German and Austrian-German Historical Thought in the Modern Era

Every nation develops a narrative structure for thinking about history generated by its own historical experience. In this study, the German and Austrian German “historias”—the way the narratives of factual significance are structured as the “story” of the events—are shown in their sameness from the late 1600s to the present. Herodotus spoke of “historia” in our evidence of Western thought, by which he meant both “inquiry” and “story.” The “story” of how the one and the many in the society become differs in each national culture. While the interpretations of historical reality among historical thinkers in each period of modernism may differ within a national culture of a time, the narrative structure is shared by each thinker of that society, learned in their public and self-education within the society’s normative template. This “historia” shapes the emphases of how meaning is articulated among the historians of a society—in this book, Germany and Austria—regardless of their guiding ideas. The author argues that these societies can become more open to what has occurred in the historical thought that guides them if they see the constriction and oversights generated by the narrative style of their traditional historia.

This study is a significant demonstration of the importance of historia and the narrative construction of historical identity in the distinct German and Austrian-German cultures. The scope of the research, the depth of analysis, and the rigor of the argument all reflect Mark Blum's experience as an intellectual historian. It is hard to think of another scholar with the sympathy and imagination to do this work. Blum writes as if he knew these historians, writers, and philosophers personally.--Steven T. Ostovich, The College of St. Scholastica

Mark E. Blum is professor of history at the University of Louisville.