Development - Rules of Writing, Historical Symbols

20 July 2012, Development - Rules of Writing, Historical Symbols

Introduction: I wrote the novel Aksinya: Enchantment and the Daemon. This was my 21st novel and through this blog, I gave you the entire novel in installments that included commentary on the writing. In the commentary, in addition to other general information on writing, I explained, how the novel was constructed, the metaphors and symbols in it, the writing techniques and tricks I used, and the way I built the scenes. You can look back through this blog and read the entire novel beginning with http://www.pilotlion.blogspot.com/2010/10/new-novel-part-3-girl-and-demon.html.

I'm using this novel as an example of how I produce, market, and eventually (we hope) get a novel published. I'll keep you informed along the way.

Today's Blog: To see the steps in the publication process, visit my writing website http://www.ldalford.com/ and select "production schedule," you will be sent to http://www.sisteroflight.com/.

Here are my rules of writing:

1. Don't confuse your readers.
2. Entertain your readers.
3. Ground your readers in the writing.
4. Don't show (or tell) everything.

All language is symbols. Therefore it shouldn't surprise you that your writing should include higher level symbols. What are higher level symbols? I mentioned before the cross as a symbol. The cross is a higher level symbol--a symbol that doesn't depend on language. Symbols can be ready made or author made symbols. Some symbols are a mix.

Yesterday, I wrote about the details of historical writing.  I didn't mention levels and symbols, but I should before we move on to the details of culture.  I wrote that bathrooms and other household facilities were a focus of the history in my novel, Aksinya.  Of course, bathrooms and household facilities was not the only focus of the history in the writing.  I used primary historical sources and information for all the history in the novel and followed my own recommendations for study and writing, but bathrooms and household facilities were a large difference between the historical world in the time of Aksinya and today. 

The bathroom and other household details became the baseline for levels in the writing and for the contrast of today's culture and Aksinya's culture.  How, you might ask?  If you go back a look at Aksinya, one of the key scenes is when she needs to go to the bathroom, which is outside.  She decided not to use the chamber pot because there would be no one to empty it (her family and all the servants were murdered by the Bolsheviks), and she didn't want to have the demon empty her chamber pot--that was too embarrassing a thought for a person from that age.  She has to go to the outhouse for her family's mansion.  If that doesn't show a huge cultural and historical difference, I don't know what does.  Aksinya has an accident (outhouse type) while going to the outhouse building--an accident that the demon becomes directly involved in.  The demon has to take her to the "bathroom" attached to her room and prepare a bath for her.  He has to take care of her soiled clothing etc.  Like her own sexuality, this incident reveals a pattern of actions by the demon that embarrass then help Aksinya.  These actions become part of the process of tempting her. 

Additionally, the outhouse, bathroom, and the bath provide symbols that relate directly to Aksinya's issues and the demon's infiltration into her life.  In the bath provided by the demon, Aksinya sees her reflection in the mirror and recognises the loss of her hair (given as a surety to the demon).  She sees her own ugliness (she thinks she is ugly).  The bath becomes a symbol for her inferiority and insecurity.  There is a bath scene with Natalya and there we see Natalya hiding the evidence of her abuse.  The bath itself becomes a symbol throughout the novel for secrets and the hidden issues of Aksinya, Natalya, and the demon.  It is no accident that Aksinya and Natalya reveal their inmost thoughts in the bedroom and in a bed rather than in the bathroom.  In the bathroom is solitude of sorts and privacy, in the bedroom there is revelation and honesty.  Which we discover later is the unseen turning point of the novel--the bedroom secret tryst between Ernst and Natalya that drives Aksinya over the edge.  The power of symbols that drive levels of storyline, plot, and theme in a historical novel should be the historical points.  Tomorrow, culture. 

There is much more to writing without confusing your readers. I'll write about that tomorrow. The following is a question asked by one of my readers. I'm going to address this over time: Please elaborate on scene, theme, plot, character development in a new novel creation....ie, the framework, the development, order if operation, the level of detail, guidelines, rule of thumb, tricks, traps and techniques. To what extent do you outline the historic context, culture, mannerism, speech, dress and thought process of the main characters, in a historic novel...in order to maintain integrity, and gradually (help) reveal attributes of a character in the story, or otherwise clarify the plot, scene, transition, tension or resolution?

I'll repeat my published novel websites so you can see more examples: http://www.ldalford.com/, and the individual novel websites: http://www.aegyptnovel.com/, http://www.centurionnovel.com/, http://www.thesecondmission.com/, http://www.theendofhonor.com/, http://www.thefoxshonor.com/, and http://www.aseasonofhonor.com/.

Development - Historical Study, more Tertiary

8 May 2012, Development - Historical Study, more Tertiary

Introduction: I wrote the novel Aksinya: Enchantment and the Daemon. This was my 21st novel and through this blog, I gave you the entire novel in installments that included commentary on the writing. In the commentary, in addition to other general information on writing, I explained, how the novel was constructed, the metaphors and symbols in it, the writing techniques and tricks I used, and the way I built the scenes. You can look back through this blog and read the entire novel beginning with http://www.pilotlion.blogspot.com/2010/10/new-novel-part-3-girl-and-demon.html.

I'm using this novel as an example of how I produce, market, and eventually (we hope) get a novel published. I'll keep you informed along the way.

Today's Blog: To see the steps in the publication process, visit my writing website http://www.ldalford.com/ and select "production schedule," you will be sent to http://www.sisteroflight.com/.

I'm writing about sources of historical research and how to make historical research. These apply to any novel or any subject you might wish to study. Here is a list:

1. Primary source documents or artifacts
2. Secondary source documents or artifacts
3. Tertiary source documents or artifacts
4. Quatriary

There is also another type of tertiary historical document.  It is really quatriary (by my definition), that is fiction written during and about the period it describes.  In this way Charles Dickens works can be used for some historical study.  What type, you might ask?  They are valuable to understand the culture and society of the times.  They are not tertiary in that they do not claim to be historical in nature, but you can gain understanding about the culture and times of the novels. 

