{"product_id":"how-to-change-history-a-salvage-project-paperback-softback-9781496240323","title":"How to Change History; A Salvage Project (Paperback \/ softback) 9781496240323","description":"\u003cfont face=\"Georgia\"\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"6\"\u003eHow to Change History\u003c\/font\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\r\n\u003cfont size=\"5\"\u003eA Salvage Project\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"4\"\u003eRobin Hemley (Author)\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e9781496240323\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003ePaperback \/ softback, published 1 March 2025\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e198 pages, 6 photographs\u003cbr\u003e22.9 x 15.2 x 1.4 cm, 0.306 kg\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003cp align=\"justify\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e\u003cdiv\u003e\"\u003ci\u003eHow to Change History: A Salvage Project \u003c\/i\u003esuggests in sum that the impulse to take available fragments and remnants and from them construct a world and an experience in ways that can survive the test of time is the origin of authorship, and in authorship, the origin of history.\"-Douglas Reichert Powell, \u003ci\u003eAnother Chicago Magazine\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“Without saying as much, \u003ci\u003eHow to Change History\u003c\/i\u003e works as a highly unselfconscious form of memoir, an intimate form of engagement with Robin Hemley’s past but by way of broader subjects, which, as a methodology, has the effect of opening up the genre, the subjects at large, and the writer’s life. In other words, this is an entirely fresh way of approaching memoir-and, to my mind, one that is far more engaging and, by way of storytelling, engages the reader in a shared exercise. This is a beautiful collection and pushes both the essay and memoir in new and necessary directions.”-Lia Purpura, author of \u003ci\u003eAll the Fierce Tethers\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“As a brilliant chronicler of both time and space, Robin Hemley’s incursions into the past are about awareness: sometimes in the moment, sometimes years afterward. The past is its own country, and, unlike geographical countries, it shifts unexpectedly, so we never know when we might again cross its border-as Hemley so insightfully does. As readers, we feel great sorrow and tenderness for the foreigners trapped in that ephemeral kingdom, because those foreigners are us.”-Sue William Silverman, author of \u003ci\u003eAcetylene Torch Songs: Writing True Stories to Ignite the Soul\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“The thing about Robin Hemley is the thing about all great essayists: subject matter is secondary; the writer is the draw. Let Hemley ponder whatever his attention wanders to-diaries or plaques or photographs or family misadventures or so much more, all of it with a pinch of complicating ‘truth’-and I’m here for it, eagerly reading at snail’s pace to savor every word, because it’s oddball commentary that grants insight, not drama and suspense, and Hemley’s mind is the consummate guide to this wonderful world we share.”-Patrick Madden, author of \u003ci\u003eDisparates\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eSublime Physick\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“\u003ci\u003eHow to Change History\u003c\/i\u003e delightfully captures the pervasive influence of the past-personal, familial, historical-on ‘the temporary haven of the present.’ With humor, deep insight, and keen self-scrutiny, Robin Hemley reminds us that although history can’t really be changed, our understanding of it remains open to revision.”-Michele Morano, author of \u003ci\u003eGrammar Lessons\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eLike Love\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“Robin Hemley interrogates the tangled histories, both private and public, that constitute his legacy as a writer, son, father, teacher, and citizen. \u003ci\u003eHow to Change History\u003c\/i\u003e, a memoir in essays, features unforgettable characters from his extended family-his parents, both of whom were writers, an uncle who appeared on the \u003ci\u003eDick Van Dyke Show\u003c\/i\u003e, an aunt-in-law who is believed to have cast evil spells on her family-as well as writers and artists he knew through their work and a stranger whose scrapbook he purchased at an estate sale. So much of every person’s life is forgotten or never noticed in the first place. Against those odds Hemley achieves what he admires in \u003ci\u003eDeath in the Woods\u003c\/i\u003e by Sherwood Anderson, which he identifies as ‘a story about the observer trying to understand what it’s like to be another person, an impossible necessity.’ \u003ci\u003eHow to Change History\u003c\/i\u003e delves into the past and delivers revelations that will always remain mysterious, as they must.”-Kyoko Mori, author of \u003ci\u003eCat and Bird: A Memoir\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“In this rich and layered collection, Robin Hemley takes us on a fascinating tour of ruins, memories, scrapbooks, memorials, and mementos, luring the reader down each rabbit hole with a winning mixture of humor and vulnerability. At the same time, he is at work on a much larger theme in sketching a portrait of humanity through what we leave behind and how we try to stay the passage of time.”