On One Feature of the English Historical Novel at the Turn of the 20th – 21st Centuries: Reflecting on the Article by Jerome de Groot

Abstract

Critically reading the chapter of the famous British specialist in the field of theory and history of the English historical novel, Jerome de Groot, ‘Transgression and Experimentation: A Historical Novel’ in the multiauthored monograph British Fiction: 1980–2018 (Cambridge, 2019), the author of the article reflects on the phenomenon of the primacy of the historical novel in the canon of the contemporary British novel both in the postmodernist and in the post-postmodernist eras. Agreeing with de Groot that the historical novel of the designated period not only preserved the core of the classical genre paradigm, laid down by Sir Walter Scott, but boldly stepped into modernity, modernizing both meaningfully and artistically the eternal dialogue of the past and present, originally inherent in the genre, the author of the article emphasizes how well the chapter fits into the general concept of the monograph – to show the dynamics of British literature precisely through the prism of the dialectic of tradition and experiment. The author of the article agrees with his English colleague that it has been since the 1980s that English contemporary historical novel began to plunge even more thoroughly and philosophically (ontologically), without responding too much to postmodern historical and epistemological doubts, into the eternal questions of existence, the complexity of the dialogue between man and the world, the fate of man and humanity, etc. The author of the article also agrees with the idea of the English literary critic that metafictional historiographical approach and self-reflection (according to Linda Hutcheon) in the British historical novel did not become absolutely dominant phenomena; that the English historical novel of the 1980s and 1990s and onwards, having quickly ‘overcome’ postmodern delights, still retained the tradition of socio-psychological realistic reading of history, even experimenting with narrative, time structure, and historiographical concepts, which was especially characteristic of the female reading of the past (A. Carter, J. Winterson, A. S. Byatt, S. Waters). Simultaneously with the postmodernist exercises inspired in the field of historical narrative and temporal parallel (synonymous, antithetical, alternative) historical constructs, another line matured in the English historical novel, not related to the postmodern game, but related to the desire to reproduce the past in its volume, in the integrity of its cultural appearance, to construct the image of the past, to the ability to immerse the reader in the very existence of history. With the example of the novels by H. Mantel, R. Tremaine, D. Moggach, etc. the author of the article demonstrates this side of the dynamics of the English historical novel, not emphasized by de Groot.