We ask this question, but is there really any meaning to it?? Is there really a difference between history and fiction?? Sure we might define fiction as a story, something that is created and constructed to be read for entertainment, it is not true of factual it's a mere fantasy. But can we really say that history is the complete opposite from this, or even different at all? History is what we believe to be true past events, that may tell us the story of why certain present events occur and may happen to reoccur as in the saying "history repeats itself". But if we were not there to view such events and occurrences how can we say that they are clearly factual and actually happened?? Is history not the recounted events of such a historian who has decided to to tell the story of such events that happened in the past, whether they witnessed them or not??
Both history and fictions are narratives of events, they tell the story of event from the point of view of the narrator. In fiction we do not get the point of view of many more characters other than the narrator or the main character, the same applies to history. The narrator of history, could be considered to be the historian, they tell the events from their point of view and only their point of view. Historical figures may be quoted but there voice is not really expressed. History being only a persons point of view on events, it conflicts and contradicts other histories. So which one can be said to be the "real" history?? Its not possible for things to have happened exactly as a person says, due to bias and the human memory is not that reliable. So what is history except for the mere fictions of the past?? The characters can be proven to have existed, but not every single event can be proven to have happened exactly as recounted
The phrase you allude to (generally attributed to Santayana, I believe) is "Those who don't study history will be doomed to repeat it." It's not simply that history just "does" repeat itself, whether we are aware of these repetitions or not--it's the commonplace assumption that the *study* of history is crucial if we are to *avoid* repeating the same quagmires and mistakes of the past. It's an argument, in short, for why history is presumed to "matter" more than "mere fiction." I'm not sure the Hayden White approach necessarily works against this idea (there is no single historical "truth," so it doesn't matter anyway). In fact, the idea of history as a field of contention, of competing interpretations and values (much like a novel workds), makes the reader's role *more* urgent. It becomes much more difficult to feel confident in a particular view of events, perhaps--but it doesn't become any less important to *try* and arrive at the insights or understandings that history can offer. Maybe it's just that these same insights are available in historical *fiction* as well?
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