Communications

ARTICLES

To the Editor:

With the convergence of history and fiction now upon us (AHR Forum: Histories and Historical Fictions [AHR 103 (December 1998): 1502–29]), perhaps it is time to change the title of the AHR to reflect this momentous development. The contribution of Margaret Atwood to the intersection of history and literature could be reflected in the journal's new name: Alias History. Or could the convergence of history and fiction be itself a fiction—another postmodernist construct—with no claim to objective reality?

     The editor of the AHR and the respondents to Atwood's essay are unable to distinguish between fiction and history, fictional narrative and historical narrative, and literary imagination and historical imagination. The epigraph of The Blue Flower by the acclaimed novelist Penelope Fitzgerald may help to clarify matters: "Novels arise out of the shortcomings of history" (Friedrich von Hardenberg [1772–1801]). The blurring of boundaries between fiction and history embraced by the AHR and the Forum respondents arises out of the shortcomings of historians.

     Lynn Hunt should not assign meaning to the ignorance of students. If students are unable to draw a distinction between history and fiction, it is the responsibility of the teacher to explain the difference between writing history and writing fiction. Student ignorance need not "reveal something fundamental about our supposedly postmodern age," a.k.a. "self-styled postmodern age" and "streetwise postmodern consciousness" (pp. 1517, 1502, 1507).

     Jonathan D. Spence describes the historian's task as a "search for knowledge about the past" in which the historian throws his or her "whole energy into the quest for interpretation and modes of recording that are as true as one can get to the spirit and contingencies of the past." Once this explanatory and narrative quest has been achieved, "the historian earns the right to bear a kind of witness, to speak with greater authority than others about what might have been and what could not have been" (p. 1524).

     Spence's description of the practice of history fosters the production of fiction. History is not about what might have been or what could not have been; it is about what has been. Fiction deals with the "might-have-beens" and the "could-not-have-beens"; history deals with what actually happened in the past.

     Spence endorses the use of fictional conversations of historical figures to enhance historical reconstruction. Although such a narrative device may indeed "sharpen the interactions between the principal figures and lure the readers deeper into their minds" (p. 1524), any use of invented dialogue runs the risk of distorting history by anachronism.

     John Demos encourages "a semi-novelistic brand of history," which claims to wrestle with the minutiae of historical evidence and to engage "the foundations of (dare we say) the human condition" (pp. 1528–29). Demos has in the past been an advocate and practitioner of history as a process for achieving "personal closure—even perhaps of exorcism"—for the past deeds of his family (John Putnam Demos, Entertaining Satan: Witchcraft and the Culture of Early New England [1982], p. x).

     The personal agenda that Demos has brought to his historical work has led him to distort documentary evidence. He has tailored his evidence to fit explanatory models borrowed from the social sciences, and he has neglected human agency as a causal factor. (For an analysis of Demos's historical methodology, see my article, "Ushering in the Millennium; Or, How an American City Reversed the Past and Single-Handedly Inaugurated the End-Time," Prospects 22 [1997]: 35–67.) Having once regarded history as a form of therapy, Demos now views it as semi-fiction. His preoccupation with social science paradigms and fictional narration has obviated any need to wrestle with the minutiae of historical evidence.

     For historians interested in wrestling with the minutiae of historical evidence, there is more than enough material to go around and a great deal of research begging to be done on documentary sources, as Brian Tierney points out in his letter to the editor (AHR 103 [December 1998]: 1758–59). Before the AHR considers turning to fiction, it might give history another try.

     The AHR might also consider establishing a genuine forum for the discussion of topics of interest to its readership—one that dares to present different points of view or discourses. In the "self-styled postmodern age," local narratives or counter-narratives within the historical profession should not be suppressed. If a forum can be provided in the AHR for Holocaust denial, lending legitimacy and stature to an anti-rational ideology (AHR 103 [December 1998]: 1760–61), why can't responsible historiography be given a forum as well?

Paul E. Chevedden

University of California, Los Angeles

Jonathan Spence replies:

In response to the trenchant comments by Paul Chevedden, allow me to clarify one point. My purpose was not to "endorse" the use of fictional conversation as such but to point out that certain very great historians of the past did frequently create such conversations in their masterworks, as a functional and deliberate part of their historical analysis. I was thinking specifically of the Chinese historian Sima Qian (ca. 145–85 bce), who is, I believe, still regarded by most Chinese scholars as the finest historian China has ever produced. A similar technique for recapturing the past was practiced by Herodotus and to some extent by Thucydides.

Jonathan Spence

Yale University

Lynn Hunt replies:

An AHR Forum is designed to provoke controversy, so I suppose that I should be happy to have been part of one that has succeeded in its mission. Unfortunately, the letter by Paul Chevedden does not raise any interesting issues. I respond only to avoid giving the impression that sloppiness of argument, willful misreading, distortion of the evidence, and superficiality do not matter to me. Chevedden claims that the participants in the Forum "Histories and Historical Fictions" "are unable to distinguish between fiction and history, fictional narrative and historical narrative, and literary imagination and historical imagination." Careful reading of the pieces would show, on the contrary, that each participant's argument is founded precisely on the distinction between fiction and history. I wrote, for instance, that "[Atwood] takes more or less for granted the difference between history and fiction, and so, I will argue, should historians" (p. 1517). John Demos wrote, "writing history and writing fiction, I learned the hard way, are very different things" (p. 1528). "Historians interested in wrestling with the minutiae of historical evidence," as Chevedden claims to be, might verify this evidence for themselves.

