Are Stories and Histories the Same Thing?

European linguistic communication often apply the same Word of God for “ story ” and “ history , ” but many English speakers regard these words as antonyms . But how different are they really?At The Last Word on Nothing , Ann Finkbeiner asked some commit PhD historians for their thought .

Philadelphia - base author , editor , and historian Audra Wolfe opens the conversation with this answer :

Of of course account are stories . account is the field of change over time , which mean that it ’s an inherently narrative enterprise , with a beginning , a centre , and an end . To be sure , it ’s possible to write a history of a given second in time , a more static account that stress to get a peculiar Zeitgeist . But even then , the author has made sure decisions about how that moment of fourth dimension is defined . Something take place beforehand , to start the era under head , and something happened at the end , to close it .

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course , the exchange gets more complicated , and more interesting , from there . Consider this zinger of a statement , for example , from skill historian Alex Wellerstein :

“ … account is not a skill in any form and should not be mistaken for one . ”

It ’s a title that , upon first impression , may strike you as surprising , but one for which Wolfe and Wellerstein make , at several points in the conversation , a compelling subject . Here ’s Wellerstein :

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… the basic structure of the story / narrative is an artistic option . Is the history I ’m tell going to be a romantic or grand one , where the protagonist gain ground out against the world ? Or will it be something more tragic , where the world come through out against the booster ? Or something in between , as in irony or comedies ? These are all dissimilar modality for plotting a story out , and when you lay them out like this , one like a shot has ideas about how they might apply to one type of historical story versus another . atomic story is often told in one of three different narrative veins — the “ official story ” is usually romantic ( where the scientists , or the government , is a hero ) , the activist level is usually tragic ( good people being poison , or persecuted ) , and the Stanley Kubrick rendering is essentially satirical ( the whole world is crazy ) . Like all author , historians who are in control of their craft ought to make these kinds of selection purposefully .

It all makes for a wonderfully fuzzy , philosophical conversation . say the full telephone exchange at The Last Word on Nothing .

connect with the author at[email protected ] . Top Image : Philip of Macedon , inner example from A Little account of the World by E.H. Gombrich .

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