Russell Shorto in Conversation with Rhonan Mokriski

Narrative History, Storytelling, and How We Teach the Past

Award-winning historian and author Russell Shorto joins Troutbeck Symposium co-founder and educator Rhonan Mokriski for a conversation about the power of narrative history - and how storytelling can transform the way young people learn the past.

Drawing on Shorto’s Revolution Song: The Story of America’s Founding in Six Remarkable Lives - along with his broader body of work, including The Island at the Center of the World and Smalltime - the evening will explore how history comes alive when it is told through real people rather than timelines and test dates. By following individuals - elite and ordinary, enslaved, indigenous, and free, men and women, Shorto reveals how human choices, contradictions, and lived experience shape the American story.

Shorto and Mokriski will connect this approach to the work of students in the Troutbeck Symposium, where young historians uncover overlooked local stories…