I recently emailed a Professor of Anthropology at a well-known London University for two reasons: I wanted permission to use her department and some (fictional) staff within my novel; and to request permission to visit the department and talk to members of staff about my ideas regarding their professional discipline. Naturally, every facility offered would have been fully acknowledged, but she did not feel the proposal would advance her department or the discipline and therefore declined.

This left me in something of a quandry. In truth, I would much prefer to use a real context in which to set fictional characters, but that might not be achievable. Maybe I could find a more accommodating group of anthropologists, but for the purposes of my plot it would be difficult to find any located so perfectly.

So what do I do next? Refer to the university but omit the name? Fictionalise it? Use it regardless? Try to relocate my novel? Persevere until the original choice gives in? What have other authors done in this kind of situation?

Andy

There's no need to use real people in a novel - I'd just make them up and use a fictional department for the scene(s). I think it would be good to write back to the person concerned, thanking them for their consideration and agreeing not to use them. You could always ask them to have a look over your scenes when finished just to get any professional tips as to whether it seems realistic to them in terms of content - I think this would be polite and, whatever you do, make sure you acknowledge their help!

Good luck with it

A
xxx

Thanks - it wasn't real people I wanted to use, but it was the physical location and the university. I guess I could go over the heads of that particular department, or use it anyway without fear of redress, but it would have been good to obtain some goodwill and involvement in the work.

Cheers

A

What's to stop you using it?

There must be thousands of films and novels out there that have scenes set in real world places. How many films and books use the Whitehouse/Oval Office, TV Dramas using the SIS and MI5 buildings and name. The only problems I can see arising is if you use actual names or try and claim that such places or department made such and such a statement.

Then there's always the disclaimer, the

"This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coicidental."

So go ahead and use it.

Geoff

Does it have to be that particular university? I've had a great response to an email from someone at Nottingham Trent University who really took the time to answer my question. I found him through a link from a forum posting - http://www.scitalk.org.uk/

Sue

Fantastic find there Sue.

We should have a page here on Writewords to permanently store these kinds of links, as an open resource for writers.

Geoff

For advice on the subject matter, it can be from anywhere (and my affinity to Nottingham is not lessened by virtue of having done my first degree there!)

OK, let's be straight about this - we're talking UCL, not least because a significant part of the action takes place in Bloomsbury. At the very least, it needs to be a central London-based uni with a pre-eminent department of anthropology. The difficulty in using any one institution is that it will not be a particularly favourable view, which is why I sought their co-operation in the first place. Of course, I could mirror it on a fictionalised version (Euston University?!), but would undoubtedly lack the power of using the UCL name and lack authenticity without the co-operation of UCL staff. Bit inconvenient, though not the end of the world...

Thanks to all

Andy

I was going to direct you to the SciTalk site as well - great idea and put together by scientists who want to talk to writers, so it's a good starting point.

I would fictionalise it for the time being if I were you - you don't say if it something that you have anyone interested in already - if not, then why not write to them again when you are nearer publication - but not pester them right now.

Of course they can't exactly stop you if you aren't using real people, but why lose goodwill if you don't really need to.

I'm writing a children's book at present which I know is going to need a lot of changes on the technology/setting side - but seemed best to me to get the story right and then worry about details which don't affect plot or characters fundamentally and which can easily be fixed later.

best of luck with it
VM