Metafiction and the study of history: makerly knowledge in the archive

Rapid changes in the context and condition of historical practice (technological, institutional, theoretical) invite practicing historians to entertain experimental techniques for engaging the past: for teaching students; for investigating archives; and for presenting the results of historical inquiry. The authors introduce a form of historically oriented research and writing that shows promise as a way of encouraging genuine immersion in the specificity and alterity of the past. This ‘metahistorical’ mode, which engages with historical fiction, but also with traditions of rigorous scholarly research, offers a powerful means by which to cultivate historical consciousness, and to promote imaginative historical practices.