Historical fiction does not really enter the picture--at best historical fiction is tertiary.  At worst it is opinion.  Opinion is another type of document that does not reach the degree of tertiary.  If would fall in my "quatriary" degree.

So, if you wanted to begin a study of Victorian England to write your historical fiction novel, you would first get all the first person accounts that you could about the times.  Diaries, autobiographies, other accounts of daily life are the primary source documents you must start with.  After you have a grounding in these, you can move on to the secondary degree documents.  You should read newspaper accounts and official biographies as well as secondary accounts of people's lives.  Only then, if you don't have enough information should you look for history books on the Victorian era.  All the history books in the world won't tell you anything you need to study about the Victorian era--they are all tertiary sources.  However, you should read the literature from that period.  First, it is a primary source artifact.  Second, it has cultural information you might not get from a primary source document.  Third, such writing will give you a feel for the times.
I'll explain more about historical study tomorrow.

I'll explain more about tension and first scene development. I'll talk about characteristics that make a bad first scene/chapter eventually.

I'll repeat my published novel websites so you can see more examples: http://www.ldalford.com/, and the individual novel websites: http://www.aegyptnovel.com/, http://www.centurionnovel.com/, http://www.thesecondmission.com/, http://www.theendofhonor.com/, http://www.thefoxshonor.com/, and http://www.aseasonofhonor.com/.

Development - more Historical Study

4 May 2012, Development - more Historical Study

Introduction: I wrote the novel Aksinya: Enchantment and the Daemon. This was my 21st novel and through this blog, I gave you the entire novel in installments that included commentary on the writing. In the commentary, in addition to other general information on writing, I explained, how the novel was constructed, the metaphors and symbols in it, the writing techniques and tricks I used, and the way I built the scenes. You can look back through this blog and read the entire novel beginning with http://www.pilotlion.blogspot.com/2010/10/new-novel-part-3-girl-and-demon.html.

I'm using this novel as an example of how I produce, market, and eventually (we hope) get a novel published. I'll keep you informed along the way.

Today's Blog: To see the steps in the publication process, visit my writing website http://www.ldalford.com/ and select "production schedule," you will be sent to http://www.sisteroflight.com/.

I'm writing about sources of historical research and how to make historical research. These apply to any novel or any subject you might wish to study. Here is a list:

1. Primary source documents or artifacts
2. Secondary source documents or artifacts
3. Tertiary source documents of artifacts

I looked at primary source documents yesterday--I'll get more in depth about them later.  Today, I want to define secondary source documents.

A secondary source document is the direct report of an eyewitness account from someone who was not an eyewitness.  In a legal court this is called hearsay evidence.  In history, secondary sources are some of our best sources.  Generally, they are documents like these:

1.  Newspaper accounts
2.  Official biographies (written from interviews of a person)
3.  Interviews
4.  Reports on actual events post the event (part of such a report can be considered primary)
5.  Court reports
6.  A painting or sculpture made from an actual person or place

A secondary document or artifact is never considered more accurate than any primary document or artifact.

All secondary accounts are considered interpretive.  Since they are not the actual eyewitness to the event they may or may not accurately portray the event, but like I mentioned, sometimes secondary evidence is the best we have in history.  For example, before photography (which is a primary source, unless reenacted), painting and sculpture was about the only visual witness we had to history.

I will use secondary sources when primary sources don't exist, but they are always considered less accurate and less reliable than any primary source.

I'll write more about this and the study of history, tomorrow.

I'll explain more about tension and first scene development. I'll talk about characteristics that make a bad first scene/chapter eventually.

I'll repeat my published novel websites so you can see more examples: http://www.ldalford.com/, and the individual novel websites: http://www.aegyptnovel.com/, http://www.centurionnovel.com/, http://www.thesecondmission.com/, http://www.theendofhonor.com/, http://www.thefoxshonor.com/, and http://www.aseasonofhonor.com/.

Publication - Problems Writing History

27 January 2012, Publication - Problems Writing History

Introduction: I realized that I need to introduce this blog a little. I wrote the novel Aksinya: Enchantment and the Daemon. The working title was Daemon, and this was my 21st novel. Over the last year, I gave you the entire novel in installments that included commentary on the writing. In the commentary, in addition to other general information on writing, I explained, how the novel was constructed, the metaphors and symbols in it, the writing techniques and tricks I used, and the way I built the scenes. You can look back through this blog and read the entire novel.

I'm using this novel as an example of how I produce, market, and eventually (we hope) get a novel published. I'll keep you informed along the way.

Today's Blog: To see the steps in the publication process, go to my writing website http://www.ldalford.com/ and select "production schedule," you will be sent to http://www.sisteroflight.com/.

Here is the list of ideas for advertising--there are more and I'll add to the list as we go along.  I'm certainly not an expert in all these, but I've dabbled in all of them.  I'll try to relate my experience and the degree of that experience to you.

1.  Have a website for your novel.
2.  Write a blog.
3.  Advertise.
4.  Literary awards.
5.  Book cards.
6.  Contests.
7.  Interviews.
8.  Blog tours.
9.  Press releases.
10.  Speaking and teaching.
11.  e-mailing.
12.  Gifts.
13.  Book signings.
14.  Book trailers
15.  ...

It isn't just history that gets kicked to the curb with many so called writers of historical fiction.  I personally don't mind people messing with details that would be unrecorded or unimportant in history, but get the details right about the things we do know.  If you aren't a historian, you will (or should) ask--how do I get the details to be accurate?  The answer is to study, study, study--the correct material.  You should then ask--what is the correct material?  the answer has been the same since Moses and Herodotus--primary source documents.  If you base and develop your historical fiction on anything other than primary source documents, you are not writing historical fiction--you are simply writing fiction in a semi-historical setting.

