Cullman Center Institute for Teachers: Autobiography and History: A Non-Fiction Writing Workshop with Martha Hodes, July 22–26

Martha Hodes, Instructor

THIS IS A PRIVATE EVENT. IT IS NOT OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. 

This is a week-long seminar taking place from July 22nd to July 26th.

This workshop explores the intersection of autobiography and history-writing. Critically and thoughtfully reading a range of works that interweave personal experience with history, we will scrutinize each author’s research and method, sources and evidence. We will discern interpretation and argument, ask questions about the problem of memory, consider intention and audience, and evaluate style and voice. During our week together, participants will make their own forays into autobiography and history.  Drawing on the resources of the Library, each workshop-member will craft an essay that places a personal experience or a personal intersection with a significant event into historical context, whether local, regional, national, or transnational. On the last day, we will share our efforts and reflect on one another’s writing.

Martha Hodes is the author, most recently, of Mourning Lincoln, named an editor’s choice in the New York Times Book Review, a best book of the year by the Wall Street Journal, and one of ten long-list finalists for the National Book Award. Her honors include fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Fulbright Foundation. As Professor of History at New York University, she teaches courses on the art and craft of history-writing. As a 2018-19 Fellow at the Cullman Center, she is writing a book about a 1970 airplane hijacking, in which she was a twelve-year-old passenger held hostage in the Jordan desert for a week.

The deadline to apply for a 2019 Summer Seminar has passed.