Seeing the Past In Time Travel Novels

If you don’t follow my “A Merry Heart” blog (check out today's post--very exciting), you might not know that I’m taking a MOOC class (massive open online course) on historical fiction. It’s called “Plagues, Witches, and War.” And it’s great.

So many topics the professor has discussed have got me thinking about how they apply to my Screwing Up Time series and other historical fiction I write. One of the topics the professor discussed was the diachronic elements of historical fiction, i.e., the fact that in historical novels at least two historical times are at play, the time that the novel is set in and the time in which the author lives and writes.

One of the interesting things about time travel fiction is that it’s very honest in its diachronic elements. For example, when Mark time travels, you know he’s seeing the past through the eyes of a modern person. So as a reader, you know he’s seeing things just like you would if you were there.

In other historical fiction, that’s not as clear. The characters are all in the past. But, you’re still getting a modern reading of the past. It’s just not as clear that that’s case. Neither is “better.” They’re just different. And, as an author who writes both kinds of historical fiction, I love being able to show our modern prejudices (many of which I share, *swallows uncomfortably*) through Henry. And I love being able to show Miranda’s perspective, which, don’t forget, is my idea of how a Medieval girl would view modernity and the ancient past.

Without droning on too long, my view of historical fiction (which many may disagree with) is that it shows that no matter how strange the past is (and I LOVE the strangeness), people and human nature aren’t really that different. Or, in my favorite quote from our readings thus far, speaking of the benefits of historical fiction, “…Much more profound is the realization that history is not primarily about the past. It is about human nature. What makes it historical is that it examines human nature through the prism of a different age.” ~Ian Mortimer.

Writing Historical Fiction, Setting

A while back I wrote a post about historical fiction and using details from your research to craft your plot. But what do you do when you need historical information and you can’t find it?

I faced this question many times for Screwing Up Babylon. For example, I needed information about the palace in Babylon. But I haven’t been able to find much information on the palace except that it was enormous (600 rooms) and extremely impressive. There are some photos on the web of the palace, except those are photos of Saddam Hussein’s rebuilding of the palace. And his attention to historical accuracy is doubtful. After all, he built his own palace in the shape of a ziggurat over Babylonian ruins. And, honestly, though Saddam’s rebuild is big, it’s kind of ugly and plain—just clay bricks that are already crumbling due to poor manufacture. My readers won’t be impressed. And the real Babylonian kings…well, let’s just say you don’t give the rulers of the known world shoddy workmanship.

So I had a few options. I could go with ugly. But I didn’t think that was fair. Particularly since the Ishtar Gate is amazing (no, the gate didn’t make it into the book), and I’ve no doubt that the Babylonian kings would have made their palace more impressive than a city gate.

Another option was to consider real possibilities and let my imagination run within those parameters. For example, Babylonians often used panels for decoration. So the palace I created has those panels. And I decorated them with aurochs and other creatures from Babylonian mythology.

The Babylonians traded all over the known world. So if an item existed within the Babylonians trading sphere at the time the story is set, then I assumed the item was fair game. For example, Tyre, Sidon, and the Egyptians all made beautiful colored glass, which means the Babylonians would have had access to it. So colored glass makes an appearance in the decoration of the palace.

Armed with historical information and imagination, I created a palace that I think my readers will like. And a palace that the king of Babylon would recognize—or at least one, that might make the king say, “We need to hire her to redecorate the palace.”