The first rule is focus your studies on primary source documents.  The second is, don't read anything into the history.  That is, don't assume any modern conventions in the historical accounts.  Go look at how people lived and what they did--don't assume they lived like they do now or did 100 years ago (unless your time period is 100 years ago).  As I mentioned yesterday, in the ancient world, people did not have furniture like chairs or tables.  If they had tables, they were for reclining, very similar to a low table from Japan.  There were no tables to hide under.  Beds were on the ground and bedrooms were for families.  Modesty is a modern invention, as is underwear and personal hygiene.  If you start with the idea that the world is very different than what you understand, you can begin to learn about it, if you don't, you won't write historical fiction.

I'll write about science fiction and expertise tomorrow.

I'll repeat my published novel websites so you can see more examples: http://www.ldalford.com/, and the individual novel websites: http://www.aegyptnovel.com/, http://www.centurionnovel.com/, http://www.thesecondmission.com/, http://www.theendofhonor.com/, http://www.thefoxshonor.com/, and http://www.aseasonofhonor.com/.

Writing Historical Fiction, part 12 Conclusions (for now)

I decided that it is time to conclude this series about writing historical fiction and turn to writing science fiction.  I do write in both genres.  I hope you discovered that all fiction writing requires immersion in the world you are writing about.  Historical fiction isn't as much a special genre of fiction as much as it is a special discipline of fiction.  The author must be disciplined enough to become steeped in the culture and history of the times he writes about, and he must be able to communicate that past world to his readers.  Further, the author must not compromise the ideas and cultures of the past to make feel-good with modern mores.  When an author does this due to lack of discipline or knowledge, then he aren't writing historical fiction anymore.  Plus, it is kind of stupid to write about the past with the blinders of the present.  Such writing cannot stand the test of time and such writing can't enlighten the next generation that really wishes to know what the world was like.  Such writing is like an Oliver Stone movie--a docudrama about a time that never was and never could be.

So my five personal rules of writing I have articulated thus far:  
1. Don't confuse your readers.

2. Entertain your readers.
3. Ground your readers in the writing.
4. Don't show (or tell) everything.
5. Immerse yourself in the world of your writing - colliery: immerse your readers in the world of your writing.
The fifth "rule" was my main concern in these twelve short articles.  This rule is pertinent to all writing.  It is critical to historical fiction, but in historical fiction, the "world" must reflect some strong degree of reality.  What I want to do next is move to the next obvious point--about worlds that reflect little reality to the past or the modern world.  The how to of science fiction.  We will expand on this concept of immersion there.

Writing Historical Fiction, part 11 more Examples

Applicable to all writing, I offer my five basic rules again, and I will show you some examples of how to immerse your readers in your writing.
1. Don't confuse your readers.

2. Entertain your readers.
3. Ground your readers in the writing.
4. Don't show (or tell) everything.
5. Immerse yourself in the world of your writing - colliery: immerse your readers in the world of your writing.
If you noticed, I added a colliery.  The point here and the point of the question I answered yesterday was, how do you immerse your readers in a completely different world than their own.  I have a foot up because one of my day jobs is to teach people, and in those classes, I try to get them to experience the cultures we are talking about.  Writing however is very different than technical writing or teaching.  You can't immerse your readers by suddenly giving them a treatise on a culture or history.  So I'll provide some examples from my writing.

The first example is description from the novel Aegypt, http://www.aegyptnovel.com/:
"Paul signaled his men to remount. His horse, l’Orage, was skittish and danced back a step as Paul hauled his aching frame into the saddle. Her muscles rippled like silk under her black coat, and Paul touched her gently to soothe her. l’Orage had been his steed for nearly three years, almost half the time he had been in Tunisia.

He had bought her from a Berber’s market on the coast. She was the most beautiful horse he had ever seen. Feral and full of fire, she was uncontrollable in the hands of her merchant owners and stood blindfolded and hobbled in the market horse pen. A demon in the guise of a horse, she was black as charcoal without a trace of lighter markings. Paul knew she was stolen the minute his eyes lit upon her.

He paid in cash—francs, and few of those, because of her temperament. When he entered the pen to claim her, Berbers, Arabs, and Tunisians lined the enclosure to watch the black fiend trample the foolish Lieutenant. Paul walked quietly up to her, and when the laughing merchant stripped off the blindfold and hobbles, Paul spoke a single word. l’Orage calmed immediately and let him stroke her face.

Contemptuously, he led her on a light field-lead out of the marketsquare. The marketplace had turned into a frenzy of babbling men, women, and children. The native peoples sidled out of Paul’s way as if he were himself a demon from the pit. At the edge of the market, to the amazement of the spectators, Paul leapt upon l’Orage bareback and rode off at a gallop. He laughed all the way back to the garrison.

l’Orage was a horse trained for war. She was an Arabian, bred and drilled to the battlefield. She was trained to kill and to the tactics of combat. She was a European’s horse. Paul could tell by her carriage and by the saddle scars on her flanks. Only one type of European warrior had found his way into the wilds of Tunisia: l’Orage had to be a Frenchman’s horse. Paul guessed that, but his confirmation came when he first stood before her, wondering himself if she would strike him before he could speak. His single word was French, and with that single word, he knew she answered to only one tongue—French. Not to the Tunisian or Berber or Arabic her previous masters unsuccessfully tried, only to French. In combat after combat, she proved herself to be, by far, one of the finest horses in the Legion stables."

