#though dont get me wrong i think historical fiction complements scholarly text too
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pisses me off to no end when people on reddit or whatever complain that the show wouldve been better off without the tuunbaq.....did we watch the same show? the tuunbaq is everything, it held everything together. the tuunbaq is the main transformative element of the terror. the tuunbaq elevates the text beyond mere historical fact and lets it say something about the expedition's broader context of imperialism. it hunted the british men who were trampling on its home as a mere stopover, a side casualty, to finding the northwest passage (for, you know, "trade with china" after britain beat china into submission after the imperialist opium war). silna couldnt complete a proper ritual with it because of the british men - just as british colonizers have historically intruded and disrupted the practice of indigenous culture. and in the end the tuunbaq dies, after all the injuries it's taken from the british over the course of 10 episodes and finally chokes to death on the worst of them. because there's no escaping the reality of colonial history, and there is especially no fantastical escape for the colonizer. there's no proper way for us to move forward otherwise.
good historical fiction doesnt have to limit itself to accuracy - it needs empathy to draw out meanings in history using literary craft. thats what the tuunbaq means to me.... if you wanted a straight depiction of historical record, just go watch a documentary.. TUUNBAQ DENIERS DNI
#hell i would argue that historical inaccuracy is just as crucial to accuracy in historical fiction#if not even more so#for a different reason that you need an anchor to remind viewers that this is fiction#and should not be taken as substitute for historical record#though dont get me wrong i think historical fiction complements scholarly text too#because histfic gets to explore aspects of the same history in different ways you cant in academia - more emotional and the like#but its also a problem if histfic presents itself as accurate and ppl start looking at it as historical record itself#kind of like the crown (hate the crown)#so the question of 'how do we play with historical facts to reinforce the themes of the story' is crucial in histfic i think#the terror#the terror amc
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