Danielle Steel’s The Ring - A Blend of Fiction and History

Danielle Steel’s The Ring - A Blend of Fiction and History

Can a plot, setting, and characters in a fictitious story be derived from actual historical events and can the two blend together? The unique writing style of Danielle Steel merges true historical events with fiction in a manner that leaves the reader emotionally touched. In her story, The Ring, Steel does not show a partition between fictitious characters and factual historical events. In fact, the two are intertwined so well that the reader can imagine the fictitious characters as real characters during a horrific period of our history, World War II.

In fact, historical setting has a very significant impact on this work of fiction. Without the historical setting this story could not take place. The Ring by Danielle Steel follows a chronological order of the emergence of World War II in Germany, bringing along with it economic turmoil, political disorders, and the general insecurity and fear. This particular story is a direct result of history, which Danielle Steel blends very well with fiction. Though the characters are fictitious, they fit perfectly into the historical setting. For instance, Ariana, the protagonist in The Ring, has witnessed firsthand the human-made death and destruction of World War II, just as many victims had seen during the actual war. Even when she goes with her husband, Manfred, to the Opera house, she is reminded that the war is still occurring in Germany. “Even on Christmas night the war was with them… and in the distance they could hear the bombs”(Steel 164). Ariana has also seen the atrocities as a result of the emergence of the war. For instance, when she is looking for her husband, she comes upon “a stack o...

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...can see past their origins and cherish their country of birth, America.

Finally, Danielle Steel has successfully captured the interlaced merger of historical events with fiction. The two flow so naturally in The Ring that it is as if the fictitious characters were real characters in real historical situations. So, the blending of history and fiction comes very much alive in this story, revealing Steel’s creativity that has placed her above most internationally renowned novelists.

Works Cited

The Ring. By Danielle Steel. Dir. Armand Mastrianni, Perf. Michael York, Jon Tenney, Tim Dekay, James B. Sikking, and Julie Cox. Lifetime Special Presentation, May 27, 2002. Class Film. NJIT. LIT 350-121. Summer Semester, 2002.

Steel, Danielle. The Ring. New York: Delacorte Press, 1980.