I agree that's how a historian should do approach his job, but I suspect that's rarely the case of how it's actually done in practice.
Ed Bloom (Big Fish)
Neo (The Matrix trilogy)
Mr. Pink (Reservoir Dogs)
Vito Corleone (The Godfather)
Clark Griswold (National Lampoon films)
Raymond Babbitt (Rain Man)
Red (The Shawshank Redemption)
Police Chief Martin Brody (Jaws)
I agree that's how a historian should do approach his job, but I suspect that's rarely the case of how it's actually done in practice.