Margaret L Carter's blog got me thinking...
How different would history be --or would it?-- if kudos for some discovery or victory went to someone else?
It wasn't Gallileo but an Englishman, Herriott who first mapped the moon with the help of a telescope.
http://news.aol.com/article/old-moon-map-corrects-history/307394
Suppose it was Admiral Lord De Saumarez who was responsible for the English fleet's great naval victories at Cadiz and on the Nile, rather than the high-profile maverick, Horatio Nelson?
What if the foresight and preparedness of Admiral Themistocles was more decisive in repelling Xerxes' invasion of Greece that were the delays and losses sustained at Thermopylae thanks to King Leonidas and his Spartans?
To pick up from Margaret's point, does it matter who built the railroad?
I suppose we've all been in situations where an upstart repeated someone else's idea but spoke more loudly, and got the credit for it. There was even a Fed-Ex advertisement on that theme!
Then, there's the tradition that it is usually the victor of any war who writes the history, prosecutes the perpetrators of war crimes, and makes the movies.
Does it matter in the long term?
How about the difference between historical injustice, and fiction?
Should a made-up character give one of the most famous political speeches in a nation's history, for instance?
Would this be acceptable if the made-up character was portrayed as the real historical character's double, standing in? Or a time traveler? Or a shape-shifting alien?
Suppose the alternate history's speech-giver was another real historical figure? (But not the person that history tells us gave the speech.)
Where does playing with history become offensive and irresponsible?
When should the facts get in the way of a good story?
Is it acceptable to "rip" alternative history from the headlines of one of the more colorful supermarket tabloids? (I assume that some of their news is made up!)
So many questions with which to wrestle!
Rowena Cherry
By the way, Knight's Fork is a featured review at UpTheStairCase.org
http://www.upthestaircase.org/cherry.htm
Sunday, January 18, 2009
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What an interesting question. I wonder what it says about me, but I see nothing wrong with changing who accomplished what in an alternative history, but I think I would find it tacky to change who delivered a famous speech. I guess I think anybody could have accomplished something--if one person doesn't do it, then sooner or later somebody else will. But I see a creative work--including a speech--as more unique. If you take winning the Civil War away from Lincoln, well, the war really could have gone either way, and lots of people were responsible for the outcome. But if you take the Gettysburg Address and have one of your characters deliver it, you really have taken something from the man.
ReplyDeleteHmm . . . thinking about it some more, I think it may be because it's rare to accomplish something in a vacuum. If you invent or discover something, you rely on the inventions and discoveries that came before you. Kind of like how Newton said he had only seen more by standing on the shoulders of giants. But I see creative work as belonging to the author much more.
Maybe that's inaccurate on my part; I don't know.
You probably know about the other scientist who came up with the theory of evolution by natural selection at the same time as Darwin. Even though Darwin himself acknowledged the other guy's work, it's Darwin whom we remember. (As shown by the fact that I can't think of the other man's name right now.)
ReplyDeleteI have a vague memory of reading something like that, but, more up my alley, calculus was invented pretty much simultaneously by Newton and Leibniz, if memory serves. Generally speaking, Newton gets most of the credit.
ReplyDeleteThank you, Margaret and Joe.
ReplyDeleteFascinating!
An alternate history based on smoke, if not fire, injustice, and some great research would be just up my alley....as long as it's not a sour grapes story!
I'd write about fictional people (who could be/become lovers) who are affected by the historically jipped great thinker.
Of course, since it is alternate history, it would be the other guy who doesn't get the credit.
Joe, you write,
ReplyDelete"If you invent or discover something, you rely on the inventions and discoveries that came before you. Kind of like how Newton said he had only seen more by standing on the shoulders of giants. But I see creative work as belonging to the author much more."
There are several literary commentators who suggest that there are only 20 or maybe fewer plots.
How often do we see a story pitched in terms of a mixture of two or three famous stories... in the case of Romance, reference is often made to well known fairy tales.
How many interpretations of Beauty and the Beast have you seen? Or Cinderella?
Shakespeare, Homer, Sophocles... everyone rehashed stories they'd heard from someone else.
All very good points, but there's so much World Building theory to discuss when it comes to alternate contemporary realities.
ReplyDeleteI did love the TV show SLIDERS - but much of it was silly.
Then there's the recent advances in mathematics (to throw sold cold SF on the problem) -- that there are 11 (no fewer and no more) alternate realities.
Then there's the spiritual/ philosopical arguments about Free Will vs. Predestination and the soul-level consequences of choices.
And then there's karma, and making sense of all those myriad theories of reincarnation from cultures around the world and throughout History when you build an alternate universe.
Star Trek did in MIRROR; MIRROR the simplest, most childish, kind of thing that has little real meat to it, philosophically.
James Blish's JACK OF EAGLES did it much better.
But no matter how you build the alternate world, the story stands or falls on the characterization.
I just saw the final episode of STARGATE: ATLANTIS and it was a totally WONDERFUL script - beautiful.
The final image of landing in SF Bay like the Enterprise did in the movie -- with the Golden Gate in the background was fabulous.
The final 2-parts all depended on the characterization of John Shephard. The entire drama would have fallen flat had it not been for our knowledge of what makes that man tick.
Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://www.simegen.com/jl/
http://twitter.com/JLichtenberg
There are several literary commentators who suggest that there are only 20 or maybe fewer plots.
ReplyDeleteHow often do we see a story pitched in terms of a mixture of two or three famous stories... in the case of Romance, reference is often made to well known fairy tales.
How many interpretations of Beauty and the Beast have you seen? Or Cinderella?
Shakespeare, Homer, Sophocles... everyone rehashed stories they'd heard from someone else.
*nod*
You're right. I've pitched my own story like that.
But then, if I rip off your plot idea but write my own derivative version, you have no recourse other than telling everyone what a jerk I am. If I take your words, though, then I'm guilty of plagiarism. Those words are what make it belong to us, so that's where I'm inclined to draw the line.
(My captcha is "hablo." Is that ironically fitting or what!)