The Archive Is Incomplete: Writing Around Absence

Not all stories are told directly. Some are reconstructed from fragments – a torn letter, a redacted report, a missing voice in an official account. In both literature and video games, absence can be as powerful as revelation.

This interactive workshop explores how writers can use erasure, fragmentation, omission and implication to craft narratives that feel discovered rather than declared. Drawing inspiration from narrative-driven games such as Pentiment, Heaven’s Vault and Tacoma, alongside literary techniques found in memoir, archival fiction and crime writing, participants will examine how incomplete records and missing perspectives create narrative tension and interpretive depth.