>> people thought about things in the 20's. But
most contemporary writers
>> who set stories in the past seem to feel obliged
to justify their
>> research by loading on the details. What they
don't often capture is
>> the attitude of the times.
It has been suggested that the reason people read historicals
is to see contemporary ideas/opinions/attitudes attached to
the romance of the past.
A book written in 1860 is not the same as a book written in
1960 and set in 1860. The idealization (idealizing either
hard times or good times) and drama is what makes a
historical a historical.
Sharon
-- Sharon Villines, Editor MacGuffin Guide to Detective Fiction, http://www.macguffin.net MacGuffinL, History & Criticism of Detective Fiction http://www.onelist.com/subscribe.cgi/MacGuffinL
-- # To unsubscribe, say "unsubscribe rara-avis" to majordomo@icomm.ca. # The web pages for the list are at http://www.miskatonic.org/rara-avis/ .
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 03 Feb 2000 EST