Eye on the Historical “I”: Creating Historical Fiction for the Classroom

How would an individual experience big, but in their time relatively slow, historical developments like the demise of Rome, the rise of Christianity, industrialization, or the emergence of the popular vote - given that humans are mortal? What understanding and wealth of experience an immortal could have! This is the central premise of a series of assignments in my European history survey classes (300 BCE – 1600 CE and 1500 - 1989 CE) where, over the course of the semester, students examine events from the point of view of an immortal fictional character: the Historical Eye. Students create and name a character early in the semester based on parameters of gender, geography, socioeconomic stratification and religion. This focuses the students’ Historical Eye on a historical “I,” a subjective experiencer, through whose lens they examine how parameters like gender or socioeconomic stratification can render the same historical phenomenon quite different in experience from one individual to another depending on systemic factors – the parameters of their character. The series of assignments of varying length create a personal connection to the past. This positively influences the students’ stake in the course and their interest in the material. They also learn the heavy intellectual work of research and citing as they gather knowledge to understand and explain their character. Students go above and beyond the requirements to scour sources for evidence, and use footnotes with creativity and rigor. They also report on thinking about their own place in relationship to the past, and present, more consciously and critically as a result of their relationship to the Historical Eye.