Right from the beginning of the novel, you have a very short description of how Lt. Bolang bought his horse l'Orage.  The description itself tells you a lot about the times, place, and people.  It gives you a small window into Lt. Bolang and tells you about the languages and the problem of language in Tunisia.  It lets you know the feeling of the people for the Foreign Legion and the fact that horses are still used in warfare at this time and in this place.  This is a method of using description to immerse the reader into the times and place and to let them taste the culture and society.  By the way, l'Orage means tempest or thunderstorm in French and the description takes place right after a thunderstorm in the desert and a tempest-like attack on Tunisian bandits.

Now an example of using conversation to immerse your reader in the times and place.  This is from Centurion, http://www.centurionnovel.com/.

“Where are you from, youngster?” Portius asked Abenadar.

“I came from Natzeret in the Galil.”
“From Natzeret?” said Euodus. “Is the Primus now accepting trash from the provinces?” Euodus was as fancy a man as Abenadar had ever seen. His short hair was carefully shaped to form oiled ringlets in the style of a Persian warrior. His face was angular but well made. He wore a colorful tunic with pins and decorations all over it.
“No, I’m a Roman citizen,” answered Abenadar.
Euodus smiled. “Another bastard child of Rome. You are well placed in this century. We are all bastards of one type or another.”
Portius laughed out loud, but Lupus protested, “I, for one, have a family in Italia.”
“Yes, but does your family claim you?” riposted Euodus.
“They will welcome me back when I am released from service.”
“If your throat is not cut first by these rebels, you may see Italia again.”
Lupus rubbed his throat and made a face. “I wish you wouldn’t put it like that, Euobus.”
“Don’t get carried away, Lupus,” said Portius. “The people fear us.”
“Yes, they fear our blood will splatter their clothing when they slit our throats.”
“Shut up, Euobus,” said Portius. “Come, Abenadar. Don’t listen to his rambling. It is meaningless. As long as we stay together, we are in little danger, and we’re always safe while in camp.”
Without waiting for Abenadar, Portius walked out the door. Abenadar quickly followed behind him. As Portius exited the barracks, Abenadar hurried to catch up. “The camp is huge. How many legions does it hold?”
Portius chuckled. “It doesn’t hold even one.”
Abenadar was shocked.
Portius noted Abenadar’s look and laughed again. “That’s right. This camp holds only two cohorts: the I Cohort, Primus and the X Cohort, Decimus—the first and the last in the III Gallica. Admittedly, the Primus Cohort is the largest and best, but the Decimus isn’t a training cohort. It isn’t made up of inexperienced recruits.” Portius glanced at Abenadar. “You excepted. You will get along well if you can translate in the marketplace, especially if you can speak with the barmaids and whores. I predict you will be a very popular man in the Decimus Cohort.”
“How many men are in our cohort?” asked Abenadar.
“During your training, you will learn how the legion is organized, but I guess I can start your education early. The Decimus Cohort is formed of six centuries. They are called the Pilus Prior, the Pilus Posterior, the Princeps Prior, the Princeps Posterior, the Hastatus Prior, and the Hastatus Posterior. We are part of the Hastatus Posterior, the Lion Century. Each century contains about 80 men. The men are organized into 10 columns of eight each. All the other cohorts from the second to the tenth are put together the same way, but the Primus Cohort is different.”
Here you can see in conversation, I give you many details about the place, times, people, and the Roman Legion.  In conversation, Portius goes on to give Abenadar a host of information about the Legions that the reader likely doesn't know and that Abenadar doesn't know.  The character and the reader both learn from the experience and the tones and conversation tells you a lot about the fears of the Roman soldiers and their concerns.
 
Tomorrow, I'll conclude this series on writing Historical Fiction and move to science fiction.

Writing Historical Fiction, part 10 Practicum

One of the readers of this blog asked these questions after reading the previous posts.  He kindly allowed me to quote him and answer the questions here.  I think this will be very helpful.  I will give my answers in italics to set them off.

"Enjoyed your 'Zen of Writing'; particularly the (5) rules thus far. Curious, how many primary sources, and how strictly do you adhere to primary source docs, when developing story outline & details? Almost exclusively where they exist.  For example, my yet unpublished Civil War/Civil Rights novel Antebellum http://www.antebellumnovel.com/, is almost completely based in letters and correspondence from two periods 1860 to 1865 and 1965.  I supplemented it with personal accounts of soldiers from the 1860s.  Only to get the locations and the architecture right did I use modern information and other tertiary source documents.  The elements of the secondary source documents are very strong in the novel as well.  I actually wove them into the storyline.  And, how much 'knowledge' do you a......ssume your audience has, when you're trying to provide sufficient historic context, events, culture,etc, to help bring out both the historic, cultural & descriptive authenticity (& consistency) in your writing? I actually assume my readers know nothing about the period, culture, and times.  I think this is obvious in Centurion http://www.centurionnovel.com/ where I lead the reader just as I lead Abenadar into the knowledge of the Legions.  In that book, I had a convenient means to introduce the readers--the main character was learning along with them.  Plus, the contrast between Abenadar's culture and the culture of the Romans made both easy to convey--it gave a reason to explain them.  In spite of this, many times only the details of a culture are shown, but when they are important, they are explained--they are necessary to be explained so you don't confuse your readers (one of the rules).


I explained much of this above, but I will answer in the context of the example below, because I think it is a good one and helpful.  For example, let's say, you're writing a military adventure, in sub-Roman Britain, early fifth century, detailing the Romans leaving Britain. Would you assume, the reader is a student of Roman history, or not?  Not at all. And, if not, how would you go about communicating the historic context, in a subtle but cohesive manner? For example, let's say, your goal is to communicate the following:

1. The Roman Empire legions are leaving Britain because the Romans needed troops to face increasing barbarian attacks on the Rhine and Danubian.  Most likely a conversation between two characters who would be in the know.  I could also use a letter to or from a major character.  Even more exciting a battle scene that transitions to an interrogation of a Roman or a Germanic soldier and results in a letter requesting more troops in Germania.

