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Oct. 11th, 2011 12:03 pmThis morning I was trying to get my head around how the technical approaches to history that I know (historiography covering two and a half millenia, ethnohistory, historical method) fit in with Tosh's stuff (not hard) and with historicism, both oldish and newish. Adding historicism in makes it harder. It really ought not, but it does.
My problem of the moment is that neither Tosh nor the historicism bods have (unless I'm missing a study - it would make my life easier if I'm missing a study) examined the ramifications of their thoughts for historical narratives of a particular sort. In other words, they take their theories so far and no further, and novels do not enter the picture.
My pain, however, doesn't lie in this. This neglect of a particular narrative form of history (and the assumption by me that it *is* a narrative form of history) leaves room for me to play. My pain is that I will only have three hundred words to explain it all and fit it in with my thesis. Or even two hundred words A single article that talked about narrative in forms in general as it relates to historicism would help (and I have the new edition of post-modern, which doesn't do that, but at least chats around the edges) but what I really, really need is someone who explains the position of fictional narratives, unequivocally. I don't have to agree with them. They just have to make sense.
This isn't today's work, or even this week's work: it belongs to the week after next. I'm just sorting out what I don't have and wondering what to do about it. The easy way out is to declare that historicism doesn't address my question at all and to leave it out. I don't like this kind of easy way out. It means that the basic and essential problem - the relationship of formal history writing with the writing of fictional narratives on related subjects - is chatted about around the edges, because it's too complicated. I won't accept that one, either. I may have to take it past the dissertation and write that book I was threatening in Leeds, but there are some very real questions about narrative, about history, about how and why we shape and perceive our past in the way we do, and I want to see these questions through.
In other news, I'm tired of not breathing: I may have to go to the doctor again tomorrow.
My problem of the moment is that neither Tosh nor the historicism bods have (unless I'm missing a study - it would make my life easier if I'm missing a study) examined the ramifications of their thoughts for historical narratives of a particular sort. In other words, they take their theories so far and no further, and novels do not enter the picture.
My pain, however, doesn't lie in this. This neglect of a particular narrative form of history (and the assumption by me that it *is* a narrative form of history) leaves room for me to play. My pain is that I will only have three hundred words to explain it all and fit it in with my thesis. Or even two hundred words A single article that talked about narrative in forms in general as it relates to historicism would help (and I have the new edition of post-modern, which doesn't do that, but at least chats around the edges) but what I really, really need is someone who explains the position of fictional narratives, unequivocally. I don't have to agree with them. They just have to make sense.
This isn't today's work, or even this week's work: it belongs to the week after next. I'm just sorting out what I don't have and wondering what to do about it. The easy way out is to declare that historicism doesn't address my question at all and to leave it out. I don't like this kind of easy way out. It means that the basic and essential problem - the relationship of formal history writing with the writing of fictional narratives on related subjects - is chatted about around the edges, because it's too complicated. I won't accept that one, either. I may have to take it past the dissertation and write that book I was threatening in Leeds, but there are some very real questions about narrative, about history, about how and why we shape and perceive our past in the way we do, and I want to see these questions through.
In other news, I'm tired of not breathing: I may have to go to the doctor again tomorrow.