     Distortions of evidence are not all that uncommon in the midst of adversarial polemics, but Chevedden's own list given above points to a more serious intellectual failing. While everyone involved in the Forum granted the difference between history and fiction, we each in our own way put greater pressure on the distinctions, as Chevedden phrases them, between "fictional narrative and historical narrative, and literary imagination and historical imagination." Here, the differences are not nearly as clear-cut as Chevedden's lumping together would suggest. Indeed, this was precisely the point of the exchange, apparently one that Chevedden missed altogether. Atwood explored her own interest—as a novelist—in historical veracity, that is, the similarities between fictional and historical narrative. Why do novelists even care about verisimilitude? I tried to suggest that history and fiction had common sources in modern notions of temporality, that is, I argued that literary and historical imagination both depended on certain notions of the experience of time. Does anyone argue that historical imagination has nothing at all in common with its literary counterpart? Does their similarity or even convergence mean that they are exactly the same thing? Hardly. Chevedden proclaims, "History is not about what might have been or what could not have been." But this is a typically—for him—literal-minded reduction of a very complicated issue. Anyone who has seriously wrestled with historical evidence would reject this claim. How could a historian possibly know "what has been" without systemically considering what might have been or what could not have been? Few documents provide minute-by-minute transcriptions of the historical past; reconstruction of any event always involves some operation of imagination, of filling in. "Responsible" imagining is based on consideration of the horizon of possible explanations and the elimination of those that fit least well with the evidence.

     On one thing, I completely agree with Chevedden. I am all in favor of "responsible historiography." Responsible historiography requires careful presentation of the evidence, clear and coherent argument based on the evidence, and an effort to win disputes by the strength of an argument itself rather than specious references to Holocaust denials. I urge interested readers to go back and read the Forum and decide who in this instance is writing history and who is writing fiction.

Lynn Hunt

University of California, Los Angeles

John Demos does not wish to reply.

The Editors

REVIEWS OF BOOKS

To the Editor:

Keith L. Bryant's review of my book, Passage to Union: How the Railroads Transformed American Life, 1829–1929 [AHR 104 (February 1999): 195], revives many of the antagonisms, old and new, that attended the history of the American railroad. Those who focus on the social impact of the railroads, whether populists, social historians, or eyewitnesses, have long raised the ire of those who focus on the business of railroading. Yes, it is a controversial issue. But no, it does not negate the points I have made in my book, and should not be used as the basis for doing so.

     Let me say first that my book is a social history on the impact of the railroads. It delves into business matters only occasionally, and in the most straightforward ways, such as quoting annual report statistics on passenger traffic revenue versus freight revenue. I want to correct the impression Bryant leaves that I take on economic issues without proper grounding. Where he says I should have quoted Maury Klein instead of John Leeds Kerr, I would like to amend this by saying that references to the Louisville & Nashville are minimal and basically matters of easily verifiable historical fact, not issues of economic interpretation. While I am flattered by the interest economic and business historians have taken in my book, I would like it to be known that most of the references to business are simply matters of historical fact, not interpretation.

     Let me say second that I take serious issue with Bryant's assertion that the societal alterations I describe are "absolute negatives." While the book is critical, it nowhere states, for example, that "The railroads systematically destroyed small-town America," or that it allowed "the rape of the land," or that "Grangers, Populists, and Progressives were absolutely correct," or that "owners and managers of the carriers were predators feeding on consumers." The intentions of the railroad company owners and their political opponents are not the focus of the book at all. After reading this litany, I had to return to the book to remind myself that it discusses such things as tourism, new forms of social interaction, reactions against slavery, the design of luggage, the rise of souvenirs, literature, and songs about railroading.

     Let me also address his mention of errors and wrong terminology. Errors that I have been able to verify as such, including, of course, the passage on Grover Cleveland, were corrected in the paperback edition of the book, which appeared last August. Incorrect terminology, however, is a more complex issue than he implies it is, for two reasons. The names of railroads changed many times over the course of time. These differences show up even from year to year in company annual reports. This applies to station names as well. Working largely from documents of the time, I may well have used names that are inconsistent or wrong from a modern perspective. But, still allowing for the possibility of error, I have used the names that applied at the time. I probably should have realized the sensitivity of this issue, and indicated in an author's note the exact course of action I took. This also applies to place names, which were variously recorded in different sources from the same time period. I did not, it is true, adopt a modern uniform standard, which would be very difficult to do when quoting historical material.

     I would also like to respond to his statement that I have ignored railroad scholarship of the last fifty years. Aside from the fact that he himself acknowledges my acquaintance with Stilgoe, Martin, and others, he should be aware, if he is not, that the study of social change brought on by the industrial revolution is a field that had its origins in the work of the Hammonds in England and the members of the Annales in France, was extended by such historians as Philippe Ariès, and continues with dozens of recent books on the railroads and orphans, railroads and song, railroads and design, many of which are in the bibliography or footnotes. If he wants a business bibliography, he should read a business history, not my social history.

Sarah H. Gordon

Quinnipiac College

Keith L. Bryant does not wish to reply.

The Editors

To the Editor:

After slogging through the usual collection of safe, carefully "balanced" book reviews ("despite these concerns, it remains a solid contribution to the ever-expanding field of . . . "), how delightful to read the splendidly savage exchange between Daryl Baswick, David Leeson, and Dominick LaCapra regarding Keith Windschuttle's The Killing of History! [AHR 104 (April 1999): 709–11.]

     Anger, passion, sarcasm, personal attacks—everything a reader longs for! How refreshing to see some vitriol, some intellectual warfare in the section usually devoted to debate over whether an author overlooked an archive or misspelled a name.

     I encouraged the AHR to promote more combat to enliven both the journal and our mundane academic lives!

Tom Noer

Carthage College

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