Writing Royalty

Writing Royalty

Ah, royalty, Kings, Queens, princesses, Henry Cavill as the Duke of Suffolk in the Tudors, what’s not to love about fictional royalty. I think almost every WIP I’ve ever written has somehow involved royalty. There’s just something about writing royalty that I’ll always love and find interesting. But, especially for my current WIP, writing royalty has involved a whole lot of research that has been fun if not a little tedious at certain times. So, here are some of my most useful tips and tricks about writing royalty in your story. 

Yes, They Actually Work 

I mean unless you’re making a character choice that your royal character pawns all of their work off on their secretary or First Minister or Steward or whatever, then royal people actually do work. Especially in countries where they have absolute power and aren’t helped or overseen by a parliamentary council or something of the like. Then, they really have to work. In countries where the monarchy is more a figurehead then yes they definitely don’t do as much work, but in my WIP, where the royals have pretty much most of the power, they all have to do a lot of work. Between all the scenes of plotting and romance and murder, I have scenes of them reading reports from ambassadors, signing treaties, looking over expenditure sheets. That’s one of the things that bothers me about a lot of books featuring royalty. The authors go on and on about how busy all the royal characters are and how good they are at ruling, but then they never show them actually working. And, I understand that might be boring for readers, but maybe at least mention it once or twice. If your royal characters don’t want to get like ya know executed or deposed or something, then they probably want to have some hand in running the country and doing the work. 

But Do You Actually Wear A Ballgown All Day?

I’m thinking no, but please, prove me wrong. Even back during Queen Victoria’s times or the times of the Romanovs, the royals didn’t wear their beautiful full length, full-court dress ballgowns all day, every day. That’s just impractical and unrealistic. If your royal character is at their family’s private home for the summer or winer or whatever, then they’re probably not wearing a whole bunch of fancy clothes. All the fancy dresses and crows and tiaras we associate with royalty and nobility, were basically their Sunday best clothes, not clothes they would wear every single day. Now that’s not to say that their causal clothes probably wouldn’t still be expensive and well-made(but not always, the Romanov grand duchesses were known to wear cotton dresses when they were in private during the summer). And, y’all, I swear if your story takes place during a time period when corsets are used please do your research about them, and any clothes or time period for that matter. But, specifically, as someone who knows a lot about corsets, every time, I read about a character absolutely hating their corset and thinking its so uncomfortable, I loose ten years of my life. 

Homegirl, where are your guards???

There is nothing that bothers me more than when a royal character is like in the middle of a war or their people are rebelling and they’re like, “ugh, I hate having all these guards around me. I just want to be free!!!!!” Which, okay fine, having a bunch of people follow you around and watch your every move does not sound fun, but getting offed doesn’t sound fun either. If your character’s country is in the middle of a war, and even if they aren’t depending on the country, they are going to have guards around them all the time. In Tudor England, guards would sleep in the King’s room even if he had company because people were always trying to assassinate each other. Even if your royal character has magic or powers or something, they still probably need guards. If your characters have been royal all their lives, they probably will know their guards very well and know how to sneak away from them for that oh so coveted night in the town as a commoner. 

Better Give Me That Title

First person to name what song that’s from gets……nothing but bragging rights. Anyways, titles are probably one of the biggest components of royalty. Who gets a title and who doesn’t get a title causes lot of friction in royal families. The siblings of the monarch, may want their children to be titled, but the monarch might be unwilling to title potential claimants to the throne. Are titles exclusive with only a certain number of titled individuals allowed at each time, or does the monarch freely hand out titles to all of their favorites? Both options have happened historically, but you just need to find out which option works best for your story. In my story, there are only a certain number of duchies and counties per territory, meaning there are only certain number of Dukes/Duchesses and Counts/Countesses per territory. That makes the nobility an even more exclusive group because there’s always a set number of peers and the titles pass down between families. 

They Are Still People 

This is true with any character you write, but especially with royal characters, a lot of authors have a tendency to write them as people whose only personality trait is being royal which having meet no royal people in my life could be completely true, but I don’t think it is. I think because of the way they were raised, being royal is a large part of their lives and maybe the most important part but they still should have a personality and other interests outside of being royal. There are countless stories of royals in history being forced to give up their true passions, hobbies, and interests because they had a duty to rule their country. That doesn’t mean those passions just magically went away though. Your character will still have them, and some nice internal conflict could be showing them and their desire to idk knit come into conflict with their duty as the Leader of their country. 

friendly reminder that when janeway said

Three years ago I didn’t even know your name. Today I can’t imagine a day without you. 

Do I have your support? 

Temporal Prime Directive. 

We’ve been through too much to stop trusting each other. 

Chakotay - let’s keep this one out of our logs, huh? 

I’ll bring the croutons. 

Surprise me. 

You’ve just threatened the wrong woman, Chakotay. 

Bridge to Chakotay: Scorpion! 

For two people who started off as enemies, it seems we get to know each other pretty well. So I’ve been wondering… just how close do we get? 

Bottle of champagne, moonlight sail on Lake George - how does that sound? 

Chakotay, there’s no one I trust more than you. You’re a fine first officer. Are you ready to captain this ship?

Not for a second. 

A soldier *and* a philosopher. Your intelligence file doesn’t do you justice. 

Commander, you and I have the same problem. I think it makes sense to try and solve it together, don’t you?

They’ll push you. They’ll threaten you. But they need you. They need this alliance… You have to make this work. I want you… to make this work. Get this crew home… 

I appreciate your trying to protect me, but a chance to see this place - it’s worth a headache.

Just be home before midnight. 

As Captain, that’s a luxury I don’t have. 

Thanks again for minding the store. 

But when I’m through… things might be better for all of us. Trust me. 

What’s important is that in the end, we got through this, together. I don’t ever want that to change. 

Are you with me? 

Maybe I could stand with an apple on my head and you could phaser it off. 

I’d say, have a seat, it’ll be a while. 

One of the nice things about being captain… is that you can keep some things to yourself. 

I won’t do this without my First Officer. 

Is that really…an ancient legend? 

Plenty of time.

what she meant was, “I love you.” 

SG-1

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i had a rough day and i'm watching The Mentalist and lisbon's caller id in jane's phone is a close up of this picture of the two of them on the couch, i am not okay