Lost in Words
Sorry about lack of blog posts lately. I'm in middle of writing a Romancing the Blog column, which is due to go live tomorrow. I read a few threads and blog posts about their general view of historical accuracy, which was interesting. What surprises me is my own reaction. Upon reading those comments, I felt so defeated that I think I finally gave up. It's a tired old topic that has been rehashed over and over for years. I think I've been worn down to the point where I say, "Aw, fuck it. Say what you want, I don't care. I just won't justify the existence of historical romances any more." Life is too short to correct same old misconceptions again and again and again, and to explain again and again and again why I dislike seeing the same old b.s. gets recycled within historical romances over and over, distorting the history of the UK to the point where some readers have this weird perspective of this country. "The heroine wouldn't do that! She has to be accompanied by her chaperone! Everybody knows that." "I can't imagine her as a professional journalist. Women didn't have this kind of job during 19th century! Everybody knows that!" "Everybody knows medieval-era women didn't own their own properties". *headwall* Wrong, wrong, wrong. It's the same old bloody song, and I'm sick of hearing it. I did tell myself that there is a new wave of readers every year, learning something new, so I'm being a grumpy little old cow. In back of my mind, I knew I should go with the flow, share what I know and move on, but this time, it feels personal and I take it personally and definitely too seriously. I think I'm in PMS mode because this doesn't normally annoy me. This topic crops up almost every month, so why I'm edgy this time round when I hadn't been before? Having had a quick thought about this, I think I finally lost patience with the genre's notorious sloppy attitude toward history, especially this country's. I think I feel those who say they don't care about historical accuracy when they read British-setting historical romances are really taking the piss out of this country. I was frustrated seeing posters sprouting opinions that are based on their incorrect assumptions and misconceptions about this country's history, especially those who say they excelled in their school class and/or trivia contest because they learned everything they needed to know about history from historical romance novels. It's quite frustrating, really. I don't even know if I gauged my reaction correctly because I don't understand my reaction considering the fact that I do understand where all these readers and authors are coming from, but my current feeling is 'Who cares? You don't give a crap, anyway, so why should I care any more?' I think my toleration and sense of fairness are failing me today. It's just not worth it, hence my zipped mouth and my new vow to stay the fuck away from that sort of thing. :D OK, then, I think I'll get the RTB column done in a couple of hours and when I do, I will be back later today on a, hopefully, cheerier note. :D Until then, cheers. Be good, be bad & be safe.
posted by lost at 9/09/2005 04:16:00 pm
13 Comments:
We all have a limited amount of energy to expend so why waste it on things that make us that frustrated? That's not to say that anyone should just disappear but sometimes we just have to shift our focus to save our sanity. Being involved in "communities" on the Internet is not that much different than real life in that respect.
Personally, for the most part I stopped getting involved in topical discussions about romance novels several years ago even though I do sometimes regress. The thing is that it wasn't so much the frustration level that got to me finally as the sheer repetitive nature of how often the same discussions came up. After a while it just gets plain old boring. Combine THAT with the frustration and it really can be a bummer.
But you know what, once I made that decision I discovered something really fascinating - there's ALWAYS a NEW book out there to talk about. :-D
So hang in there, Maili, and don't think you're alone.
9/09/2005 05:10:00 pm
We need to blame authors for these mistakes and the perpetuation of these misconceptions and authors need to help correct them. If an author includes a professional woman journalist in 19th century England then they need to point out that this is in fact correct.
I love historical notes in the back of books. I hate to admit it, but if they're back there I read them first. Susan Johnson used to include footnotes with addtional info in the back of her historicals--loved that.
For years I obsessed about historical accuracy to the point of going to the library to check facts (pathetic, I know). This was one of the reasons I read historicals set in other countries, I wouldn't recognize mistakes unless they were painfully glaring.
In recent months I've started reading American historicals again and am enjoying them. As long as the dialogue feels realistic and the facts and locations are close to accurate I'm happy.
Tara
PS When I was posting to Kristie's blog yesterday I was thinking of you and almost added a comment about Scotsmen and kilts.
9/09/2005 05:18:00 pm
Tara Marie brings up a very good point. Science fiction, fantasy and sometimes even mysteries use all kinds of notes, list and general glossaries but romances almost never do. Why is that?
And before I really do regress big time here (G) I'll mention a minor pet peeve related to this topic. I wish it was a mandatory thing that romances had to start with a date. How in the world can I, who admit to a almost complete lack of any recognition of what is and what isn't historically accurate in most cases, supposed to figure it out when I sometimes don't even know when a story to supposed to be set?
