Hi Jim,

I just finished reading Soul Siphon and really liked your character, Mary. As I kept reading, she started talking about historical events that she was involved in, namely the Jack the Ripper killings. I’m not a history buff, so I decided to google the Whitechapel killings to get a little context.

To my surprise, you took Mary directly from the history books! I was really shocked to find out that she was an actual living person. As a writer, I’m curious how you were able to write her. You don’t know what she was like when she was alive, so how can you hope to portray her correctly? Not only that, don’t you think her descendants would object to you using her in your book, especially given some of the things she does?

I’m not trying to accuse you of anything, I’m just wondering as I find her usage intersting and potentially something I’d like to do.

Thanks,
Jeanette

Hi Jeannette,

No attack implied.

So let’s tackle your questions one at a time…

As a writer, I’m curious how you were able to write her. You don’t know what she was like when she was alive, so how can you hope to portray her correctly?

A very good question. The unfortunate answer is that I can’t. My character may be WAY off on what Mary was really like. So where did my approximation come from?
Well what do we know about Mary?
– She was Irish.
– She went by the nickname ‘Black Mary’ for starting brawls.
– She was known for getting heavily intoxicated and singing Irish songs… very loudly.
– She worked at a brothel.

So that’s all we know. So I took that and added in a level of frustration, sadness, and a high level of bitterness not only from being murdered, but (SPOILER ALERT) not being able to hunt down and reap vengeance on the man responsible. (/SPOILER)

So really that’s basically all I had to work with, if you checked out her history, you saw that that information on her is very limited. Some historians even dispute her hair color. So when you don’t have much to work with, you do your best to fill in the blanks where ever you can. That’s where the frustration, bitterness, and sadness came in.

Simply put, you do the best you can with what little you have to work with. Take what situational information you have the person, find out as much as you can about what they’ve done, how their lives were, and how they reacted to people, and build off of that.

Not only that, don’t you think her descendants would object to you using her in your book, especially given some of the things she does?

I worry about that every time I write a historical character into my stories. However we have no definitive confirmation of any descendants in the case of Mary. Some people have come forward claiming to be a granddaughter, great-niece, etc. None have been confirmed, and too often many are trying to sell books…

Honestly, if we had confirmation of someone being related to her or one of the other historical characters that I’d written about in the past, I’d absolutely contact them first. Not only to ask permission to use their names and identities, but also for some information on their ancestor. It’s courtesy and it makes sense.

So I hope that helps, this is how I create a character from a historical person where we have limited information about them.

Readers, do you have another method? Have you written about a Historical person? How do you tackle the hurdles mentioned above?

Readers,

Do you have a question about writing, publishing, my stories, etc? Please feel free to post a comment or email me.
jimthewritingwizard@gmail.com
I’ll use those comments to select my next blog post.

I have been writing for several years, have 4 published works, experience with publishing and independent work, so I can hopefully be of assistance.
Please note, I only do one of these a day and will do my best to respond to everyone, but it may take some time.

Also, feel free to check out my works of Fantasy and Historical Fiction, Available on Amazon and where ever books are sold. See the link below:

http://www.amazon.com/James-Harrington/e/B00P7FBXTU

Thanks friends!
Catch you on the flip side!

-Jim