Recently I attended a course about writing history in which historical fiction was discredited as a source of history because of the dangers of historical inaccuracy. I want to write about why I think historical fiction is in fact a very valid source.
Much historical fiction is written for children. I was given the novel Playing Beattie Bow to read in primary school and it made an indelible print inside me. Suddenly I wanted to go to The Rocks in Sydney, to see first-hand the setting of this 19th-century world that had been so richly described in fiction. I never really thought about it as history, it was more a fantasy world of time travel and adventure. But at the same time I was learning.
I finally went to the Rocks last year – inspired by my rereading Playing Beattie Bow, now published in the Popular Penguins series. I had a vision of old cobbled streets full of home-made sweet shops and oil lamps. Needless to say I was somewhat disappointed by the very modern tourist vibe and many unpreserved buildings. But my childhood illusions were set alight by street names I recognised from the book and the existing patches of cobbled roads and restored sandstone buildings. I was still able to transport myself back to a whole century in Australia’s past.
This year I have also been re-reading For the Term of His Natural Life – which I also studied in high school – and which is a fascinating depiction of convict transportation, and a novel by Jackie French covering the Eureka Stockade and life on Australia’s gold fields. Even as an adult these books have taught me much about these eras and I can only imagine the new and interesting worlds that they would open for young students. I make no claim for total historical accuracy. I do believe that at times bias and imagination might consume actual facts. But at the very least students and children will experience vivid portrayals of clothes, speech, landmarks and events in rich, exciting ways that a text book may not provide. The popular time-travel style makes history immediately relevant to young readers by firmly linking the past with the future and playing with ideas that consequences and repercussions of the past can make such massive impacts on the future.
I think historical fiction makes history alive and fun and I would much prefer to see children reading historical fiction than not engaging with history at all.
Hi Susanna. I know what you mean by the Rocks being a let down. I was up in Sydney last week visiting some friends and I went for a walk around the Rocks area. There is still the odd cool cobble stoned path here, and the huge Rock walls everywhere. But it was certainly a bit of a ‘tourist trap’ with a large market happening on the Sunday morning I walked through.