You know medieval covers a lot of centuries . . . and things did change even between those.
9/09/2005 05:55:00 pm
I just wanted to let you know that the many things that you have spoke about in your posts have been beneficial to me.
For example, when I first started reading historical romance I didn't take these books as fact and quite frankly still don't.
I took a British social history class in university but I believe we were looking at the classes in a different way. For example, we were taught that poorer people slept in the same house as their livestock because they were as valuable to them as their own lives. Then there were the little things we learned about how one could tell someones rank by where they sat in the relation to the salt.
These things I don't see in historicals but, I think it was when I read about this White's place one time too often that it struck me that it might actaully exist. So, yes. I would like to see historical accuracy in many of the books I read except I draw the line at knowing when the potato was discoverd. Hey, I just don't know so that isn't going to phase me. (Although I should have known because we also discussed diet)
I guess the flip side is do you want to read historically acurate romance set in Southern US where there were slaves. For me, it would be a hard read but as long as the heroine and hero could remain heroic then I would have no problem with reading a book set in this time.
Anyways, I am sorry that the discussions on historical accuracy have got you down. Take a breather because there is room for all of us and there are writers out there who will write your style of book.
CindyS
9/10/2005 07:09:00 am
Maili
Perhaps this would be a constructive exercise (though I'll understand completely if you're so fed up with the subject, you don't care to pursue it).
Can you make me a short list of perhaps five historical romances which you felt were historically accurate or particularly well researched?
(I'll even let you cheat and go outside the genre, to historical fiction, if you care to. Because, in my thirst for well-written reading matter with historical settings, that's frankly what I've been doing.)
That would be helpful to me for my own reading and would give me a "gold standard" to measure other works by.
9/10/2005 04:41:00 pm
Hey, *I* care! *g* You (and some others) pointed out an historical inaccuracy in my first book (it actually had to do with class anc country issues--I'd been reading more lower-middle-class British and country/farming British and rural American books when I wrote that one, so it was wrong for the people I was writing about but right for others from other classes/place, ack!), and now I'm never going to make it again. And I like to fly in the face of, "Well, you know THAT would never happen..." stories, too. :-P
So some of us care and are listening! And, BTW, I'm glad you liked the book after you got into it. *g* I was afraid you'd missed the ever-so-slightly tongue-in-cheek intro and taken my gentle play off the sex bargain genre too seriously!
--Lydia (Joyce)
9/11/2005 02:57:00 am
Hell, I REALLY care. I care so much that I just didn't want to write historical romances anymore because all the effort I put into researching every aspect of my stories would be deemed useless by the TPTB. I am v. confused on this issue--romance readers boast about their adoration for historical fiction by the likes of Tracy Chevalier, Philippa Gregory, Elizabeth Chadwick, Dorothy Dunnett,etc, but bring up historical innacuracy in a historical romance and you'll hear "I don't want a history lesson" or "it's supposed to be a romance, the history doesn't make the story better". ARG!!! The history is supposed to have an impact on the story otherwise it's...gasp...the 21st century(well, romanceland 21st C)! Okay...I'm calm...*g*
9/11/2005 09:41:00 am
Beverly - good points. I think you're right - it's the repetitive nature that got to me, rather than the actual topic itself. Thanks for your insight, which does help a lot. :>
Tara - Ooh, I'm not too sure about the blame game, but you do have many good points. Hm, I will address your comments in a blog post tomorrow [otherwise it'd take up a lot of space here :D].
Beverly - yes, I sometimes wondered about that. Another point to address. Thanks for that.
CindyS - I guess the flip side is do you want to read historically accurate romance set in Southern US where there were slaves Well, readers and authors seem to have no problem with historical romances set in England where there were underpaid servants who worked around the clock for titled heroes and heroines.
These servants rarely see their families, and they rarely had time off for themselves and when they did, it was taken out of their already pathetic salaries. Unlucky ones worked in mansions where they sometimes were seriously mistreated or raped by their employers or employers' sons and guests. Not only that, if they were dismissed from their employment, they oft cannot get another job in the domestic service because they didn't have character references, which usually means a) they end up living in poverty or b) move to another county with a new identity, but this means moving away from their families that they rarely saw anyway.
