As you may have seen recently–I’m not sure if I’ve posted about it before on my blog, or just kept it to social media–I’ve fallen in love with a new murder mystery series. The Lord Peter Wimsey books by Dorothy L. Sayers are pretty much perfect. Lord Peter, the main detective, is unique and witty and almost certainly has ADHD. The plots are great, the conclusions are a strange mixture of fulfilling and jarring, and two out of the three books I’ve read so far have included a really nice moment where Lord Peter lays aside his normal joviality to have a serious moral discussion with someone.
But there’s only one problem. The books were written in the 1920s and 30s. As such, some of the characters have some…outdated views and opinion. To put it more bluntly, I brought Unnatural Death (book 3 in the series) to a family friend’s house for Christmas dinner and was shocked to read a fictional character say the most racist thing I’ve seen outside of To Kill a Mockingbird.
Now comes the problem. Obviously, racism is wrong. However, as an author, I am cursed to hold unacceptable opinions. One of those opinions is that I don’t expect fictional characters to uphold all the moral standards that I do, especially if they’re from a different time and place. I write Christian fiction, and I appreciate a character with good morals probably more than the average person does. But do you know what else I value in a story? A good story. And it’s impossible to tell a good story with a cast full of morally upstanding characters.
Now, there are a few disclaimers that I want to throw out. Firstly, there’s a difference between including something evil just because you want to be edgy and because it’s good for the story. In this case, Sayers makes the racism pay off pretty well. The racist comments come from two side characters. The character of color (he’s mixed race and from the West Indies) is portrayed as a very kind elderly clergyman. Lord Peter is immediately ashamed of himself for even considering being racist towards him. And, although an attempt is made to frame the clergyman for the book’s crimes, he winds up receiving a sizeable check from one of the deceased characters’ estates, which he uses to support his family and further his ministry. His subplot is well-written and has an overall positive effect on the story.
However, not all subplots with evil characters are like that. I’m not terribly familiar with Game of Thrones, but I’ve seen enough clips of it on YouTube to know that it contains violence and sex just for the heck of it. A few episodes of Criminal Minds have had similar problems (although, as a crime show, it gets a bit of extra grace). As far as books go, I read a piece of historical fiction a while ago that included infanticide, which made me mad for two days.
Speaking of infanticide, I’d like to note that it’s okay to get mad at something and stop reading a book. I certainly stopped reading that historical fiction novel once they killed the baby. Did I miss out on potentially a good rest of the book? Maybe. (I doubt it, considering how hypersexualized the female characters had been up to that point.) The real question comes in when you ask if people should be allowed to write things that might offend people. I believe that, while authors shouldn’t try to intentionally offend anyone, you can’t fully pursue truth if you’re too afraid of making people mad to say what needs to be said. When specifically dealing with historical books, I believe we can’t fully learn from a censored past. I was once asked to remove some of the references to breastfeeding in my third novel Where Arrows Fall, and my response was that Vikings didn’t have baby formula. I won’t change the past to make my readers more comfortable.
In conclusion, I’d like to offer a few helpful guidelines for interacting with books written or set a long time ago:
- Not all views and opinions expressed by fictional characters are endorsed by the author–especially if the character is a side or minor character.
- Fictional characters are not supposed to be morally perfect. They’re supposed to be interesting.
- Judge the past with the same grace you’d like to be judged with by the future.
What’s your opinion on stuff like this? Let me know in the comments below! God bless you, dear readers, and don’t forget to review us on Amazon!