-Sonya Huber, author of \u003ci\u003eLove and Industry: A Midwestern Workbook\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“Reading \u003ci\u003eHow to Change History\u003c\/i\u003e is akin to sitting with an intimate friend, going through old photos and scrapbooks, conversing deep into the night about what connects us to the past and what might endure into the future. ‘Everything is about letting go,’ Robin Hemley writes, ‘but still we let go reluctantly.’ With his characteristic wit and keen acumen, Hemley inspects places near and far, even the most mundane sites-such as waiting rooms and flooded basements-for the wisdom they might offer us as we move through this temporary world.”-Brenda Miller, author of \u003ci\u003eA Braided Heart: Essays on Writing and Form\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e \u003cdiv\u003e“I wish Robin Hemley had written our actual history. In \u003ci\u003eHow to Change History\u003c\/i\u003e, we are invited into a world where our uncle works on set with Dick Van Dyke, where our parents were not only writers but also knew all the cool writers and actors, including Larry, Curly, Shemp, and Moe, as well as William Carlos Williams. Where Provincetown is a kind of hometown and the Philippines is our backyard. Where true love is attending an Air Supply concert at the behest of true love. Not everything is perfect in this world, but if Hemley had devised our world, our lives would have been funnier, kinder, smarter, and more beautifully written. So, while our actual history was often painful, at least we have this book we can live in for a little while.”-Nicole Walker, author of \u003ci\u003eProcessed Meats: Essays on Food, Flesh, and Navigating Disaster\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp align=\"justify\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003eIn \u003ci\u003eHow to Change History\u003c\/i\u003e Robin Hemley grapples with the individual’s navigation of history and the conflict between personal and public histories. In an attempt to restore, resurrect, and reclaim what might otherwise be lost, Hemley meditates and speculates on photography, scrapbooks, historical markers, travelogues, TV shows, real estate come-ons, washed up rock stars, incontinent dachshunds, stalkers, skeletons in the closet, and literature. He also examines his parents’ lives as writers, documenting their under-seen influence on the art movements of the day.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e In one essay, he writes about his mother’s first cousin, Roy, a survivor of Pearl Harbor whose troubled daughter murdered him. The essay “Jim’s Corner” examines the notion of memorial plaques and how they often highlight erasure rather than forestall it. Hemley writes about a stranger whose World War II experiences were chronicled in a scrapbook Hemley bought at an estate sale. In this book about reconstruction, Hemley posits that while we cannot change events once they have passed, we can return to those events to learn and sometimes perhaps change our understanding of them.\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e\u003cp\u003e List of Illustrations\u003cbr\u003e Acknowledgments \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e Prologue: Moments of Attention \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e Part 1. Indescribable People\u003cbr\u003e In the Waiting Room of Dick Van Dyke\u003cbr\u003e Reading History to My Mother\u003cbr\u003e The Incomplete History of Mary Hilliard\u003cbr\u003e Jim’s Corner\u003cbr\u003e In the Theater of Half-Truths\u003cbr\u003e In the Storeroom of Figments\u003cbr\u003e A Word from Our Sponsors\u003cbr\u003e The Unmentionable One \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e Part 2. Ghosts I Follow\u003cbr\u003e How to Change History\u003cbr\u003e Of the Affection of Fathers for Their Children\u003cbr\u003e A Reincarnation When I Didn’t Want One\u003cbr\u003e The Dachshund Endures\u003cbr\u003e On the Island of Our Fathers’ Ghosts\u003cbr\u003e For the Spirits of Guinaang\u003cbr\u003e Feast for the Departed\u003cbr\u003e In the Storeroom of Petty Hatreds \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e Part 3. Salvage Projects\u003cbr\u003e How to Remove a Curse\u003cbr\u003e Something Must Be Understood\u003cbr\u003e Skinny Dipping with James Agee\u003cbr\u003e The Hypocrite’s Guide to Saving the Earth\u003cbr\u003e The Air Supply Guide to Matrimonial Bliss\u003cbr\u003e How to Change History, Redux\u003cbr\u003e The Writer across the Table\u003cbr\u003e In the Basement of Afflictions \u003c\/p\u003e\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003c\/font\u003e","brand":"University of Nebraska Press","offers":[{"title":"Brand New","offer_id":52681743139096,"sku":"9781496240323","price":15.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"url":"https:\/\/freshlyprintedbooks.co.uk\/products\/how-to-change-history-a-salvage-project-paperback-softback-9781496240323","provider":"Freshly Printed Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}