17 December 2025
Registration for the Erlangen Conference is now closed. Happy festive season!
28 November 2025
The final programme for the HFRN Online Workshop is out now.
10 November 2025
The preliminary programme for our HFRN Online Workshop on “Historical Fiction in / and the Anthropocene” is available on our website.
20 October 2025
Registration for the HFRN Online Workshop on “Historical Fiction in / and the Anthropocene” is now open. The programme will be available soon.
15 October 2025
Registration for the Erlangen Conference is now open.
24 September 2025
Registration for the 2026 HFRN Conference will open in October. More information will be available here soon.
12 September 2025
There is still time to submit a proposal to our winter workshop on Historical Fiction in / and the Anthropocene. The deadline is on 1 October 2025.
4 September 2025
The CfP for the 2026 Annual Conference is now officially closed. If you have any questions, please be in touch.
1 September 2025
The dates for the next two HFRN Online lectures are out now:
24 September 4 pm BST (UTC+1) / 5 pm CEST: Yolanda Rodriguez Perez, University of Amsterdam, In Search of ‘usable pasts’: The Historical Novel in Spain
29 October 4 pm BST (UTC+1) / 5 pm CEST: : Emi Tozawa, University of Manchester, ‘Samurai Tales and Scholars’ Frowns? Historical Novels in Japan’
26 August 2025
The CfP for our 2026 Annual Conference closes on 1 September.
20 August 2025
The Historical Fictions Research Network has been officially registered as a charity with the Charity Commission.
31 July 2025
The CfP for our 3rd Online Winter Workshop is out now. Join us to talk about Historical Fiction in / and the Anthropocene.
21 July 2025
On 24 September 4 pm BST (UTC+1) / 5 pm CEST,
Yolanda Rodriguez Perez from the University of Amsterdam will be giving the third of our free online lecutures. She will be talking about: In Search of ‘usable pasts’: The Historical Novel in Spain
25 June 2025
Unfortunately, we will have to postpone next week’s lecture on Japanese historical fiction. Apologies! We will be in touch with a new date soon.
26 May 2025
Our CfP for the 2026 Annual Conference is out now.
19 May 2025
On 1 July, we will have our 3rd HFRN Online Lecture. Emi Tozawa (University of Manchester) will be talking about ‘Samurai Tales and Scholars’ Frowns? Historical Novels in Japan’.
7 May 2025
Don’t miss the deadline for our summer online workshop on Transnational and Postnational Historical Fictions. You can still submit an abstract until 15 May.
2 May 2025
Don’t forget to join us on 14 May for the next HFRN Online Lecture. Claudia Linden and Lisa Grahn will be talking about Swedish Historical Fiction – The Thrill of a Miserable Past.
7 April 2025
The CfP for our online workshop on Transnational and Postnational Historical Fictions is out now.
24 March 2025
On 13 June 2025, the Historical Fictions Research Network will be hosting an online workshop on Transnational and Postnational Historical Fictions. More information soon!
5 March 2025
Our first online lecture takes place next week!
Don’t forget to register so you can hear Jerome de Groot (University of Manchester) talk about “A ‘maternal genealogy’ of the Historical Novel (in ‘England’)?” (10 March, 4 p.m. GMT)
24 February 2025
HFRN is running a free online lecture series this year. For details and registration please visit our webpage.
24 January 2025
HFRN has left Twitter. Find us on http://@historicalfic.bsky.social
13 January 2025
The Journal of Historical Fictions is currently looking for new submissions. For details, please see our new website.
18 December 2024
The Draft Programme for HFRC 2025 at Manchester is out now!
14 December 2024
Call for Expressions of Interest: Reviews Editor, The Journal of Historical Fictions
The Journal of Historical Fictions is seeking a Reviews Editor to commence working with the Editor in 2025.
Tasks include: seeking review copies of relevant titles in the field, soliciting reviewers, editing and proofing reviews, and other tasks as required.
At present, we are planning to release editions of the Journal biannually.
This is a voluntary position. Please send a short statement about your interest in the position to Stephanie Russo at stephanie.russo@mq.edu.au
30 November 2024
Volume 5.1 of the Journal of Historical Fictions is out now. Congratulations to Stephanie Russo!
28 October 2024
The preliminary programme for the HFRN Online Workshop is out now!
22 October 2024
Registration for the 2024 HFRN Online Workshop is open now!
14 October 2024
Registration for the HFRN 2025 Conference at Manchester closes on 20 October!
22 August 2024
The CfP for our Winter Online Workshop is out now. We are looking for 15-minute papers on “Pleasure and / in Historical Fictions”.
15 August 2024
Registration for the HFRC 2025 at Manchester is now open! More information is available here.
15th July 2024
The CfP is now officially closed. Acceptances will go out in July.
1st July 2024
We have extended the deadline for the Call for Papers to 7th July.
Last chance to submit!
24th June 2024
The CfP for the Manchester conference ends on 28th June!
