| Contents > Perceiving Reality in Historical Fiction by Kim Wilson |
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Perceiving Reality in Historical Fiction
History’s referents are presumed to be real;
fictions are not.
(Hutcheon 1988, p.119)
PART I: Theorising the perception of reality in historical fiction
Historical fiction poses an ambiguous reality. It is an uncomfortable, problematic way of retelling the past. Its fictive element cannot be denied and yet it is something other than purely creative writing. The tag ‘historical’ lends this type of literature gravitas and an assumed intrinsic reality. Whilst authors often strenuously assert their work is one of fiction they will in the same context offer numerous examples of their adherence to the official historical record. Essential to this discussion on perceiving reality in historical fiction is the concept of truth. Truth is often understood as belonging to the consensus of a group, with the group’s judgement based on the tacit agreement of right and wrong or, of what lies inside and outside boundaries. In this sense it is our communal understanding and our faith in that understanding that causes us to define what is true and what is otherwise. ‘Culture is not natural it is ‘made by us’’ (Hutcheon 1989, p.2) and cultural communities make truth possible. If truth is the property of a community in a particular historical and cultural context then reality becomes relative to the context in which that truth was understood. Historical fiction’s dual claim to reality and fiction, and the seamless fusion of both (McHale, pp.90-91), makes the perception of reality in this genre slippery. At what point does our understanding of a text transform from historical recreation to historical fabrication? To what extent does fabrication in the context of historical fiction invalidate the truth value of the text? These are important questions when thinking about how reality is or can be perceived in accounts of the past that are story bound.
There is a significant degree of similarity between history and historical fiction. Writers of both must reconcile their understanding of truth and how it functions within their text. Will it be dominant and unflinching or subtle and exposed? And in its application, will the truth of the text redefine the understanding of its target? There is similarity also in the purposes of both forms of writing. History’s purpose is not simply mimesis of past events – it is an analysis with the intention of understanding (Zagorin, pp.21-22). History and historical fiction gives the past order (Hutcheon 1988, p. 192) and allows meaning to be ascribed through patterning and explanation. Both allow for the construction of meaning through absent material and both will be understood differently depending on the subject position of the reader. However, the two forms of writing are not, as some post-modernist theorists have argued, interchangeable. Historical fiction is a kind of performative; it constructs the real as absolute but then performs the real as production. Performativity ‘consists in a reiteration of norms which precede, constrain and exceed the performer’ (Butler, p.234). Historical fiction is represented in performance when it takes a real event or person and creates a clearly articulated ‘story’ with beginning, middle and end together with some dramatic tension to keep the reader engaged. ‘In such cases, the role is recognised or understood as already scripted before the performance’ (Stephens, p.5). Historical fiction is in fact constrained by that epithet in its self-definition, ‘fiction’.
PART II: Perceiving reality in fictional accounts of Joan of Arc
Saint Joan of Arc, as many biographers have commented, is the most well known and easily recognised woman from the middle ages. The textual evidence from her Trial and Rehabilitation provide a unique set of documents illuminating the life and crusade of this female prophet, warrior and religious icon. She was an unlikely heroine; born female, a peasant and to parents of some little standing in the village of Domremy. Yet what makes her rise to prominence particularly surprising is her avowed relationship to God. To the clergy of her day Joan’s refusal to perceive the ‘clerics as intermediaries between God and herself’ (Sullivan, p.128) was the most abhorrent aspect of her proclamations. By presenting ‘herself as intermediary between God and [the clergy]’ (Sullivan, p.128), Joan unwittingly challenged the position and more importantly the authority and power of the Church militant 1 .
There is an abundance of biographies, interrogations and fiction concerning the life and historical context of Joan of Arc. The profundity of representation cautions us to be cognisant of the ideological positioning of the chronicler, biographer or story-teller. The first revision of the image of Joan occurred a little more than twenty years after her death. Politically motivated, the Rehabilitation trial cleared Joan of heresy and declared her holy, thus removing the taint of association for Charles VII. From this time onwards Joan’s fame blossomed and her image became firmly entrenched as a symbol of national independence. So much so, that when Voltaire wrote the ‘wickedly funny, racy, [and] bawdy’ poem La Pucelle d’Orléans (Warner, p.239), he provoked vehement hatred towards himself. Voltaire had defiled France itself.
In the 19th and 20th centuries Joan of Arc proved a fruitful protagonist for Children’s Literature. She serves the purposes of this genre of writing very well, providing a character who, engaged in a quest, is asserting her own agency and developing subjectivity. ‘Joan’s story tantalizes us today because of its unexplained passion and conviction’ (Meltzer, p.90). She blurs the boundaries of gender, social class and nationality – it is not without paradox that Joan of Arc is held as a symbol of forging nationhood in England 2 (as well as other Western European countries). However, as an enigmatic historical figure redrawn as a fictional character, the perception of reality in these retold stories is difficult and shadowy. To pursue this line of enquiry I will be examining Nancy Garden’s Dove and Sword (1995), Michael Morpurgo’s Joan of Arc (1998), Edwin Fadiman’s The Feast Day (1973) and the 19th century Joan of Arc (1896) by Maurice Boutet de Monvel.
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| Contents > Perceiving Reality in Historical Fiction by Kim Wilson |