January 2011

Asking what historians think of historical novelists is like asking cows what they think of butchers. Of course they won’t like them. They see brash amateurs, accountable to no standards of scholarship, invading their field and exploiting their body of work.

Historical novels are never written for historians. Is the sportswriter’s history of the game written for the coaches? It is historians who write for historical novelists, among others. Historical novelists’ purposes, you see, differ from historians', though they both start with the same material.

As an amateur historian and lecturer thereon, I am often asked by my juniors, “What was it like to live in America in the 1960s?” and I reply, “There are no books, fiction or nonfiction, that answer that question as well as two historical novels, James Carroll’s Prince of Peace and George R. R. Martin’s The Armageddon Rag .”

I was surprised—and rather disappointed—that neither was mentioned among the favorite historical novels, while many works of inferior historical value and literary quality received fulsome praise.

As one historian precisely stated it, “Too often the savor of drama, the sense of reliving the past, the communicable thrill of a story to tell, is buried under the accretion of data. Yet history is inevitably dramatic. The very word comes from the same root as ‘story'; narration is of the essence.” This appeared nearly four decades ago in your publication, written by Dixon Wecter in his blast of fresh air titled “History and How to Write It.” As an amateur historian, I find that portions of his thoughts still make the hair on my neck stand up in excitement:

“To say also that the chronicle of great events calls for a touch of poetry is not to call down upon us showers of cadenced prose and purple passages, beloved of the swashbucklers and patrioteers. It means that powers of symmetry, proportion, aesthetic design, controlled emotion, even a knack of playfulness, and at high moments a certain unforced eloquence can be summoned into the service of truth.”

Perhaps Thomas Macaulay in 1824 gave us the definitive word on the value of the historical novel. In his essay “On Mitford’s History of Greece” he comments on the inability of writers of history, even one as celebrated as Plutarch, to convey the full essence of an era: “Historians have, almost without exception, confined themselves to the public transactions of states, and have left to the negligent administration of writers of fiction a province at least equally extensive and valuable.”

I subscribe to American Heritage for its historical pieces. I simply don’t care what someone who has done some writing looks upon as his or her “favorite” historical novel. Nor am I impressed by observations on “the power of a historical novel.” Sure, they are easier to write since their authors don’t have to worry too much about attribution. But that is what makes them non-history. Give us the facts. Give us what we have come to expect of American Heritage .

I was pleased to see Faulkner’s work mentioned so often. Reading him inspired my first real appreciation for history, and for the importance of history in understanding life’s deeper problems and mysteries. Faulkner is the chief reason why today I am a history, rather than an English, teacher.

Amazing! Margaret Mitchell romanticizes the concerns of self-absorbed, pro-lavery elitists in Gone With the Wind and gets a page-plus of ink from the “Truth and Fiction experts” and nobody mentions Alex Haley’s Roots !?

Greater clarity of writing: Haley. Greater historical depth: Haley. So? The panel throws in its lot with the myths of treasonous rebels. Frankly, Scarlet, your reputation is a damn sight better off these days than it oughta be.

Inventing sex

The sexual revolution seems a part of the gale that blew through the country in the 1960s, but in fact all its catalysts were in place by the end of the fifties. Like every revolution, it tapped into great historical tides, but also like every revolution, it was the work of individual men and women. And so when David Halberstam came to chart its course in his big new book on the 1950s, he chose to do so through the biographies of some of those who brought it about. We offer a preview.

Ruffian

“There was a miraculous and all-conquering horse,” writes Gene Smith, “a filly, not a colt, who in nine out of ten races broke or equaled speed records that had stood for years and decades.” What made her great destroyed her, and millions saw her brought down at the peak of her glory. “She had done what no horse had ever done and was buried where no horse was ever buried.” Smith recalls the heartbreaking epic of the greatest filly—and perhaps the greatest horse—that ever lived.

Bulfinch Press; 144 pages.

Not long ago The New York Times took note of the increasing number of American workers whose unemployment benefits were running out. For these people, the reporter commented, “a $7.50 film is a luxury.” Quite likely the newly unemployed have more on their minds than missing a movie. Perhaps almost as irritating is the notion that for everyone else a $7.50 movie isn’t a luxury. Those of us whose years stretch back to the twenty-five-cent, Saturday-morning show now have in Ticket to Paradise the perfect book to engage our memories of a kinder, gentler world of moviegoing.

Smithsonian Collection of Recordings; 84 songs on 4 CDs or cassettes; 800-927-7377.

Indiana Historical Society; 69 songs.

To mark the hundredth birthday of Cole Porter, two historical institutions have put out lavish collections of classic performances of his songs, in handsome LP-size boxes with copiously illustrated books containing essays on Porter and mini-essays on each song and performer.

Unsurprisingly there’s a fair amount of overlap in the wonderful material the two sets offer—neither could have imaginably left out Ethel Merman singing “I Get a Kick out of You” or Mary Martin doing “My Heart Belongs to Daddy” or Fred Astaire’s “Night and Day”—and both sets are no less than compendiums of America’s most sophisticated popular music. But there are big differences too.