2. Say, you hint at signs of decay in Roman rule in Britain. And, you're in the forth quarter of 4th century; urban and villa life had grown less intense; decline of military Roman culture, maybe hint at rarity of Roman coins, culture, etc. (minted past 402 AD.  Have the lady of a house or a slave make a comment about the fact the markets won't take Roman coins any more--perhaps part of a scene in the marketplace.  Or show the contempt the Britons have in the marketplace for a Roman slave, children, or lady.

What literary vehicle or scene, would you use, to set up such a story?  That depends on the plot and the theme. Would you choose a high ranking Roman soldier in a Garrison, in formal military correspondence w/ his Superiors in Rome, communicating the state of affairs, the Roman strategy, garrison efforts, difficulty at obtaining supplies, etc; or, avoid giving (broad) historic context, and instead, use private dialogue w/ a peer at the military garrison to (simply) hint at decay in Roman rule, or maybe, private letter back home to wife, to convey the above?  The choice of theme and plot determines specifically these details.  For example, if I was writing about the redemption of the Britons, I would choose a young man who had lost everything to the Romans and wanted to remove them from his land.  The plot might be one where he learns to pity the Romans more than hate them--that would drive the entire plot.  On the other hand, if I wanted the theme to be about the Britons' lack of culture and society, I might pick a Roman and his Briton bride whose lives would contrast as he had to leave her.

And, however you do it, precisely how do you outline, map or track the storyline 'facts' that are being revealed, over various pages of the novel, to confirm you've provided sufficient info, and ensure both historic & storyline consistency?  For the non-historical parts, my prepub readers are critical. Stated another way, what writing tools (spreadsheets, word documents, reader boards, white boards, character or journey maps) might you use, to track how well you are developing or convey (authentic) info to the reader in the most precise, but subtle manner...ie. "immersing yourself in the world you're creating"?  You can see some of the examples of the documents I use in the secret pages for each book on my website http://www.ldalford.com/.  In fact, many of them have pictures and data that I mined for the novels in them and that I hope will be in the final published books.  These aren't comprehensive, but they are what I put up from my base files.  I could put up Megs of data if I were to put up the whole of the info and notes from one novel.  I use four basic files to keep everything straight:
1.  A file of the names, places, descriptions, and basic knowledge from the time.  This includes the characters I made up as well.
2.  A file of in depth knowledge I mined and need for parts of the novel.  Includes quotes and sections of books as well as pictures, maps, and charts.
3.  A file of notes for inconsistencies and issues that need to be addressed in the novel.  Especially those further on.
4.  An outline of the scenes in the novel."

I hope this answers these questions in sufficient detail.  In the next post, I will give some examples from my books.

Writing Historical Fiction, part 8 Into the Present

Well, not quite into the present, but let's move our analysis into the modern period.  As a reader of this blog commented, immersion for more modern eras is both easier and more difficult.  It is more difficult because of the amount of data available.  It is easier because of the amount of data available.  In modern eras, the author must become a data miner and sifter where in the more ancient historical periods, the author is just a data miner.  The good ore from the past is so rare, an author should be familiar with almost all the writing from a period.  The ore is so available from the modern eras, the author must discard everything but the best nuggets.  The question is how do you do that?  I'll use my book Aegypt http://www.aegyptnovel.com/ as an example.  To study the French Foreign Legion and Tunisia in 1926, I found as many French Foreign Legion first person accounts as I could and first person accounts about Tunisia during the period.  There are a few--so the nuggets were available in the ore.  I listened to music from that period and studied French fashion and Tunisian dress and customs.  I found traveler's reports from the times and travel books.  I read old papers and tried to glean as much information about the place and subjects from them.  I had to delve into WWI because the main character of Aegypt, Paul Bolang, participated in that war.  I tried to get broadcasts and decipher the political and culturally important issues of the times.  As I tell my classes, history is like an iceberg, you see the small bit above the water, but 90 percent of it is out of sight.  In a great historical fiction novel, you only see the tip of the author's research, the rest is buried deep within the novel.  If you visit the website for Aegypt http://www.aegyptnovel.com/, you can review the slides for the classes I have taught on the history in the novel.  Through these, you can begin to see the depth of information assumed in the final novel.  Many of the facts and figures I show in the slides is nowhere in the book, because Aegypt is not a history text, it is historical fiction.  To describe all the tailings of research in the novel would just bore the reader--the point is that all the history described in the class slides is apparent in the novel whether it is directly said or not.  The characters, events, and places revolve around the historicity of the novel, and this gives it its historical authenticity.  So, like in your general writing, don't show everything, likewise, in your historical fiction, there is no need for you regurgitate all you learned onto the page.  You only need show your readers what is important to drive the storyline, plot, and theme.  Everything else should come out as a result of your self immersion and therefore your voice of the times and culture.

Writing Historical Fiction, part 7 Into the Past

All right, we are moving into the realm of esoterics.  The question is what is the point of historical fiction?  To answer this question we need to look at the three aspects of a novel: storyline, plot, and theme.  Obviously, the storyline has to convey some degree of adventure or mystery--entertainment, remember entertain your readers.  In a historical fiction novel, the storyline must convey the entertaining aspects of the life or portion of the life of your characters in a way that is entertaining to your readers.  Therefore, the storyline must be steeped in the times.  This is where the true voice of the times and culture come out.  This is where you must be completely true to the historical times and place.  The storyline may be contrived, but not the setting and thinking of your characters.  The historical view is contained within the storyline.  So what about the plot?  The plot is the pattern of events that make up the larger narrative.  In the plot, you must also hold to the basic historical view of the times that is conveyed in the storyline, but there is a larger point in it.  The storyline must be made up of real elements, elements that are not out of place in the times of your novel.  The plot may not stray from historical accuracy, but the pattern of events may not be from history at all.  You might follow a character little known in the history of the world or who is a complete fabrication.  The events of the storyline are real in terms of the past, the plot may deviate, not in history, but in the overall pattern of events, because, ultimately, your theme will hopefully not be the same as any other novel.  In fact, your theme will hopefully be unique to your time and views.  That is the point of the theme and that is the point of a historical novel.  You convey to your readers a theme that is wholly yours and wholly your time, but that is wrapped perfectly in a historical plot and storyline. 

