Alice Hoffman’s Journey from Magic Realism Novelist to Religion and Public Life

Alice Hoffman, MRPL ’24, is one of the most prolific novelists of the twenty-first century, writing over thirty novels including When We Flew Away, Aquamarine, and Here on Earth, which was selected for Oprah’s Book Club. Now a 2024-25 Religion and Public Life Fellow, Hoffman reflects on what drew her to the Master of Religion and Public Life program and how it has impacted her work. 

Hoffman first found out about the program after a friend connected her with American singer-songwriter, producer, and HDS alum Maggie Rogers, MRPL ‘23. Hoffman was especially interested in Maggie Rogers’ experience because she was a fellow artist navigating a divinity school. “I thought, ‘How did it impact her work? And what difference did it make to what she was writing?’” Hoffman continued, “She was very positive about it and how it had affected her work while she was there.” 

After writing many books with religious themes and magical elements, Hoffman looked forward to taking classes that would allow her to have a deeper understanding of religion and its place in literature. Hoffman felt drawn to the experience described by Rogers and, in particular, to the opportunity to grow in religious literacy, the first component of the RPL Method which serves as the foundation of inquiry in the MRPL.  

Another alum, American journalist and editor Phil Picardi, MRPL ‘23, encouraged Hoffman to meet with Diane L. Moore, the associate dean of Religion and Public Life at the time and the founding director of the program. “Phil Picardi had said to me,” Hoffman recalls, “‘Talk to Dean Diane Moore. If you talk to her, you’re going to want to go.’ So, I did talk to her, and he was right. As soon as I met her, I thought, ‘Yeah, this is what I want to do.’” Hoffman finished, “Now, having spent so much time with her and feeling her dedication to the program and the students, I feel really lucky to have worked with her.” 

Once a student, Hoffman found that the framework and curriculum of the MRPL program enriched all her coursework while providing space to pursue her own project path. “What MRPL allows you to do is follow your own heart. You can make it into whatever works for you, your work, and your search,” said Hoffman. 

This sense of searching was important to Hoffman’s experience at HDS, having immediately felt a difference in the people she was surrounded by upon arriving. “I felt people were there not to so much get something but to find something, and that was really interesting to me,” Hoffman recalled. 

Hoffman mentioned two classes that “really opened up things” for her and greatly influenced the novel she is currently working on: “Theories and Methods” with Professor Annette Reed and “We Are One: An Anthropological Introduction to Contemporary Spiritualities” with Professor Giovanna Parmigiana. 

While the lessons she learned and the classes she took were all intriguing and insightful for her work, she reflected that it was ultimately the people who truly made her time at Harvard Divinity School a worthwhile experience. “It’s the singer, not the song,” Hoffman said, a quote she lives by and that best encompassed her experience as a student.  

In addition to Diane L. Moore, Hoffman loved the professors she was able to work with. She most appreciated how they valued her unique situatedness, allowing her to tailor assignments to fit her needs and interests as an author. For example, Hoffman described Professor Shaul Magid as a fantastic teacher, saying, “Professor Magid allowed me to do assignments in ways that related to my larger work, like writing poems or fiction in response to class readings. That was great for me.” 

Professor Matthew Ichihashi Potts, Plummer Professor of Christian Morals and Pusey Minister in the Memorial Church, was another professor from whom she learned a particular lesson.  

“I always have thought that fiction tells the truth, and nonfiction is a lie,” said Hoffman. However, it was Professor Potts and his recent book Forgiveness that helped Hoffman articulate why: “A lot of people who write in an academic way also want the chance to write in a different way and find different kinds of truths. Fiction gets to the heart of things in a way that is pure and emotional.” 

Hoffman also felt the impact of her MRPL cohort and their moral imagination. Unlike the many ideologies that she encountered while working for corporate, she found that her peers united under a core value of “doing good and finding and searching.” She stated that “most people do not have time to explore and search while working full-time and balancing a bunch of other things. I was thrilled to be surrounded by so many passionate and reflective individuals from various fields.” Such interdependence with one another and the new insights born of their shared investment in just peacebuilding and the moral imagination to pursue not what is but what is possible have fueled Hoffman’s creative work.  

Hoffman’s use of fiction as a typology of peace is best exemplified through her recent novel When We Flew Away, which is written as a prequel to Anne Frank’s Diary, reconstructing the story of Anne Frank’s life from the moment the Nazis invaded the Netherlands until the Frank family was forced into hiding. 

“When I was asked by a publisher at Scholastic to write this book, I immediately said yes,” Hoffman said. “I felt like it was a way, even though I was writing fiction—albeit fiction that was extremely well-researched in cooperation with the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam—it was a way to express emotionally what had happened or what might have happened.” 

The novel, in many ways, embodies much of what Hoffman gained through the MRPL curriculum and the impact of religious literacy. 

“I still can’t believe I did it,” Hoffman said. “In a way, I feel like I stepped out of my life for a year. But everything I learned while a student in the Master of Religion and Public Life program now impacts my life going forward. I’m still friendly and in touch with several people from my time at HDS. And I feel really fortunate that I got to be with people who, at a time when I was searching, were also searching.”