Amelia Possanza

Jul 25, 2024 | electricliterature.com | Justin Torres |Amelia Possanza |Saidiya Hartman |Hugh Ryan

For me, queerness has always been related to imagination. Like many of us, I grew up without a blueprint for a queer life. In the evangelical household I was raised in, I had to dream my queerness into existence, conjure a life that was forbidden to me, claim it because no one was ever going to give it to me. This has been true for so many of us, now and in the past, as we’ve existed outside of and beyond the boundaries of what our world calls normal and good.

May 14, 2024 | narratively.com | Amelia Possanza

For her book, Lesbian Love Story: A Memoir in Archives (named a Best Book of 2023 by NPR), Amelia Possanza listened to hours of oral history tapes, sifted through archives and retraced the steps of her research subjects across New York City. Next week, she’ll share how to take a similarly exhaustive approach to any research-heavy writing project in the Narratively Academy seminar Reporter, Sleuth, Storyteller, Spy: The 90-Minute Guide to Investigating Like a Pro.

Jun 6, 2023 | wfdd.org | Julie Depenbrock |Amelia Possanza

by Julie Depenbrock When publicist and writer Amelia Possanza moved to Brooklyn, N.Y., she found herself, for the first time, surrounded by queer stories — on historical placards, on her LGBTQ swim team and on her television screen. But these stories were rarely about lesbians — and even more rarely — lesbians in love. So began Possanza's journey into the archives to uncover the romances and role models written out of history.

May 30, 2023 | lithub.com | Amelia Possanza

Growing up, I was only allowed to watch one reality TV show: The History Detectives, which ran for eleven seasons on PBS. Viewers wrote in with questions like, did my grandfather’s pocket watch really belong to Mark Twain, or is that just another family myth? Then, the hosts—a sociologist, an architectural historian, and two auction appraisers—traveled to far-off libraries, scrolled through reams of microfiche, and interviewed other experts in search of an answer.