Let's be very clear, your theme cannot be a convenient fiction to get across your personal message.  For example, historical fiction is likely not the best means to get across an anti-religious theme.  To do so would compromise the storyline and plot.  Historical fiction is likely not the best way to get across many modern ideas--they are too foreign to the past.  Many themes have been plumbed a little too much in historical fiction, and some are just trite.  For example, an anti-slavery theme would be great for the 1800s but a little overwrought today.  An anti-patriarchal theme would fit in the early 1900s, but not so much in the 21st century.  A closer novel to today would better convey these themes.  The most powerful themes for historical fiction are comparative themes.  Those that draw comparisons from the past and lure the reader into the past to then spit them back up into the real world with a piece of the golden fleece or a golden apple in their hands.  The greater the differences and the greater the comparisons, the more powerfully the theme can draw and affect your readers.  So, examples...

Dana-ana http://www.goddessnovel.com/ is a historical fiction themed novel in a modern setting--it likely would not count as historical fiction.  It pulls a character from the past into the modern world and allows the readers to see, by comparison, the strengths and weaknesses of the Anglo-Saxon culture.  Especially, the religious fervor of Dana-ana becomes apparent.  The direct comparison is to the view of religion in the modern world.  The difference is the way Dana-ana goes about her experience of life, love, and religion.  The theme is about redemption.

Aegypt http://www.aegyptnovel.com/ is a historical fiction novel in a historical setting--1926.  Its theme asks ultimate questions about what might be true.  It puts up four competing arguments.  First, is truth only in what we believe?  Second, is truth only in what we perceive?  Third, is truth only in what we know?  Fourth, is truth only in what we can understand?  This is the theme, the storyline and the plot are very different because it is not a philosophical treatise, it is a fiction novel.  The point of the novel is to use historical comparisons to bring up and answer these questions in the mind of the reader.

Centurion http://www.centurionnovel.com/ is a historical fiction novel that follows the life of a known historical person, the Centurion who executed Christ.  It posits a very historically based theme about the difference between belief and truth.  The point it asks of the reader is why would the Centurion at the foot of the cross say, "Surely this was the son of God."  This is the theme of the novel.

So in historical fiction, the theme may be historically based, or not.  The storyline and plot must be.

Writing Historical Fiction, part 6 The Voice of the Times and Culture

I'm not certain there is any writing that is easy.  All writing is difficult, but I think historical fiction may be the most difficult.  First, it requires a lot of research and especially primary and secondary source research (real research) that is if you intend to write good historical fiction.  Second, you must immerse yourself in the culture and understand it from the point of a participant.  Third, you have to be able to find the voice of the times and culture.  The voice of the times and culture is the point of immersion and research.  Fourth, you have to be able to write well.  The fourth point is beyond the scope of this series, but is is a critical point.  Many of us have read literature today that is crippled by the inability of the author to write well.  Many popular books are missing the spark of good writing and makes you wonder why they were published to begin with.  But back to the third point...if you can't capture the voice of the times and culture, your historical fiction will not be historical fiction, it will be a modern novel set in a historical period.  That simple observation has been my greatest experience with writing that claims to be historical fiction today.  Most is not historical at all, but rather modern fiction set in a historical period.  When you find modern issues and modern ideas along with historical infidelity in a historical novel, that writer has not taken the three required steps to write about the times.  So how do you find the voice of the times?  That is a function of immersion and knowledge, but the precise point is that you have to subjugate your mind to the mind of the times.  Now comes the difficult point.  To have the voice of the times and culture means the ability to convey that time and culture to your readers in the modern world.  I personally use many genre crossing techniques to allow a modern person to see the times and culture through the eyes of the modern world.  The normal technique in historical fiction is the one from my novel Centurion http://www.centurionnovel.com/.  Centurion uses the typical model of simply a novel from the viewpoint of the people of the times.  There are no tricks and there is no ability or basis for comparison with the modern world.  The novel unfolds as a normal piece of historical fiction writing.  In The Second Mission http://www.thesecondmission.com/, I use time travel as a technique to move the reader into the past.  This method allows the writer to make comparisons and to convey the period through the eyes of a modern person.  It also allows comparisons with a future world or ideas.  This is a complex method and requires the author to be strongly consistent in immersion and research.  If the comparisons aren't there, then their is no purpose in using this technique.  The third method I have used (by no means the last) is using a fantastic means to pull people from the past into the present.  Aegypt http://www.aegyptnovel.com/ takes place in 1926 and pulls a being from the 18th Egyptian dynasty (1539 to 1295 BC) into that place and time.  The comparisons here and the power in the novel is the ability to see the world in the French Foreign Legion in Tunisia in 1926, the period of great archaeological discoveries in Egypt, plus the comparison of the world from the eyes of a person from classical Egypt.  And that ultimately is the power of historical fiction.  It allows the author to present the past as it was and lets the reader see the differences in the times and culture.  Tomorrow, I'll expand on this.

