Imagining The Past

Steven Conte speaks about planning and executing The Tolstoy Estate (2020), writing ‘behind the enemy lines’, the risks of shaking up a novel’s structure, and the Gurya Ghost and the Little Boy Lost with Greg Johnston.  

CYA author Susanne Gervey discusses her new time-slip novel, Heroes of the Secret Underground, migration, sculpting stories from WWII for CYA, and Pálinka with Greg Johnston 

Julie Janson is a Burruberongal woman of Darug nation.  She discusses her recent novel, Benevolence, the challenges of writing First Nation's Historical Fiction, and of First Nation's writers finding publishers with Greg Johnston. 

Shortlisted for the inaugural ARA Historical Fiction Prize 2020, author Sienna Brown discusses writing, multifaceted research, constructing Jamaican patois, and Master of My Fate with Greg Johnston.

Author and inaugural winner of the ARA Historical Fiction Prize 2020 Mirandi Riwoe discusses writing, research, gender-bending, sea-cucumbers and Stone Sky Gold Mountain with Greg Johnston. 

Imagining the Past’s new season features live recorded sessions from the 2019 HNSA conference brought to you by our host, Greg Johnston. Our  fourteenth episode explores the allure of France has often inspired historical novelists to conjure the romance and tumult of its history. Kate Forsyth’s latest novel, The Blue Rose, transports the reader to the perils of the French Revolution and the exotic world of Imperial China. Natasha Lester’s The French Photographer deals with more recent history of World War II France and America. Jackie Ballantyne discusses why Kate and Natasha were drawn to set their books in France, and how they discovered new stories to tell about a country that continues to fascinate.

Imagining the Past’s new season features live recorded sessions from the 2019 HNSA conference brought to you by our host, Greg Johnston. Our episode thirteenth explores the challenges faced in researching pre-history when there are no written records? How do you approach interpreting Middle Age chronicles? Or choose between a plethora of conflicting primary sources when delving into modern history? Isolde Martyn investigates the research challenges faced by Ilka Tampke, Gillian Polack and Pamela Hart when they tried to find answers that may or may not be known.

Imagining the Past’s new season features live recorded sessions from the 2019 HNSA conference brought to you by our host, Greg Johnston. Our twelfth episode explores History and Mystery: weaving a web of truth and lies in detective fiction.  Writing historical crime fiction is like a treasure hunt for authors who dig up nuggets from the past to recreate old crimes and mysteries, both real and imaginary. How do authors lay down clues to keep readers (and the central characters) guessing whodunit? How do you balance the interlacing stories of detective, murderer and victim? What sources do authors use to set the scene and solve the crime using old-fashioned methods of crime detection? Felicity Pulman tracks down the answers to these questions and more with Malla Nunn, Katherine Kovacic and Tessa Lunney.

Imagining the Past’s new season features live recorded sessions from the 2019 HNSA conference brought to you by our host, Greg Johnston. Our eleventh episode explores the silver screen: scriptwriting and adaptations. 
More and more historical novels are being adapted for screen with lavish production values and high profile stars. What is the secret to writing scripts compared to books? How do scriptwriters condense intricate plots into a few hours screen time while maintaining complexity of characters and themes? What elements are producers searching for when considering a story? And are compromises needed when wooing an audience compared to a readership? Jesse Blackadder, Malla Nunn and Mira Robertson discuss with Kelly Gardiner the different approaches required when writing novels, adaptations and screenplays.

Imagining the Past’s new season features live recorded sessions from the 2019 HNSA conference brought to you by our host, Greg Johnston. Our tenth episode explores Parramatta, the second penal settlement established in Australia. When Thomas Keneally and Meg Keneally decided to set their Monsarratt detective series there, Meg sought the assistance of local historian, Gay Hendrikson, to dig into the township’s history. Gillian Polack learns how Meg and Gay formed a working relationship to trace the footsteps of the Keneallys’ characters, locate potential murder sites, and pore over history together, and how their collaboration extended to Meg’s first solo novel Fled.