In parts 1, 2, and 3, we discussed the challenge of writing the past, that we should start with a story, and research like an historian but write like a novelist, respectively. Part 4 is about making the setting feel real and lived in by characters specifically and people of the era in general.
I can remember my instructor from one of my earliest writing workshops telling me that my story felt “bookish,” as in nonfiction, that it was missing “quotidian” details. He went on to explain using sensory details, describing people’s ordinary routines, and letting the setting influence the plot but not overwhelm it.
Most writing workshops will teach you to show, not tell, what the characters see, hear, smell, eat, and worry about. This, of course, takes a boatload of research to make sure what you’re showing is authentic. Again, this is key in historical fiction because someone, somewhere may be an expert in the era you’re writing about and will call out your mistakes. Publicly.
As a high school and college student, I learned how to research, and back then in the dark ages, it was hard work. Spending hours at the card catalogue making note of book titles and where to find them in the stacks. (You younger folk may have to Google “card catalogue” and “stacks” to understand what I’m talking about.) Then, you actually had to read the books you discovered. In some cases all you might need is a specific chapter or section, but either way note-taking had to be meticulous. I used index cards and usually walked away with a stack of them. (You may also need to Google “index cards.”)
Depending on what era you’re writing about, it may be one where personal hygiene isn’t a priority. So, people smelled all the time; however, unless you were upper class, everyone smelled, so they didn’t notice it. If you’re going to have a character react to someone’s BO and describe that, make sure that it would be something out of the ordinary.
Many things can disrupt the ordinary lives of people in any era: war, plagues, oppressive governments or rulers, invasions, colonization. It’s important, then, to show contrast, i.e., what were common routines among classes of people before a disruption and after.
You need to portray how people of different classes dressed, what they ate, what they’d see on a daily basis, the smells in their immediate area, and what things caused them to worry, not to mention how they reacted to that worry. Making your characters living, breathing human beings with problems and hopes and inspiration makes them relatable to the reader.
We now have the Google, and so many of these seemingly mundane facts, those quotidian details, are easily findable. I wanted to know what the weather was like in the summer in Belfast in the North of Ireland in the 1970s. Google found me a British weather database where I learned what the weather was like on an hourly basis on specific days. The history nerd in me was ecstatic, and this helped me improve a key scene. That novel was The Devil Passed By.
In addition to a lot of books that related what life was like during The Troubles, I also found images of Belfast and the sectarian violence that let me enhance the story. In this way, I could allow that setting to influence the plot. In that time, every aspect of daily life was sectarian, from pubs to stores to jobs to housing. That setting affected what the characters saw (rubble from bombings) heard (clashes between people and police and/or the British Army), smelled (burning tires, tear gas, gunsmoke), ate (different foods depending on what side you were on), and the worry was constant (getting caught up in a riot, having your home invaded by police, being sent to prison without trial). In The Devil Passed By, that was a tumultuous setting, and it made the plot what it was.
In summary, then, to make your setting feel lived in, research, research, research. Again, back in my dark ages, some sources included people’s diaries and letters, things where you could get a real sense of how people lived and dealt with historical circumstances. How to research changes with the distance from when you’re writing the story back to when and where the story happens. It pays to get the past right.
