The Archive

Essays & Notes

Reflections on historical fiction, political memory, archival research, and the craft of writing about the past.

What the Archive Refuses to Say

On the silences embedded in the official record — the documents that were never filed, the testimonies that were never taken, and the history that persists only in the body.

March 2024Read

Research Notes16 min read

The Dictator in the Room: Trujillo in Literature

From Vargas Llosa's The Feast of the Goat to Junot Díaz's The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao — how writers have circled the figure of Trujillo without ever quite capturing him.

July 2023Read