The actual life of Constantine VI, the subject of Count No Man Happy, is a problem and for the same reason. His mother, the empress Irene, is known to history (and considered a saint by some) because she restored icon veneration. Certainly that was a major event in Roman history, but her son's minor claim to fame rests mostly on her ordering that he be blinded. His waring against Bulgars and Arabs under the fabled Haroun el- Rashid was pretty indecisive and his attempts to rule can easily be seen as an aspect of his mom's history. Likewise the treason of his uncle Nicephorus led nowhere except to Nicephorus being blinded. I did take some license here though. That Nicephorus attempted to seize the throne in the wake of a failed attack by Constantine on the Bulgars is a fact. That he collaborated with the Bulgars is not, or at least Theophanes Confessor made no such charge. I stretched the historical record because it could have been so and it made for a better story. Yet sometimes the historical record can be beyond what the writer would make up if he wants to be believed. I would not have dared to manufacture the episode where Irene chases her grown son around the throne room beating him. And much as I may dislike and even stereotype his mom it was necessary to admit that her minions were probably better equipped by experience to run the empire than Constantine's supporters. These certainly had their own agendas and were surely using him. The truth can be more complex than a simple fiction written only to entertain.
First, it is not enough to have an adventure story with a cross thrown in every once in a while. After all, Byzantium is strange territory to most people. If an author is writing about, say, Louis XIV he can assume a certain general understanding of the era on the part of his readers. So long as he does not actually contradict the known facts he can write a piece of pure fiction without concern that the reader will get some wrong idea. Byzantium is otherwise. One of the finest novels about the empire is Robert Graves' Count Belisarius yet because it is so good I have seen a fiction that he created cited as fact in a non fiction piece.
One must also consider the author's purpose in writing. A novel intended for a mass audience will be mostly a good story. Writing to engage those who would like to know something about the empire is as much informational. That was my problem in writing Count No Man Happy. I spent the first three chapters describing the background – especially the religious feuding of the eighth century – before I could get into the meat. Did that make those first chapters boring? You bet. But I did not think that I could do it bit by bit throughout the book. Perhaps another writer could have done so, but it would still have had to be done and the iconoclastic controversy is difficult for most people to care about today.
Paul
Kastenellos