Enemy Women
By Paulette Jiles (2003 Selection)
Set in southeast Missouri during the Civil War, the fictional tale centers on the experiences of a teenage girl, Adair Colley, who is denounced as disloyal to the Union and sent to a women's prison in St. Louis.
Reader's guide for Enemy Women
History and Literature
By Michael Bouman, Director
Missouri Humanities Council
I read Enemy Women because there was a hubub in the wind. I read the case against the book before I read the book. You can see some of that case in the lengthy Reader's Guide that Kathleen Nigro prepared for ReadMOre in 2003.
The case, in a nutshell, is that fiction about historical figures should not contradict the factual evidence because (a) it may be the only account of these figures that a reader ever sees, and that will distort the reader's idea of history, and (b) because it also tends to negate the painstaking work of scholars to establish a correct account, and (c) it can snuff the enthusiasm of amateur history afficionados for certain revered historical figures. A shorter version is, "don't smear a hero just to make a good story."
I accept as true that a writer establishes a bond of trust with a reader. If we know we're reading fiction, but we also know the author is basing the story on real historical figures, about whom a lot can be documented, then I think we assume that the observable facts won't be changed for the sake of the story. I think we assume that the author will indulge in speculation about motivation and personality, and that there may be invented scenes and events for which there is no contradictory evidence. We will accept the plausible for the sake of a good story. We will even accept a far-fetched situation if we imagine it could have happened by some twist of fate or circumstance. But I think we trust the author not to "rewrite history." We expect to see it used as a backdrop or as a point of departure.
Imagine, for example, coming across a compelling novel of the Vietnam War that opens with a scene in a hamlet named My Lai. The teenage girl who is the central character is in a group of villagers running from the sound of weapons fire when they are suddenly surrounded by American soldiers with blood lust in their eyes. A scene of unspeakable carnage is about to begin when a young lieutenant named Calley steps between the gunners and their intended victims, rebukes them at great risk to himself, and prevents a massacre. The girl's difficult escape from a war zone thus begins and we hear no more of Calley. This is not his story, but hers. And yet...
The rub for the trusting reader comes when the point of departure, which we assume is historical fact, is actually a fiction that is refutable by the factual record. Then there are complaints about breaking that bond of trust between author and reader. That was the controversy and complaint that led me to buy Enemy Women and to read it, even though I thought the case against it was so compelling that to read it would be to ratify a "crime against history," to coin a phrase.
Once into the opening pages, I felt the gullibility that troubles historians envelop me. I felt that bond of trust in the author take shape, and because the story was gripping, I excused the distortion of the record and the sullying of the reputations of those soldiers. Within the spell of the book, those things did not matter to me. I was reading the story as a complete fiction, which is to say, I was interested in the brand of "truth" that fiction is made to deliver. This is not a truth of the labor of research, but a truth of the labor of empathy and insight and the structure of narrative.
I am sorry that Paulette Jiles wrote such a gripping story that included "false history" about known historical figures. I wish it had been otherwise. But I still remember scenes from her book five years later.
(April 2008)
