[Justine K]

Hi Mr Jones
sorry to invade your privacy in the holidays but i really have to ask you something about my internal assessment.
In my book, 'The Sweetest Dream' there is this really great passage which looks forward like about 10 years to 2002 and the land invasions. I could really easily find loads of online recent newspaper articles relating to the land invasions and therefore I would have a piece of historical fiction and a factual piece.
However that is like 2 years ago and I have a suspicion it might be too recent even though I would love to do that- is it too recent or could I get away with it??
If I don't do that there is another piece in the book which is like a portrait of the president, describing him and his coming to power and a little of how things went wrong thereafter. I could do that- It won't make me as happy but I could probably also find information on that and that is from a longer time ago like early 1980's.
Anyway just wondering- could you email me the reply coz it is easier to check my mail??
thankyou, justine

[Mr Jones-Nerzic]

Justine K, on Oct 25 2004, 01:42 PM, said:

In my book, 'The Sweetest Dream' there is this really great passage which looks forward like about 10 years to 2002 and the land invasions. I could really easily find loads of online recent newspaper articles relating to the land invasions and therefore I would have a piece of historical fiction and a factual piece.
However that is like 2 years ago and I have a suspicion it might be too recent even though I would love to do that- is it too recent or could I get away with it??
If I don't do that there is another piece in the book which is like a portrait of the president, describing him and his coming to power and a little of how things went wrong thereafter. I could do that- It won't make me as happy but I could probably also find information on that and that is from a longer time ago like early 1980's.

Although your source refers to 2002, it was actually produced in the 1990s? and about events that go back to 1980s? If so, this makes it ok. The fact that it looks to the future is an obvious 'weakness' when considering the usefulness of the source.

What about your research question? Is is still looking at 'how useful is historical fiction to the historian, case study 1980s Zimbabwe'?

Have a look at this thread on History Teachers' Discussion Forum to see how much history teachers can get themselves worked up about this question. http://www.schoolhis...?showtopic=4168

[Justine K]

Thankyou Mr Jones but I thik you misunderstood me. The book is fictional and so in the book it is like the beginning of the 1990's but the book itself was published in 2002- so I guess it is not OK to do that then??? Or is it??

[Mr Jones-Nerzic]

Justine K, on Oct 27 2004, 08:56 AM, said:

Thankyou Mr Jones but I thik you misunderstood me. The book is fictional and so in the book it is like the beginning of the 1990's but the book itself was published in 2002- so I guess it is not OK to do that then??? Or is it??

It is ok. The events it describes are (sufficiently) in the past. This is all that matters.

If you were researching from a standard history text book, I would expect the research to be as up-to-date as possible. It does not matter when the interpretation was written, fictional or ortherwise.