In this practical workshop, writer and historian Tony Perrottet discusses how to bring the past to life in a way that is fresh, vivid, and relevant. He discusses how to find and most effectively use original and secondary sources to create both fiction and nonfiction works.

Perrottet explains how we can learn about the past by approaching it through our own culture’s obsessions with celebrity, sex, food, real estate, and fashion, and how we should approach unusual primary sources like ancient Roman gossip writers. He also discusses what storytelling techniques we can use to create a compelling narrative, explaining that writers delving into history must behave like travelers exploring an exotic lost world, trying to understand a landscape that is vaguely familiar yet bizarre.

Practical nuts and bolts of the literary marketplace are discussed, including composing winning magazine proposals, dealing with editors, formulating book proposals, and creating outlines. Participants may present their own projects for discussion.

Perrottet is a regular contributor to Conde Nast Traveler, National Geographic Adventure, and Smithsonian magazine and is the author of The Naked Olympics, Pagan Holiday, and Napoleon’s Privates.

CODE: 1J0-504