Writing Historical Fiction, part 5 Religion

I've been writing about historical immersion as a means to prepare to write historical fiction.  The major points I've made have been about the tools to get historical information (primary and secondary sources) and getting rid of cultural and social prejudice.  I've been using examples mostly from ancient Greece, and articulated in my book The Second Mission http://www.thesecondmission.com/.  Today, I want to focus on religion.  As with all cultural and social mores, we imagine the world was always the way it is for us today.  We imagine our way of thinking and our ways of doing are the ways everyone lived and existed in the past.  The truth is very far from that.  Even today, people think much differently depending on their culture and society.  One of the most important, if not the most important issue in all cultures is religion.  Religion forms, focuses, and directs a culture.  This is especially true in the ancient world.  In a pagan worldview, which includes both animistic and pantheonic paganism, the culture understands the world and its forces only through the gods.  There is no conception of natural forces or nature.  In animism every thing that has force or life (plants, animals, heavens, clouds, the sea, bodies of water,...) has a god in it.  The god sustains and produces the forces in nature.  The god must be placated lest something bad happen.  So whenever a creature is killed, the god within (or in charge of) the creature must be placated--thus all killing required sacrifice to appease the gods.  With literacy comes pantheonic paganism.  In this form of pagan worldview, the gods take on new meanings and responsibilities, but are still the focus of all the power in the world.  Everything goes from the gods and the cause of all action in the universe is due to the gods.  The new functions of the gods are related to civilization itself: wisdom, writing, music, metallurgy, war, love... With literacy new ideas spring fully armed from the minds of men.  In the Greek worldview, men are fated (pathos) and the gods are fated (chronos), and the fates or both are not pleasant.  The world revolves around the gods and fate.  This is the center of the Greek universe.  It is a universe where no one will make a move without a word from the gods.  It is a world where everyone believes and those who don't, don't live long.  The religion is forced and enforced.  It is not coercive, it is obvious to everyone.  Even the Greek philosophers did not disagree on this most basic view in Greek thought.  They played on the edges of the whys and wherefores, but they did not dispute or disagree with any basic point of the pagan worldview.

Therefore, if you want to understand any culture well enough to write about it, you must begin to understand its view of religion.  You can't hold a people's religious view in contempt.  You can't judge it from within.  You can only look at it within the context of their culture.  It is a foundation and a center point of the entire culture, so you can't ignore it either.  Many modern writers completely ignore the religious views of the culture they write about.  They make their characters like modern thinkers who ignore religion or who parrot some non religious worldview.  Their characters miraculously understand the world from a modern world view based in cause and effect.  They assume that modern ideas infuse especially the thinking men and women of the past.  This is a completely false and foolish idea about the past and about history in general.  Religion drives the world--it especially powers the ancient world.  The modern wars driven by Islam and secular Communism should warn us that the modern world is driven by much more religion than many would like to admit.  In your immersion, you must learn much more than what the people ate (we saw religion played a huge role in Greek food) or what they did (look at the architecture of the Greeks, based on temples and the gods).  You have to learn how they thought and why their thoughts became the reality of their culture.  Only then can you start to understand enough to write about their history.

Writing Historical Fiction, part 4 Historical Immersion

The point I keep trying to make is that to write effective historical fiction, you must immerse yourself in the culture of the times.  I would also advise becoming familiar in some degree with the language and writing, but we'll get to that.  My primary expertise in with classical Greek and Anglo-Saxon languages.  I feel that I have been able to immerse myself well in those cultures at least to the ability to write about them.  Since they are the most familiar to me, I am especially concerned that other writers get those periods right in their writing.  Plus, my best and most powerful examples are from those times.  As I mentioned yesterday, you have to realise your moral or social prejudices must fall to the culture you intend to write about.  That doesn't mean you have to give up you morals or ideas, but you have to be able to subjugate them in order to understand the culture you are studying.  Yesterday, I put up the example of slavery.  Slavery was ubiquitous and considered moral in the ancient world.  In an historical novel, that view must come to your readers.  You have to be able to dispassionately approach subjects like this to give them reality and historical authenticity.  That doesn't mean you have to accept slavery, you just need to understand the culture and its underpinnings.  The same is true of every other subject important to human life and interaction.  One of the most misunderstood areas in ancient cultures is food and eating.  We tend to imagine that people in other cultures and other times ate similarly to us.  A simple trip to a foreign country or to a Japanese restaurant will show you otherwise, but it is more than that.  Most ancient cultures were survival cultures.  Few of the inhabitants ate as many calories as they wanted or needed.  In many cultures people only ate one meal a day, at the most two.  Meat was a commodity that was eaten very rarely.  Meat, in most ancient cultures was only eaten as a result of religious worship--following a sacrifice.  This is true of the Greeks.  They had meat only from sacrifices.  That means the wealthy ate meat perhaps once every other month at a festival or when they provided the sacrifice at a temple.  The temple precincts were next to the marketplace and extra meat was sold in the market.  The cost made it very dear.  Greeks would get most of their protein from fish, a non sacrificial animal, and dairy (cheese).  Can you imagine a world were meat is that precious.  I tell my classes that when momma (actually a slave or the father, momma was in the gynacium--next note) took her children to the market, they cried not for toys but for meat.

About women in Greek society.  I think in The Second Mission http://www.thesecondmission.com/ I gave the proper latitude of freedom to lower middle class women.  Upper class and upper middle class women were kept in a gynacium at home.  They were not allowed out of the gynacium when free men, other than those of their household, were in the house.  A gynacium was an isolated portion of the house.  Women were kept in a gynicium for their protection because in a near lawless culture, wealthy women were prey for many reasons.  In many regards, it is better to be a captive in your own home than to be dead, kidnapped, or raped.  Greek homes were built like miniature fortresses because of the problem of a lack of law or ability to keep laws except through "might makes right."  In spite of this, the social contract of the Greeks kept a relatively lawful society, but there were no police to keep the peace.  Your Demi (loosely, your familial group but of political and tribal dimensions as well) kept the peace and meted out judgement within the Demi.  Already, you should be able to see that the ancient Greeks are nothing like our culture.  They are nothing like the modern Greek culture.  If we decouple the fact that they are so different from our expectations, we may be able to start to understand them.  As you can see with food, religion is intertwined in the Greek culture.  This is true of all cultures in antiquity and many today.  Tomorrow, I'll write about this very important and much misunderstood dynamic of religion and life.