12th June 2024
Our Newsletter has moved to a new provider. To receive updates, please sign up here https://newsletter.historicalfictionsresearch.org/subscribe.jsf
3rd June 2024
The Journal of Historical Fictions,journal of the international Historical Fictions Research Network, is currently accepting submissions.
Articles should be between 6000 and 8000 words, exclusive of notes and Works Cited. For submission guidelines, see http://historicalfictionsjournal.org.
All enquiries concerning the journal should be sent to:
mail@historicalfictionsjournal.org
7th may 2024
The Call for Papers for the 2025 Historical Fictions Research Conference in Manchester, UK, is now online. Please spread widely!
23RD APRIL 2024
Happy to announce that the Journal of Historical Fictions has a new editor. Stephanie Russo from Macquarie University is taking over. Welcome Stephanie!
18th March 2024
Invitation:
Histories at Risk has organised an online workshop on Conservative Public History taking place on Thursday 2oth June 2024 from 10h00 to 18h00 GMT. There will be speakers on the Theory and Practice of Conservative Public History as well as case studies from Spain, the UK, Brazil, Colombia, and Nigeria. Sign up for free here, and please circulate this invitation widely!
Across the world right-wing popular political movements are harnessing the past as a means for attacking and challenging liberal consensus. From the infiltration work of Restore Trust in the UK to the legislative attacks of Florida republicans, work in this area is increasingly purposeful and well organised.
Whilst conservative popular history is hardly new, increasingly the ‘weaponization’ of the past has become programmatic and performative. As neoliberal think tanks and groups increasingly collaborate and share practice, method and funding in their resistance to progressive institutions and research, attacks on historical understanding are becoming organised. Historical knowledge production and distribution is becoming strategically addressed by various groups. Conservative approaches to history in public are becoming more performative and need to be understood to be countered.
What does this mean for an understanding of public history? How is the past in public becoming utilised by right-wing actors? What does this mean for an understanding of public history’s activist, liberal, progressive aspects? Does an understanding of public history as something innately conservative challenge our paradigms for work in this area? What is the theory and practice of right-wing public history?
https://www.tickettailor.com/events/historiesatrisk/1194749#
13th March 2024
Save the Date! The HFRC 2025 will take place in Manchester on
13-14 February 2025. See you there!
29th FEbruary 2024
TinyLetters, which we currently use for our Newsletters, will discontinue its services. We will be moving our Newsletter to a new platform.
23rd February 2024
The Historical Fictions Research Network (HFRN) has officially launched a new book series with academic publisher Brill at the Annual Historical Fictions Research Conference in Malmö this Friday, February 23rd, 2024 . ‘Global Historical Fictions’ is now open for submissions! Two publications have already been commissioned. Please do consider submitting your proposals and manuscripts.
Historical fictions are booming – historical novels regularly feature on bestseller lists and are nominated for literary prizes. Films and TV dramas set in the past likewise enjoy growing prominence. Across a range of media, the past is increasingly perceived through imagining the unrecorded, by encountering re-imagined personalities and experiencing what it might have been like to be “there.” Popular history offers both recreation and re-creation. Therefore, fictional narratives and images often supersede scientific history in public consciousness, and support political claims, identities and agendas.
Emerging from the international and interdisciplinary Historical Fictions Research Network, the series has three overarching aims:
- To explore the impact of popular fictional forms in the shaping of popular perceptions of the past.
- To widen the range of media forms (particularly popular ones) that are recognised as crucial to the popular understanding of history.
- Though studies focusing on individual nation literatures and cultural forms are encouraged, to draw attention to the importance of transnational or international popular histories and thus to challenge the Western dominance of the field.
You may find all further information here.
on the same day
Members elected new and old trustees to the board. A warm welcome to Paul Csillag (European University Institute, Florence), who is joining the board as a trustee for the first time. Please find all information on current board members here. We would also like to thank former trustee Mara Dougall, who did not stand for re-election, for her service to the network!
22nd February 2024
The opening of 2024’s Annual Historical Fictions Research Conference (HFRC 2024) takes place tomorrow. The conference will be co-hosted by the University of Malmö and the Historical Fictions Research Network (HFRN). More than 60 delegates will travel to Sweden from all over the world. The conference will include a business meeting of the HFRN, where the board will present their plans to register the network as a charity, or incorporated charitable organisation (ICO).
9th December 2023
The Historical Fictions Research Network’s Inaugural, International, Interdisciplinary Online Workshop took place this Saturday. Fifteen delegates from all over the world and time zones spanning the globe took part in the one-day-event, discussing new and emerging issues and approaches to the field of historical fiction and historical narrative research.
1st November 2023
The Historical Fictions Research Network will launch a new book series with academic publisher Brill. The series, entitled ‘Global Historical Fictions’, will welcome both edited collections and monographs. Find more information here.
Launch of the News section
The Historical Fictions Research Network (HFRN) website now has a news section. Please return to this page at your leisure for all of our latest news. Do also consider signing up for newsletter.
Historical Fictions Research Network 