stories), but not yet to the Great War (no clubland heroes any more – only tragic, betrayed young men or opportunists and cads). The twentieth century is also an excuse to choose settings for British heroes and heroines anywhere in the world – China and the Far East are becoming more popular as we become more interested in those areas. Other trends are for novels about artists and musicians – ideally if connected to the perennial box office of Hitler and the Holocaust.
The nineteenth century
Twenty two per cent of all English language historical novels published in 2013 are set in the nineteenth century (63). The events of the nineteenth century are less well known to readers, so writers use different ways of tweaking our interest. Authors often use wellknown people to draw us back: Brunel, Victoria, the Ripper (endlessly), Brummell, Dickens, Bonaparte. Again, there are plenty of artists and musicians – and again, many stories about the women behind the men. The things we are interested in would appear to be (not necessarily in this order): dark, gothic, grimy, smoky, abusive London 18 The Historian – Spring 2013
(or New York or other industrial big city); glamorous, sexy, fashionable, enlightened Paris (or Vienna or other European mini-break city); far flung Empire (how arrogant we were, how primitive but soulful they were); Victorian women were lusty beneath their bustles (not just Victoria herself) but very fearful of being ‘fallen’ (except where they were abused/part of the sex industry, in which case they were already fallen but never lusty); Science, medicine, engineering, photography – great advances, moral conundrums, silly misconceptions; related to the previous, Spiritualism, mediums, magic shows and charlatanry. And Vampires. Where authors can’t find real people to draw us back, they use fictional characters and extend, gloss or subvert well-known stories. There is an industry in books related to Pride and Prejudice. At the other end of the century, Sherlock Holmes has been redrawn in many different ways – as have the people supposed to have inspired Sherlock Holmes. For the rest, there are the usual genres. There are stories of adventure and derring-do set in Europe and around the Empire (Sharpe and Sharpealikes, and those inspired by George
Macdonald Fraser’s Flashman). There are still new offerings in the Hornblower genre (for example navy man Julian Stockwin’s Kydd series). There are sagas at home (poverty and nursing – for example Jean Fullerton’s excellent Hold On To Hope) and stories of love across the divide in different cultures. Novelists approach the nineteenth century with a special mark of respect, regarding it (rightly?) as the Golden Age of the form. Recently there have been a number of landmark novels which show more or less where we are in relation to the genesis. Michel Faber’s Crimson Petal and the White mirrors Dickens’ dark worlds of exploitation, but subverts them. Sugar is ‘rescued’ from penury by her would-be writerly protector, but only on his terms. Faber’s Dickens-like authorial voice is used to puncture the hypocrisies of Victorian sensibility – though he is by no means disparaging of real charity. Sarah Waters takes the great women’s novels of the Victorian period and thoroughly shakes them about in Fingersmith. Romance, innocence, inheritance, and mental health are all revisited and renewed, and there are some stunning plot reversals. Geraldine Brooks won a Pulitzer for taking the