The Orenda Q7: Historicity

Apocryphal

This is historical fiction, and in interviews the author discusses the degree of research he undertook. The book was also reviewed and vetted for accuracy by noted Wendat historian Georges Sioui. https://www.strongnations.com/gs/show.php?gs=3&gsd=1538

And yet others have pointed out several historical accuracies, particularly around the way the Iroqouis were portrayed, and how the fall of the Wendat took place a generation after the death of Champlain:

https://peggyblair.wordpress.com/2013/10/30/the-orenda-by-joseph-boyden-a-historical-review/

How important is historicity to historic fiction? To what degree can we forgive the inconsistencies in favour of a good story?

RichardAbbott

Personally I don't mind some historical latitude in the interest of a better story, though I have good friends who take a much stricter view. So for example I can see good purpose in simplifying the complexities of real events in order to make them digestible, or to bring out more clearly a connection which the author feels important. Like maybe combining multiple historical individuals into a single representative figure, or amalgamating multiple events into a single dramatic turning point of. (I think this is particularly useful in a film version where it only lasts a couple of hours and you have to convey something memorable to the viewers)

In this case I didn't have a clue about the actual history, so it came over to me as no different from pure fiction. I can readily believe that in fact there were dozens of Jesuits across the area, and that they have been combined into three for the purposes of storytelling. Maybe there were dozens of girls like Snow Falls who ended up growing up in an enemy tribe... or maybe there were none... but it doesn't matter to me as the situation has clearly been crafted (or maybe contrived) to create the three-way tension.

Advocates of the "it should be totally accurate to the known facts" school of thought say that to do otherwise spreads misinformation, in that unknowing readers (such as myself in this case) take what they read as correct in an uncritical way and so end up believing falsehood. And the better-written and more compelling the book (to that school) the more important it is to be right.

All that is one reason why, when I've written HF, I do so about places and people where there is essentially no factual information! Nobody can really tell me that there _could not_ have been a village priest called Damariel in an obscure Canaanite hill country village somewhere around the end of the Late Bronze Age! They may take exception to my supposition that his clan practiced matrilineal ownership of property, but again it's hard to say yeah or nay, and I wanted that to bring in particular social and personal tension.

In the case of The Orenda, I guess it's a middle ground... probably the French, British and Jesuit people and actions are well recorded, but less so those of the tribes. Nobody can say that Bird or Snow Falls _could not_ have lived and died as described, though we may well know the names of every single Jesuit missionary. But to repeat, it doesn't bother me much.

NeilNjae

I think this story has to tread carefully, as it feeds into current discussions and decisions about the descendants of the people in the story. There's a responsibility to portray cultures accurately, even if some of the people and events are fictitious. @RichardAbbott sums up a lot of that, and @Apocryphal 's links show how the book may not be that accurate.

For the original question, "How important is historicity?" I think the answer is "very" for this book, because of the real-world ramifications of the book on people around now.

clash_bowley

I know a fair amount about the situation for a layman from casual reading, and i thought aside from the more magical things happening it didn't disagree with anything I knew for fact. In detail it may be wrong, but that didn't bother me in reading.