Character Quote by Heather Graham Pozzessere

Of all studies, the most delightful and the most useful is biography. The seeds of great events lie near the surface; historians delve too…

— Walter Savage Landor

I love to have real people of history interact with my fictional characters. History gives me the plot. I research the period meticulously, and…

— Virginia Henley

Historical fiction of course is particularly research-heavy. The details of everyday life are there to trip you up. Things that we take for granted,…

— Sara Sheridan

I don't read many popular histories like the ones I write. The building blocks for my research are scholarly monographs, and the inspiration for…

— Rick Perlstein

One thing I like about historical fiction is that I'm not constantly focusing on me, or people like me; you're obliged to concentrate on…

— Emma Donoghue

The key for me with historical characters is they're interesting because they're human beings. A little bit of Hemingway goes a long way here,…

— Michael Hirst

One of the things I enjoy most about writing historical romance is researching inspiring backgrounds and settings.

— Nicola Cornick

I find historical figures in general very tricky because you feel at times that you're serving two masters. Not only the arc and wonderful…

— Vincent Piazza

It can be a long gap between the emergence of fully researched historical biographies.

— Antonia Fraser

Well, I think it can be quite helpful to be working on a character who actually existed, historically. Of course, you might have material…

— Gaspard Ulliel

I love those historians that are either very simple or most excellent. Such as are between both (which is the most common fashion), it…

— Michel de Montaigne

I think I'm too lazy a writer to do something like historical fiction. You have to do so much research. I just write what…

— Sarah Dessen