Reading Behind the Lines

This book takes the concept of postmemory, developed in Holocaust studies, and applies it for the first time to novels by contemporary British writers. Focusing on war fiction, Alden builds upon current scholarship on historical fiction and memory studies, and extends the field by exploring how the use of historical research within fiction illuminates the ways in which we remember and recreate the past.

Using postmemory to unlock both the transgenerational aspects of the novels discussed and the development of historiographic metafiction, Alden provides a ground-breaking analysis of the nature and potential of contemporary historical fiction. By examining the patterns and motivations behind authors’ translations of material from the historical record into fiction, Alden also asks to what extent such writing is, necessarily, metafictional. Ultimately, this study offers an updated answer to the question that historical fiction has always posed: what can fiction do with history that history cannot?