Writing Historical Fiction, part 3 Historical Information

What goes through the mind of a person who does not sit to eat or who doesn't have furniture?  Historical literature generally won't tell you because two things get left out of historical writing--especially ancient writing.  The first is the mundane.  You would be hard pressed to determine the rules of baseball from a movie or book about baseball.  The reason is that the basics of baseball are assumed to be understood within our culture.  The mundane doesn't get written down.  You could point to a book of baseball rules, and there would be your source for some of that information, but not all.  For example, you couldn't gather from a book of baseball rules, the seventh inning stretch or the playing of the national anthem or "Take Me Out to the Ballgame."  In the modern era, much of this data is available from various sources, but in the paucity and the economics of the ancient world, these details are rare.  The second part that gets left out of historical writing is what everyone knows but may be unique.  A great event like a battle or an earth quake or the movement of an army.  These are great events and unique, but they might not be written down because everyone in the time knows about them.  Those events that get written are the ones that were important to the writers and to their audience.  Those that were saved in history are the documents that were important to those who came later.  So you have to do what you can with the information you have.  The big point about writing about time of antiquity is that you have to immerse yourself in the worldview of the people and understand where they were coming from.  This is much harder than it sounds.  The first problem is cultural prejudice and the second is moral prejudice.  Both have to give way to immersion.

For example, almost every culture in the world prior to about 1830 was fully slave based.  This is not a debatable fact.  It is.  The ancient Greeks, Romans, Egyptians, Anglo-Saxons, Norman-French, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese, do I have to list every nation in antiquity?  I could.  They are all slavery based even up as far as 1830.  In fact, the word "slave" comes from the word for Slav, because the Greeks and Romans claimed Slavs made the best slaves.  During the time from antiquity to the 19th century, slavery had gone from the province of the middle class to solely that of the wealthy and then very wealthy.  By the 1860s, in the US, the rate of slave ownership was 8% in the south.  In ancient Greece the ownership of slaves was about 100%.  The point I'm making here is to understand a slave based culture, you have to first of all recognize that it is slave based, and second, you cannot see it through modern cultural blinders.  When you write about the culture, the existence and expectations of slavery must be part of the writing.  Because it is so nominative to the people in the culture, it must seem normative in your historical writing.  Almost no one questioned the existence and ethics of slavery in any culture until the 18th century.  Your writing must acknowledge and report on the existence of slavery just as you might write about eating or sleeping or any other subject within the culture. 

After all, that's the whole idea, to understand the culture like a person from that culture so you can bring out the nuances of the society and times.  If you don't understand, what their lives are like, you can't begin to understand their history or write about them.  Tomorrow, I'll look more deeply at this subject and give more details.

Writing Historical Fiction, part 2 More on Immersion

The basics of immersion.  Immersion, in this context, is placing yourself in the position to understand the culture and times of the people you intend to write about.  I wrote yesterday that the first step is to research and read all the primary and secondary source documents about the time period that you can.  This is when you begin to build your data on the historical period you are studying.  I start a file of the information and add to it over time.  You can see some parts of these files at http://www.ldalford.com/ under the "secrets" pages for my books.  This isn't all the information, but parts of it.  This type of all inclusive research works well for antiquity, but for more modern history, the number of documents becomes overwhelming.  You have to select them carefully.  Past a certain point in the modern era (beyond Gutenberg), I'd recommend using only primary and secondary sources.  When I researched the period of the civil war for a yet unpublished novel http://www.antebellumnovel.com/, I used only primary and secondary source documents (mostly letters and personal accounts).  I limited my research to Southern documents from mostly the area of the events of the novel.  I used pictures and my experience of the area along with period documents and reconstructions.  Because the information is so copious from that time, I had to intentionally limit my studies to the area and people at hand.  This is an important point about your frame of reference.  My frame of reference was the people in a certain town, in a certain place, in a certain time.  The better your can bound the scope of your subjects, the better you can immerse yourself in their lives and the better you can write about them.

Let's look deeper at some very important ways of understanding a culture.  Start with a blank slate.  I implied this yesterday.  Don't start with any preconceived ideas about the culture or the history of the times.  That might blow your theme out of the water, but it is better to get the history right than to work toward an agenda that will not stand up to scrutiny.  Some of the most egregious mistakes I see in historical novels set in antiquity are the obvious historical errors in them.  Some of the worse are a lack of understanding of: furniture, clothing, money, cultural ideas, food, meat, sexuality, general culture, slavery, commerce, religion.  These basics drive a society and culture.  A lack of understanding of them will cripple any historical novel because they define the culture and time and the way people think.  For example, in the West, money was not invented until ca. 600 BC by the Lydians.  It was not ubiquitous in the known world until the Roman empire and even then it was rare in many areas.  If you write a novel in these periods, you have to understand there is no money in general circulation until about 250 BC.  You have to figure out, from history, how people traded and did business without money.  Even after money is available, it is rare, and people still use the older methods of trading without it.  Money, or lack of it, drives the entire culture and ideas of the people.  A book with money in it in the periods mentioned (definitely prior to 600 BC but in varying degrees until much later) is just silly.  Ubiquitous furniture is another example of a lack of understanding about the past.  People did not have furniture, except the very wealthy and royalty, until very late in human history.  People in antiquity in the West, especially the wealthy, lay on their sides to eat and sat on the floor or cushions.  Slaves sat up to eat.  There were few chairs.  Tables were nonexistent or very low and small.  There were few pots or pans or plates and no utensils used for eating.  I'll get into more details about these subjects tomorrow, but you can see how important these details are for understanding about the past and history.