Why History Feels so Powerful in Storytelling
When you start writing and you realise, I've heard this somewhere
before...
History has always fascinated us. We build entire television channels around it. We study it in schools. We return constantly to stories of past conflicts, political choices and social conventions; from the drawing rooms of Bridgerton to the smoke-filled back streets of Peaky Blinders.
But I do not think history fascinates us simply because of the events themselves.
History is more than kings, battles and political movements. At its core, it is a record of human behaviour; of choices, desires, fears and consequences. It shows us what happens when power concentrates in the wrong hands. What happens when belief becomes control. What happens when love, ambition, fear or survival begin shaping the choices people make.
And perhaps the reason history still feels so relevant is because people themselves have not changed nearly as much as we like to believe.
That is why history feels so important to fantasy writing. Fantasy allows writers to draw from recognisable human behaviour without being confined by historical fact. It takes the emotional truth of history; power struggles, persecution, loyalty, rebellion, fear, and reshapes it into something new. The setting may be fictional. The kingdoms may never have existed. But the behaviour underneath it still feels real because, in many ways, we already know it.
We have seen versions of it before.
Many writers draw from history, my favourite being Game of Thrones. (I'm ashamed to say I watched it first.) I was never more shocked and manipulated than the events of the Red Wedding. Not to give away too many spoilers but it is quite obvious that George R. Martin, set the Starks up as the 'Yorks' and the Lannisters as the 'Lancasters,' from the Wars of the Roses. This happens to be one of my absolute favourite parts of history and I know it incredibly well. I went all the way through those episodes watching Rob Stark line up as the parallel to Edward IV - even his inappropriate choice of wife lined up. Then bang the Red Wedding happened and I DID NOT see it coming.
To me, this is an incredibly clever use of history in fantasy writing. It is a great story generally, then it has this really fun extra level for those of us who can see the historical parallels. And it truly threw me as it was the absolute opposite of what I was expecting to happen. Lulled me right into his trap and I fell for it.
Perhaps that familiarity is what makes these stories resonate so deeply. Even in fantasy, we recognise the patterns: the rise of power, the manipulation of belief, the misunderstandings that become conflict, the desperate attempts people make to survive, protect or control. History never really disappears. It simply changes shape.
And maybe that is why studying it, writing from it, feels so endlessly fascinating.
Because long after the kingdoms, wars and rulers are gone, human nature remains stubbornly familiar.
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