How To Change History
A Salvage Project
“As a brilliant chronicler of both time and space, Robin Hemley’s incursions into the past are about awareness: sometimes in the moment, sometimes years afterward. The past is its own country, and, unlike geographical countries, it shifts unexpectedly, so we never know when we might again cross its border—as Hemley so insightfully does.”
While we cannot change events once they have passed, we can return to those events to learn and sometimes perhaps change our understanding of them. In How to Change History Robin Hemley grapples with the individual’s navigation of history and the conflict between personal and public histories. In an attempt to restore, resurrect, and reclaim what might otherwise be lost, Hemley meditates and speculates on photography, scrapbooks, historical markers, travelogues, TV shows, real estate come-ons, washed up rock stars, incontinent dachshunds, stalkers, and skeletons in the closet
Robin’s Other Books
Oblivion
Borderline Citizen
The Art and Craft of Asian Stories
A Field Guide for Immersion Writing