Oh, boy. Folks, this is where it gets real.
Western civilization has a long history of theorizing history—and a lot of that theorizing came right out of Germany. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, for example, saw history as a series of epochs with different sets of overlords, because, you know, um, greatness deserves to rule, or something like that. He also thought Germany was going to be the world leader in the last, best epoch.
Cue a bunch of Nazis using his work a hundred years later to justify their quest for global domination.
Then there's everyone's favorite gadfly, Friedrich Nietzsche. This guy wasn't down with Hegel's view of history: he argued that history turns out to be a series of traditions passed down through generations. But according to Nietzsche, the best thing was better than that, to break out of our shackles and be an Übermensch, or super-man.
Now, Nietzsche meant all of that in a kind of spiritual or intellectual way. The Übermensch was just supposed to be someone who could live freely, without mental shackles; this kind of person wasn't supposed to, like, take over the world. Yeah, well, nobody told Hitler that. And guess who Hitler thought the real Übermensch was? And guess what he thought it was his right and duty to do?
Yeah, it's bad.
The stories we tell about the past are tricky. Is there any meaning in history at all? Nobody can say: it's all just theory. But as Mother Night shows, you can make up some pretty dangerous stories about history, and people will believe them. The novel pokes and prods at many of the ways people create history and comes to the conclusion that historical narratives are more an imaginative act than a retelling of facts.
Questions About Philosophical Viewpoints: Philosophy of History & Historical Narratives
- What is Campbell's investment in history?
- Does the text suggest any methods for getting history "right'?
- How important is art in documenting history? In creating it?
- How does propaganda distort reality and our understanding of the past?
Chew on This
Several times in the text, characters discuss the "machine" of history, assuming that it's like a clockwork mechanism that just runs. It's a predetermined, pre-set universe.
All of Campbell's research and documentation in his memoir casts him as an amateur historian collecting data.