It’s 1927, women have the right to vote and morals are slackening, but 23 year old Marta Rosenblit is not a typical woman of her time. She has little connection with her elder sisters, her mother has been detained in an asylum since Marta was born and she has spent her life being shaped as her father Arnold’s protégé. She is lost, unsure of who she is
and who she wants to be.
RESEARCHING A NOVEL
‘An ounce of fact is worth a pound of controversy.’ Arthur
Schomburg, Historian, Writer & Activist
There are lots of different ways to write your way through
history, but if you are working on fiction it can be tempting to throw caution
to the wind and ditch historical accuracy in favour of a heap of artistic
license so that your plot can move along in the way you want it to. Does it
really matter if my femme fatale is wearing nylons pre 1940?
Who cares if I
shift the date of that war by a year or two so I don’t have to weave in details
of a battle that will detract from the mystery? Readers do! A little historical accuracy goes a long way when creating a
believable story that feels authentic to its setting. Research is as important for fiction as it is for non-fiction. So, by
now you might be wondering how I tackled the twenties in my own novel.
Let me start
with a little confession. I didn’t intend to write a historical novel. I
just sat down and started to write a story that intrigued me, featuring
characters that appealed to me. I
didn’t plan to set it in 1927, but that became my chosen year. The Doctor’s
Daughter travels through Vienna, Budapest and London. Did I know that’s where
it would take me when I started? Not at all!
I know that is
not the way all writers approach their work, but I can only talk about my own
journey from first paragraph through to final draft. I may not have started
with much of a plan, but once I got going I most certainly wanted to ensure
that I did everything I could to keep the reader in my historical world. One outdated
slang word or use of a modern medicine and I knew I would pop the bubble and my
readers would tumble right out of the pages.
What I lacked
in the planning, I made up for in the writing, reading, redrafting and
rereading later. For the locations, I spent hours researching the cities my
characters passed through. I tried to ensure that any landmarks, important
buildings and street names existed, or were at least based on similar ones. It
wouldn’t do at all to mention a library or a hotel that had been built in the
last 50 years! The flora and fauna too, the food and even the dining habits of
people at that time. All vital if I were to create authentic scenes.
As for the
timing, I had to consider the literature, communication methods, education
system, transport, clothing, social context and so much more. It would have
been easy to ramble through a bunch of roaring twenties clichés, but my story
is very much driven by character. Marta, Elise, Leopold and Arnold are living
in the late 1920s, but they are also human beings affected by their experiences
and bearing flaws that still resonate in people’s lives today.
Whilst there is
a sprinkling of speakeasy culture, The Doctor’s Daughter is no Gatsby. My
characters are imaginings of real people with hopes and dreams, doubts and
fears, highs and lows. They can be both warm and austere. They cry, they
suffer, they hurt and get hurt, they have compulsions and dark secrets. They
are the best of people and the worst of people.
It took almost
as long to research as it did to write it, and I hope the reader’s experience
will be richer for it. Thanks so much Tony for inviting me to write this post
for you, I could talk about writing for hours so it’s nice to be able to share
at least some of my thoughts with your audience.
Vanessa Matthews
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About the Author
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