Does it matter—in so far as anything literary matters these days—if historical fiction is inaccurate? Does anyone mind if Richard III is a tendentious, even a sycophantic and opportunist, justification of the Tudor dynasty, and that the real Richard III of history was a jolly Good Thing (in the Sellar and Yeatman sense), or at least a very much less Bad Thing?

Not long ago, I read Sebastian Faulks's novel Human Traces (reviewed in BMJ 2005;331:1029 doi: 10.1136/bmj.331.7523.1029). It brought out the inner pedant in me: there was more rejoicing in my mind over one historical mistake than over 99 true facts.

As it happens, there is …