Creative license to invent a sibling to a historical figure?

Question

I am about half-way into writing a manuscript of historical fiction depicting mostly fictional European characters in the period between the First and Second World Wars. For purposes of the storyline I would like to create an imaginary third sister to Czar Nicholas II of Russia — someone who generally opposed the monarchy and specifically her brother's brutal regime, and decided to marry a commoner and leave the country.

We're all familiar with "fictionalizing" dialogue and situations within the lives of actual, historical figures. But I'm uncertain if what I'm describing is also commonplace. In other words, I wonder if it's acceptable or prudent to "invent" a sibling in this manner.

Answer 1

Personally, I wouldn’t have a problem with your proposal.

Your description is of a fictional work, set in a real, historical setting: not a biography of a historical figure. And it seems you have a sound reason to include her: she could function as an opponent to the royal family’s views and morals – a “voice of the common people” in the palace.

However, I would advise you to include a foreword or afterword, which is not part of the story, telling the reading that the character did not exist, and why you included her.

I don’t read much historical fiction, so I can’t recall a book where this has been done. However, the HBO/BBC TV series Rome – a very detailed and heavily researched historical drama – did change family trees of known historical figures in order to tell a fictional story.

Also, if anyone says doing this harms your credibility as a fiction writer, ask them what they think of William Shakespeare. Falstaff – one of Shakespeare’s most popular characters, who appeared in 5 plays – first appeared in Henry IV Part I and was the best friend of the young King Henry IV.

Henry IV was a real person. Falstaff was not.

Answer 2

Can you? Yes. There is nothing wrong with it, either legally or ethically. What you're doing would come under "artistic license". In fact, Alexandre Dumas' "The Man in the Iron Mask", for instance, relies on similar artistic license: as far as we know, Louis XIV had no twin brother. So you'd be in good company.

Should you? That's rather opinion-based. Here's something for you to consider, however: unlike Dumas' original readers, your readers would have access to Wikipedia. They'd immediately know there was no such sister. For some, that might significantly impede their suspension of disbelief. Then again, the fact that Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna had been very definitely murdered together with the rest of her family, did not prevent Disney (or was it some other studio?) making an animated movie about how she actually survived.

Answer 3

Historical fiction often takes great liberties with the actual history. The trick, I think, is to make your story so that nothing in it is easily proven wrong by reading a conventional history book. That is, you can add all sorts of things to what's in the history books, but you should avoid contradicting the history books.

Basically, that means either, (a) the person or event that you invent is minor enough that no one would be surprised that it didn't make it into the history books; or (b) it's something that would have been private or even secret; or (c) you give some explanation for why the history books got it wrong.

For example: (a) You say that one day Tsar Nicholas was touring the city and met a peasant girl and they had this interesting conversation. Who would know that that didn't really happen? History doesn't record every step the tsar ever took or every person he ever spoke to.

(b) You relate a private conversation between the tsar and tsarina about their personal lives. If no one else was there, who would know what was said?

(c) You say that Princess Anastasia really survived the massacre of her family, but no one knew because she had amnesia and didn't know herself, and friends and relatives tried to keep it all secret so that the communists wouldn't hunt her down and kill her.

In your case: Another sister is surely too big for the history books to just miss, and would likely have been widely known. So you have to come up with some reason why the sister is not in the history books. One possibility that occurs to me is to say that the family found the behavior you describe so scandalous that they had her cut out of all official histories, threatened newspaper publishers with dire consequences if they ever mentioned her name, etc, and so wiped all knowledge of her out of existence. When the communists took over, they didn't want to talk about the sister either because an anti-monarchist but not pro-communist member of the royal family might become a rallying point for anti-communists, someone who could be held up as the "rightful queen", so they were happy to go along with expunging her.

If that particular ideas doesn't work in your story, fine, come up with something else that DOES fit.

Lots of historical fiction has very fanciful scenarios to explain away what's in the history books in favor of their more entertaining tale.

Total side thought: I'm sure every historical fiction novel has scenes that are provably false because they get details wrong that only the most dedicated history buffs would be likely to know. Like, "Hey, this story says that Tsar Nicholas talked to Rasputin on August 12??? But everybody knows that Rasputin was in St Petersburg that day while the tsar was in Sevastopol ..." I wonder if this ruins the story for the history buff.

Answer 4

I would advise against it. In a historical novel, you do not want to "tamper" with history. That is, you do not want to create a character close enough to a historical figure to be able to re-write history. People who are familiar with the actual history of the historical figure might resent this. The exception to this rule might be if a historical figure would be the main character.

There is a saying for a historical novel, "Your fiction's main characters ought to be minor characters in history, and your (main) historical characters should be minor characters in your fiction." You can make your hero say, a bodyguard to George Washington. "Everyone" knows that such figures have bodyguards and practically no one cares who they are. You can even allow your bodyguard hero to overhear Washington's battle plans and react accordingly. But your character should not be close enough to Washington to "talk back," or "consult" with him on battle plans, thereby affecting the course of history. Unless, of course s/he did so in real life.