Why "who" is so important in historical fiction, a guest essay by Susanne Dunlap

Thanks to multi-published historical novelist Susanne Dunlap for writing the following guest post, which explores the decisions she makes when writing fiction about historical people. Her latest release, The Adored One, focuses on Lillian Lorraine, a famous Broadway star from the early 20th century.

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Why Who Is So Important in Historical Fiction 

Susanne Dunlap

All the choices we make as writers when crafting a novel are important: where to start the story, what kind of a story to tell, the style, the pace, etc. etc. But in historical fiction, there’s one choice that underpins all the others, that influences every other choice along the way. That is, simply, will your protagonist be historical or invented—a question that doesn’t arise in any other category of fiction.

I will be the first to admit that I approach having a historical protagonist with some trepidation for one reason: Real life doesn’t arrange itself in satisfying story arcs, and finding an arc within an actual human being’s existence can be a stretch.

Why does that matter? When it comes to writing fiction, the arc—at least in the western European tradition—is fundamental. Your protagonist has to start out as one person with one set of beliefs and ambitions and problems and be changed through the events of the novel to become something wiser, better, in some cases worse—or someone who finally has the ability to overcome certain obstacles. It’s possible to build a story around a protagonist who doesn’t do any of this, but very risky if you want to keep a reader caring about the story and turning the pages.

The Adored One is my fourteenth published historical novel, but it’s only the third I’ve written featuring a historical protagonist.

The first was Anastasia’s Secret, which came out in 2010. Twelve years later I published The Portraitist, about the French 18th-century artist, Adélaïde Labille-Guiard.

The protagonist of The Adored One—Lillian Lorraine, the love of producer Florenz Ziegfeld’s life—is historical too. Not only that, but with few exceptions, all the characters in the novel lived, and every event actually happened. But you’ve probably never heard of Lillian, correct? So why did I choose to write about her?

Lillian Lorraine was a rock star in her time. As a performer whose looks were her stock in trade, her image graced magazines and sheet music covers, and her antics fed the hunger for sensational news stories. When she outgrew her early stardom, she faded away from the public eye—as so often happens with women entertainers.

Thus the image of Lillian that has come down to posterity is that of a ditzy, thoughtless ingenue who wrecked her own life. But what about the world she existed in? How did those expectations shape her?

Lillian went on stage for the first time when she was four years old. Her ambitious mother pushed her and dragged her around the country—something that wasn’t very conducive to a well-rounded education.

She rocketed to stardom at the age of 16, and soon after was bedded and controlled by one of the most powerful figures on the Broadway stage of the early 20th century. A lot for a teenager of any period to handle.

author Susanne Dunlap

She fell in and out of love, got involved with the bad boys, experienced the underbelly of early 20th-century New York City. She drank all night, came late to rehearsals, and made her share of enemies. Her mother’s death when she was still a teen left her alone and unprotected.

She also made the switch to Vaudeville when she was blacklisted by Abe Erlanger—and loved it there.

While on Vaudeville she worked on the side with Alice Guy Blaché—a pioneering woman filmmaker—and Lillian is also credited with directing some early films after she made the move to Hollywood.

She became a close friend of Bert Williams, the first Black man allowed to perform on Broadway.

In fact, Lillian had many loyal friends. Throughout her life, she did all she could to help friends in need, and even remained on good terms with Ziegfeld until his death.

Yet Lillian refused Ziegfeld’s offers of marriage not once or twice, but four times. She said no to one of the most powerful men in show business before she was even twenty years old. Marrying him would have assured her a comfortable and safe life. Why didn’t she want that?

This was just one of the questions that intrigued me about Lillian, and led me to believe she had hidden depths and reserves of strength.

The Adored One takes place from 1906 to 1913, from when Lillian and her stage mother arrived in New York until she finally split from Ziegfeld at a New Year's Eve party. That allowed me to trace the arc that took her from naïve teenager to young woman fully in control of her own destiny. It enabled me to show her many mistakes and missteps, but also her growth.

Because the image of Lillian that has come down through history illustrates, for me, the way stories have been written by the powerful men in any sphere. Biographical historical fiction provides an opportunity to explore lesser-known individuals who had roles to play in history, whose contributions in their sphere deserve to be better known, but who were ignored—or whose contributions were distorted—by those powerful men.

Today’s historical fiction has broadened and deepened our understanding of the past by exploring the interstices, daring to investigate what might have been but isn’t in the historical record, resurrecting forgotten individuals whose stories are engaging and inspiring.

That’s why who is such an important question to ask before writing a historical novel. It’s tied closely not only to the research you’ll do, but to your intentions as a novelist.

I hope readers of The Adored One not only enjoy learning about and being entertained by the wild and crazy world of the early Ziegfeld Follies, but also fall in love with Lillian Lorraine the way I did. Like so many other forgotten women, she deserves a chance.

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Susanne Dunlap is the author more than a dozen historical novels for adults and teens. Her work has won and been nominated for many awards, including the Bank Street Books Children’s Book of the Year, the Utah Book Award, and the Missouri Gateway Readers’ Prize. Most recently, her novel The Portraitist won its category in the Eric Hoffer Book Awards, and The Paris Affair won first place in the CIBA Dante Rossetti awards for Young Adult Fiction. Susanne earned her PhD in music history from Yale, and her BA and MA (musicology) from Smith College. She lives and writes in Biddeford, Maine.