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Article: Writing backward: modern models in historical fiction.(children's literature)
- Article from:
- The Horn Book Magazine
- Article date:
- January 1, 1998
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1998 Horn Book, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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I expect we can all agree that historical fiction should be good fiction and good history. If we leap over the first briar patch by calling good fiction an "interesting narrative with well--developed characters," we are still left with the question of what is good history. Alas, there are nearly as many thorns here as among the briars. The German historian Leopold von Ranke said that writing history was saying "what really happened"--but according to whom? Writers of history select, describe, and explain historical evidence--and thereby interpret. Not only will the loser's version of the war never match the winner's, but historical interpretations of what happened, and ...