who has interesting take (that you don't necessarily agree with) on interplay of narrative as motive force versus material conditions/circumstances in outworking of history
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re narrative as a motive force,https://twitter.com/allgebrah/status/784487482201104384 …
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though in a history context, it's probably more about "what propaganda can you make work" and the narrative constraints on propaganda
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I specifically don't mean propaganda (ie a narrative constructed with intent, to "sell something", which is only interesting for its utility) but what I've been calling "world-ideas" ie models of reality
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basically the way I unify narrative-mode "here is the story of history and the pivotal moments when ideas emerged" and materialist-mode "the narratives are fake let's look at what people ate" etc stuff
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is people behave according to a world-idea which contributes to guiding action but over time the narrative drifts away from reality (eg what power centers have "legitimacy" vs which have real power)
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this tension builds until it becomes unsustainable at which point a new narrative has to be constructed to explain the current reality
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at which point the narrative is projected both forwards in time to guide action and *backwards* in time to explain events from before it existed
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this to me is the crucial idea that can be used to make sense of both events of history over a long span and also writings of historians projecting their world-idea back onto times past
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What do you think of Tolstoy’s Theory of History digressions in War and Peace?
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have only read anna karenina
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W&P is less tightly constructed but if you like thinking about the Big Sweep of Events overshadowing rather than being overshadowed by domestic drama it’s very satisfying
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nice knowing you
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