FICT 38 W — The Past Is Never Past: Historical Fiction Workshop
Quarter: Summer
Instructor(s): Deborah Johnson
Date(s): Jun 25—Aug 27
Class Recording Available: Yes
Class Meeting Day: Thursdays
Class Meeting Time: 12:00—1:00 pm (PT)
Tuition: $1000
Refund Deadline: Jun 27
Unit(s): 2
Enrollment Limit: 18
Status: Registration opens May 18, 8:30 am (PT)
Quarter: Summer
Day: Thursdays
Duration: 10 weeks
Time: 12:00—1:00 pm (PT)
Date(s): Jun 25—Aug 27
Unit(s): 2
Tuition: $1000
Refund Deadline: Jun 27
Instructor(s): Deborah Johnson
Enrollment Limit: 18
Recording Available: Yes
Status: Registration opens May 18, 8:30 am (PT)
The historical novel is reaching new heights and audiences. Recent bestsellers have found their stories in World War II, pre–Civil Rights Mississippi, and the court of England’s Henry VIII. In these successful historical novels, the concerns of the past resonate powerfully with readers today. This hands-on workshop will teach you to do the same in your own historical fiction. We will draw inspiration from All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr, The Wise Woman by Philippa Gregory, and Small Mercies by Dennis Lehane. Through close reading, discussion, and guided exercises, we will explore varied approaches to plot, character, and theme that connect historical moments to enduring questions of power, identity, and moral choice. Each student will write and workshop one chapter of 10 to 25 pages, leaving with a strong foundation for a longer work that speaks as urgently to the present as it does to the past.
DEBORAH JOHNSON
Author
Deborah Johnson’s novel The Secret of Magic received the 2015 Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction. Her previous novel, The Air Between Us, received the Mississippi Library Association Award for fiction. She worked in Rome for many years as an editor and translator and as a broadcaster at Vatican Radio. She has completed a new novel, Washington & Leigh, a ghost story about the beginnings of rock and roll set in 1950s Mississippi, which will be published in early 2027. Textbooks for this course:
(Required) Dennis Lehane, Small Mercies (ISBN 978-0062129499)
(Required) Anthony Doerr, All the Light We Cannot See (ISBN 978-1501173219)
(Required) Edith Wharton, Ethan Frome (ISBN 978-1508474135)
(Required) Elizabeth George, Write Away: One Novelist's Approach to Fiction and the Writing Life (ISBN 978-0060560447)
(Required) Anthony Doerr, All the Light We Cannot See (ISBN 978-1501173219)
(Required) Edith Wharton, Ethan Frome (ISBN 978-1508474135)
(Required) Elizabeth George, Write Away: One Novelist's Approach to Fiction and the Writing Life (ISBN 978-0060560447)