The Importance Of Historical Fiction

Literature is not only important to society, but is very important for each individual to read and understand. Literature can provide a way for people to learn more about what happened in the past and can even be a way for people to reduce stress in their lives. There are many different types of literature and each of them can be used for different reasons. You can use books to study specific topics, to relive the past, and to express yourself through writing. Literature can be written about the past, the future and even about present day society. Even if the book or novel is fiction, it still has some sort of theme that resembles a real world experience or problem. We need literature in our lives to help us develop and improve, not only as individuals, but as a society and to learn about the past.

Recently, I read a story of “A Coyote Columbus Story” by King. The story included history, the discovery of island by Columbus. However, this was written in different point of view, not similar to general history books. He was described as an invader from the other island, rather than a hero who explored the new land. From First nation people’s eyes, Columbus must have been a foreigner who stole everything from their land. His characteristic was told to be rude and disrespectful. Why does it contain different story comparing history books? Why is Columbus described as an invader? I realized story depended on who is writing the story. I started thinking about how history books were written, and furthermore, considered why novels were written.

American History, it has done so much in time that has affected how we live life today and how we interpret things. American Literature reflects that and all it has left us with. Throughout the stories and passages we’ve read this course all of them have left a impact on how and why the writers wrote about what they did. It was all because of American History which later went on and fathered American Literature. American Literature has made society how it is today and painted a vivid picture of how American’s and people live and many of these writers had that in mind when they took these notes.

This will help my writing by encouraging me to incorporate facts where they seamlessly fit in the text, as opposed to placing historical elements in careless, literary locations that create a lackluster reading experience. By continuing to read texts from the historical fiction genre, an aspiring (as well as current) writer can monitor the various ways historical research affects a piece, whether it be in a positive or negative

Characteristics/Genre: Historical fiction is a literary genre in which past events are formulated from genuine, factual history, but the plot of the story and characters are merely fictional. Postcolonial fiction is a literary genre in which appropriation of colonial language thus African is integrated and colonialism subtly attributed. Also, valorization, cultural identity, and racism is often found.

Knowing the historical context of a work is crucial to understanding both its general meaning and its deeper essence. Often times, authors use their works as outlets to freely express their personal feelings toward a social trend or issue. As such, the time in which a story is written can have a strong influence on the message the author is trying to convey to his or her reader. Their personal reflections can be asserted in many ways; among the most common being through the characters themselves and their development throughout the work, the setting, and the implied themes.

This is because the historical fiction does not contain as much detail, the detail it does have may be twisted for the sake of plot, and emotion is not mutually exclusive to fiction. Truth is an elusive thing, and it is far more advisable to search for it in a nonfiction then a

Have you ever wondered why literature refers to history? Well, most literature is taken from prior history. Unless of course it is a fiction story, but even then there are still some historical facts involved in those stories. Literature portrays a lot of history. Without literature we probably would not know how the United States of America came to be, who helped it happen, or when it happened. As a citizen, those are very pertinent facts to know. Some literature that has to do with history would be the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Bill of Rights, Thomas Paine’s “Give Me Liberty” and a whole bunch more.

Human beings have passed on knowledge throughout the ages in stories. There is a reason that more people have probably read the Illiad than straight histories of the Trojan war; we like to have a story to think about as opposed to a fact sheet to memorize. If you can incorporate thought or fun along with facts, it can make the learning process easier. This is something we see and tend to acknowledge more in children though it is truthful for adults as well. Daniel Willingham (2004), a cognitive scientist, points out that research has shown “[p]eople find material presented in a story format more engaging than if it is presented in expository text no matter what the topic” (para. 5). Reporting in a narrative keeps the reader interested and this results in better retention of information we were exposed to. More than likely, each of us could state more of the facts that Thompson pointed out in his story than list cancelled events reported by Litsky and

There are many ways in which an individual can study history, but for most reading a textbook describing events and dates does not give them a clear picture of what life was like for the people of the time. Although, textbook reading can allow an individual to know a lot of facts about historical events, which can be helpful, it lacks the ability to touch the readers emotions and allow them to relate to the people of the time. However, these emotions and comparisons can be elicited through the reading of fictional and nonfictional primary sources. Also, modern textbooks give biased historical accounts based on modern principles, which can change what certain historical events truly meant. Reading primary works of both fiction and nonfiction can help people better understand the past through many avenues.

However, others may believe that using historical fiction is a great way of teaching students. They assume that it can encourage and even motivate students to learn, but it can be misleading, and possibly dangerous. Those in favor of teaching through historical fiction may think that it can take a boring subject and make it more exciting. This may be true, but it discourages the understanding of what actually

I believe that completing historical research is crucial when writing a historical novel. Historical research can give the novel a more accurate representation of the time period, with corresponding problems or benefits of a particular time period. In the novel, The Ash Garden, Sophie was a Jewish refugee who had escaped the war in Austria, and was taken away from her family. As the novel takes us through her journey to freedom, one discovers why she had to escape, “Sophie knew this journey had been forced upon her as a result of the star painted in white on the front of her father’s music shop. He feared the men roaming through the streets, shattering windows, and knocking people down” (Bock, 133).

The genre of historical fiction novels can be subdivided into many categories and often crosses genres, such as historical mysteries and romances. The traditional definition of the historical fiction genre is “fiction set in the past” where the author is writing from research rather than personal experience. This definition leaves a lot of room for interpretation, controversy, and contradiction. Critics in the media, even when they praise individual historical novels in their reviews, somehow manage to turn this praise into criticism of the genre as a whole. In 1950, author Howard Fast, a historical novelist himself, wrote: “This is an era of many historical novels, few of them good and very few indeed which have more than a nodding

Numerous nations have a concrete national school syllabus. However, some do not, such as the United States. Consequently, students enrolled in an English class, within the United States, read a miscellany of texts, which differentiate from school to school. Due to the fact that some nations have a stipulated national school curriculum, those nations enforce that all students read the same texts. This ultimately poses the question whether all students of high school English should be required to read definite texts or books. There should not be specific texts that all students of high school English must read, due to the fact it hinders cultural insight, and literary canon books are beginning to abate.

In "Historical Text as Literary Artifact," Hayden White compares historiography with literature. Historians must rely on a "historical imagination," such as filling in the blanks or making assumptions about events. History is a "constructive" enterprise, and historians are trained to perceive patterns that may or may not have actually existed. If historians rely on the "historical imagination," as they must to complete their task, then historiography and historical literature are qualitatively similar. White admits that the "conflation of mythic and historical consciousness will offend some historians and disturb"¦literary theorists," (1713). Yet these two seemingly distinct disciplines have more points of convergence than is often assumed. The sensitivity surrounding White's claim stems from a common presumption that historiography equals absolute fact, whereas literature equals absolute fiction.