restored, because the ability to have power and influence over people is necessarily seen as hereditary
- material wealth and power is seen something that should be aspired to to justify an individual's existence - and once gained, comes with neither costs nor responsibilities.

IMO more writers especially should challenge their assumptions about class. They run very much in parallel with any other social considerations such as race, sex, and gender.

@The Bluestocking - my apologies if it felt like I was broadsiding you, that wasn't my intention. I have a huge rant about social class issues coming at some point.

 

[Montero]

I suspect we're moving away from the point raised in the opening post, which was less about the necessity of observing everyday details of the past, as much as trying to be respectfully true of the people in those periods.

While some degree of artistic licence is to be expected - and sometimes beneficial - too many modern values could make an historical fiction seem overly anachronistic..

I rather thought I was saying that........ SOCIAL details....

There's also the sad point that history - being written by the rich, for the rich - has underlined that only the rich have ever been of importance. This is something I do not see challenged enough in either HF or even fantasy.

While the lives of some political figures can be a wonder to explore, they usually neither represent nor are typical of their times.

Additionally, too much reading of political history gives rise to the illusion - rarely challenged - that only those with links to the nobility can be important.

This commonly comes up in fantasy, where:

- heroes must have some hidden noble lineage, because ordinary people cannot be respected for succeeding on their own merits without a bloodline to justify it,
- a prince or princess must have their birthright restored, because the ability to have power and influence over people is necessarily seen as hereditary
- material wealth and power is seen something that should be aspired to to justify an individual's existence - and once gained, comes with neither costs nor responsibilities.

IMO more writers especially should challenge their assumptions about class. They run very much in parallel with any other social considerations such as race, sex, and gender.
.

Yes. Juliet McKenna springs to mind as one of those challenge the assumption. Barbara Hambly - very few of her main characters are of noble birth, and where one is, in the Darwath series she finished living a very practical life with no real court whatsoever.

And there is some political history that counters the general nobility assumptions - Putney debates at the end of the English Civil war where members of the Parliamentary army tried to produce a blue print for the future, the annoyance of the French that Henry V got peasant longbowmen to fire on the noble knights.....

I think a lot of the problem is not that some fantasy writers read too much political history, but that some fantasy writers read a lot of other fantasy and start writing with a subconscious pre-built world which they don't think through fully and they don't read history directly. Not that I can directly say that I know how their books came about - but some of the books do read like that.

 

[Montero]

Further to previous - my mind ran on - what is really needed is joined up thinking. Technology fuels social change - faster and cheaper modes of transport and communication changes society. It used to be the done thing if you moved to a new area to arrive with letters of introduction - you knew someone, who knew someone etc. Effectively proved your character and social level - long since died out with people moving around so much more.
Industrial revolution changed everything - jobs people did, where they lived, how much they could buy - machine produced cloth being a lot cheaper than hand woven.

Not that people didn't move around in the Medieval period - look at all the pilgrims - but many of them were reasonably well-to-do to be able to afford to leave their business while travelling. Or had nothing at all to leave.

So yes, indirectly agreeing with you again Brian - writers should read more broadly than upper class political history. But I do think the underlying importance of economics and technology is not necessarily noticed by all writers setting stories in earlier periods.

 

[Brian G Turner]

I rather thought I was saying that

I was simply trying to avoid another thread on How historical do you want your historical fic? - I wasn't pointing fingers at individuals.

challenge the assumption

It's something I like about Abercrombie and Gemmell as well. Neither author treats noble birth as a prerequisite to greatness.

In terms of historical fiction, Ken Follet's Pillars of the Earth and World Without End are both primarily about ordinary people living everyday lives.

I do think the underlying importance of economics and technology is not necessarily noticed by all writers setting stories in earlier periods.

That is a seriously interesting point. It's something a lot of fantasy avoids by being technologically static, while economics is left as a background detail that somehow attends to itself.

 

[Dave]

I suspect we're moving away from the point raised in the opening post, which was less about the necessity of observing everyday details of the past, as much as trying to be respectfully true of the people in those periods.

Not at all. Hillary Mantel was discussing Social History in her lecture. There is a whole discipline of Social History, which she seems to have neither read nor understands.

I was simply trying to avoid another thread on How historical do you want your historical fic? - I wasn't pointing fingers at individuals.

Sorry, I hadn't read that other thread here, so I wasn't aware it had covered the same topic. Don't worry that @Montero and I are about to fall out. I hadn't actually realised that his was the reply I mentioned in the Combat thread, but I realise now that our views on the subject are much closer than I had earlier thought, if not actually the same.

 

[The Big Peat]

Additionally, too much reading of political history gives rise to the illusion - rarely challenged - that only those with links to the nobility can be important.

This commonly comes up in fantasy, where:

- heroes must have some hidden noble lineage, because ordinary people cannot be respected for succeeding on their own merits without a bloodline to justify it,
- a prince or princess must have their birthright restored, because the ability to have power and influence over people is necessarily seen as hereditary
- material wealth and power is seen something that should be aspired to to justify an individual's existence - and once gained, comes with neither costs nor responsibilities.

IMO more writers especially should challenge their assumptions about class. They run very much in parallel with any other social considerations such as race, sex, and gender.

I'm guessing that 95% of the authors that do the first two aren't doing it because of their reading of history, but rather of myth and folklore where it's very common - Oedipus, Paris, Pryderi, Sir Gareth (who I now think might have been one of the models for Eddings' Garion, not that Eddings ever said that) and on and on.

As for the third - I'm curious - any books in particular you're thinking of here?