racy in westerns and does it matter, on the Black Horse Western Forum - anyone wanting interesting debate should join Here. Anyone can join but you'll need a free Yahoo account.It's led me to wonder how important is it to be historically accurate?
In my own westerns I am mindful of getting the location, guns, clothing etc spot on but the wild west of my books owes more to the west of John Wayne and Clint Eastwood than the true historical west. In my west Billy the Kid lived to be an old man, Arkansas Smith was the quickest draw there ever was and Gary Dobbs is a wandering hack who pens popular dime novels full of lies. The books are written to entertain and I'm very conscious of creating a universe that is fantasy but at the same time feels real enough to convince.
In Sergio Leone's epic Once Upon a Time in the West - When Harmonica climbs down the ladder, only to meet Frank at the other end of a '45, we see that the ladder is electro-welded to the wagon and the steps are also electro-welded to the legs of the ladder - rather lousy welding seams, too! The movie takes place around 1870. Electro-welding started during the '90s, but the method got practicable only in the 1920s – and began to be commonly used in the late '30s when the great navies (except for the Royal Navy) started to use the method for their first-line ships. The great leap forward came during WW2, when Liberty ships and many other vessels were electro-welded.
In High Noon - After Gary Cooper writes his last will and testament, he puts it into an envelope and licks it shut. Those kind of envelopes were invented about thirty years after the film takes place.
In Tombstone - In the scene just before the fight at the O.K. Corral, Wyatt is talking to his brothers and Doc on the porch of the sheriff's office. There is an American flag flying behind him with 50 stars on it when in fact there were only 38 stars on the flag in 1881.
A level of accuracy is, I suppose essential - for instance using a gun that wasn't invented until 1900 in an 1880 set western would be a no no. Maybe most readers wouldn't notice but there would always be someon
e who would know their guns and for them that would ruin the story. But no matter how well you research errors can crop up - for instance in the first draft of Arkansas Smith I had a character mention powdered milk many years before it had been invented. Thankfully the editor picked up on that and I was able to change the piece. Now I would never have known that and I feel I have a wealth of knowledge on the old west, as any writer of westerns must have. So it wouldn't have ruined the story for me were I reading it but someone would have noticed. The result that person would have been dragged out of the story by the error and would have a problem suspending disbelief further.In The Shootist - The opening montage depicting Books's past exploits mentions a Colt .45 and shows a single action Colt revolver being fired. The date indicated on the screen is 1871. This revolver was not manufactured until 1873.
In The Alamo - The movie's opening scene manages to get wrong almost every historical detail except the names. Sam Houston was never in San Antonio with Colonels Neill, Travis, and Bowie. Then-governor Henry Smith - not General Houston - made Travis a colonel (in December). Bowie did a lot of drinking and carousing, but that never caused him to be demoted or to lose a command. Bowie did marry into the Mexican aristocracy, and he acquired a lot of land, but it would have been ridiculous for Travis to therefore doubt his loyalty to the rebellion. Bowie was one of the rebellion's best-known firebrands and had just taken San Antonio from the Mexicans.
So in the final analysis how important is historical accuracy in a western?
Pretty darn important, I guess.
4 comments:
Hi, Gary.
You hit the nail on the head when you wrote, "The result that person would have been dragged out of the story by the error and would have a problem suspending disbelief further."
One or two blunders can "ruin" the enjoyment of any film, but especially history oriented ones. Further more, it is insulting to my personal intelligence when there is an obvious disregard for the minimums of authenticity. I know you have personally witnessed how much preparation goes into some scenes. They'll shoot them numerous times and in between "takes" are so careful that the set is not "disturbed." Yet something as simple as a 50-star flag means little. It tells me that they think me so ignorant and stupid that I won't notice. 17 years have passed and there are still forums talking about the goofs on Tombstone. While enjoyable to watch the film will never reach the classic backing of films that have fewer or no mistakes, historically speaking.
Jeff Smith
The debate will continue for as long as we have western books and movies. It has been going for more than a while already. (See the "Striking argument" Hoofprint on the current page at http://blackhorsewesterns.com )
Notably, the public generally pardons Hollywood's clangers. Not so those by novelists -- especially if they weren't born and bred in the territories that once comprised the Frontier West.
Some agents and publishers have refused even to consider westerns by British and other foreign writers, using past lapses ("flying coyotes") as justification.
But sloppy historical research by an author who, say, features dynamite in a Trailsman yarn set before it was invented is OK.
The boo-boos you list up are in the movies, which are famous for their inaccuracies, and not just Westerns. It's the written page, however, that needs to be held to a higher standard. Plus, with a little research, the hero can drink Old Potrero whiskey at the bar instead of rye, or rot gut or some other generic booze. In Guns of Ponderosa, Deputy Dan Brady carries a converted Dragoon Colt. In Hell Fire in Paradise, which comes out in November, and if you're interested, you can find out where Dan gets that gun and why he treasures it, antiquated as it is.
There's "real" West, there's "fantasy" West, and there's "what the hell was he thinking?" West. Each has the potential to be interesting, so it just boils down to what you are looking for at any given time.
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