Oh, I forgot. With British historical romances, servants are either invisible or heroine's best friends. That makes it all right, then. :D
Don't get me wrong, I don't expect authors to include these servants because if it doesn't serve the story, then I feel that they shouldn't bother to acknowledge their existence. It's fine by me. Jane Austen didn't really acknowledge serious social problems in her novels, so why should romance authors? :>
Sherryfair - lol! I am indeed fed up with the topic, but ask me again next week, you can bet I'll come back with excitement. :D No, I won't cheat by going outside the genre. I think it would be unfair of me, so I'll have a think and write up a list of five romance novels that I feel convey their time periods well. Thanks. :)
Lynda - "Well, you know THAT would never happen..." Ah, but my idea of 'would never happen' tends to differ from the others. I promise I'll write a blog post to clarify my whine and my definition of 'historical accuracy'. :D Your last bit baffled me, I admit. I don't believe I have read your book. Could you be confusing me with someone else? :)
Sienna - hello! Actually, you do have a very good point, which I'll address in my blog post. It's an issue that bothers me sometimes, so thanks for bringing it up.
9/11/2005 03:19:00 pm
LYDIA, not Lynda! :-P And, yep, you read it, and you used to visit my blog regularly before I pulled my disappearing act. You also posted on the AAR boards about it.
Actually, I blogged in response to one of your historical accuracy rants about...oh, six months ago. I agreed with most, but one--a "that would never happen!"--I did disagree with. You didn't think nobles would/could marry nobodies when it happened with a fair degree of frequency--there was even an opera singer/whore during the Victorian era who was first a countess and then a duchess when her first husband died! Now, SHE wasn't full accepted in some circles, but her husbands suffered no social repercussions.
On the other hand, if a peer's daughter married a nobody, she was cast out from polite society completely...
Now, I've read a few historical romances that try to be history lessons, and those are terribly tiresome (and often badly inaccurate in details of social history). Writing a good story and pedantry are two entirely different things, though!
9/11/2005 11:46:00 pm
Lydia - sorry, sorry *blushes*. OK, you're scaring me now. I honestly don't remember reading your book. I have read your other book, the one you wrote years ago, but that one? It's a complete blank on my mind. I probably did read it but forgot, which is even more embarrassing [and quite insulting for you, I'd imagine]. Sorrrreeee!!
You didn't think nobles would/could marry nobodies when it happened with a fair degree of frequency--there was even an opera singer/whore during the Victorian era who was first a countess and then a duchess when her first husband died! Now, SHE wasn't full accepted in some circles, but her husbands suffered no social repercussions.
You misunderstood me then and you misunderstand me now, but I strongly feel that the fault of causing this misunderstanding lies with me for not clarifying.
I'm well aware that members of the nobility in the past married "commoners", even those with dodgy reputations. Jesus, a couple of our kings married their non-noble-born mistresses who already gave them children. I'll try to explain what I meant later, I promise with my hand on my heart. :)
Now, I've read a few historical romances that try to be history lessons, and those are terribly tiresome (and often badly inaccurate in details of social history). Writing a good story and pedantry are two entirely different things, though!
I agree with you. 100%. Goddamnit, I need to finish that blog post. Hm, it should be up by this Tuesday.
9/12/2005 12:01:00 am
P.S. I wanted to say this a couple of posts back: Welcome back. You've been missed. :)
9/12/2005 12:07:00 am
*laughs* Well, I don't know what you meant by the book I wrote years ago! My very first *published* one was The Veil of Night. Unless you were my critique parter or something like that and I'm such a ditz I've forgotten! And I THINK you read it because you said on AAR that you liked it except for one mistake that confused you.
Oh, well!
Maybe you meant marry nobodies with absolute casualness and no repercussions? (nag, nag, nagnagnag) ;-) Or that every single woman in an author's society sometimes seems to have a Cinderella story? (That's a danger that I have to look out for--events that seem emminently reasonable on their own might become silly if too much of the society I create begins to take on this atypical pattern. Most of my hero/heroine couples are from the same social standing, though, and many have known at least OF each other for a long time, which adds some credulity to the numerous stories of wild passion...)
Thanks for the welcome back! I had a great summer away from the computer. Now I'm back to hanging around the blogoshpere with a cocktail in my hand.
--Lydia
9/12/2005 05:24:00 pm
I'm totally the accuracy police when it comes to historical romances which is why I don't read them that much. I just got so frustrated. I've thrown way too many books across the room when I've come across something that should easily be checked at the library. I admire Eloisa James for correcting the mistakes in her first historical romance. I abhor romances set in Britain where the heroes all names that no upperclass Englishman would have had, and where all the characters sound modern and American.
9/22/2005 02:28:00 am
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