Sediments of Time

On Possible Histories

Reinhart Koselleck, Sean Franzel, Stefan-Ludwig Hoffmann, Sean Franzel, Stefan-Ludwig Hoffmann

• Publisher: Stanford University Press
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781503605978
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Histoire
• Subtopic: Historiographie

Sediments of Time features the most important essays by renowned German historian Reinhart Koselleck not previously available in English, several of them essential to his theory of history. The volume sheds new light on Koselleck's crucial concerns, including his theory of sediments of time; his theory of historical repetition, duration, and acceleration; his encounters with philosophical hermeneutics and political and legal thought; his concern with the limits of historical meaning; and his views on historical commemoration, including that of the Second World War and the Holocaust. A critical introduction addresses some of the challenges and potentials of Koselleck's reception in the Anglophone world.

PART I

1

Sediments of Time

My topic is “sediments of time.” And I should preface it by noting that, as a historian, I am not capable of making any claims based on the laws of physics or biology. Instead, this essay operates much more in the realm of metaphor: “sediments or layers of time” refers to geological formations that differ in age and depth and that changed and set themselves apart from each other at differing speeds over the course of the so-called history of the earth. We are, then, using a metaphor that first emerged in the eighteenth century, after traditional, static natural history (historia naturalis) had become temporalized and thus also historicized. By transposing this metaphor back into human, political, or social history as well as into structural history, we can analytically separate different temporal levels upon which people move and events unfold, and thus ask about the longer-term preconditions for such events.

As is well known, historians usually deal with time in a bipolar manner. Time is either portrayed as linear, as an arrow of time that heads in a teleological direction, or toward an open future, or conceived of as recurrent and cyclical. The first model envisions an irreversible form of sequential unfolding, while the second addresses the recurrence of what is fundamentally the same. This cyclical model is commonly traced back to the Greeks, whereas the Jews and Christians are thought to have developed the linear model. However, Momigliano has already shown that this opposition is ideologically overdetermined.¹ Both models are insufficient, because every historical sequence contains linear as well as recurrent elements. After all, every so-called cycle must also be conceived of teleologically, for the end of its movement is from the outset its predetermined goal: cyclical movement is a line directed back into itself.

In what follows, I use a theoretical approach that draws on the notion of sediments of time to parse historical findings and circumvent the linear-cyclical dichotomy. Historical times consist of multiple layers that refer to each other in a reciprocal way, though without being wholly dependent upon each other. First, though, one more etymological point: in response to Kant and his formal, a priori definition of time, Herder already insisted on the idea of “proper or individual times” [Eigenzeiten], the idea that every living thing has its own time and carries within itself its own temporal measure. And a second etymological point, which is also worth noting, given its central importance for history [Historie]. In Greek, historia originally meant what is called Erfahrung (experience) in German, and since the related verb erfahren (to have an experience) implies going from one place to another, what is involved is something like a journey of discovery. But as a science [Wissenschaft], history [Historie] first emerges through the report about this journey and reflective work on this report. By definition, history is the science of experience. When I speak about sediments of time in the following, I am always referring to the results of experience, even if I parse these analytically into three different layers:

1. Upon examining the role of time in historical processes, the first finding based on experience is naturally that of singularity. Events are experienced primarily as surprising and irreversible; this is something that each person knows from his or her own biography. But the same applies to communities of action, which experience their own evolution in terms of political or military histories or social and economic situations simply as the succession of singular constellations. The same applies to all matters that need to be addressed historically. The history of religion, for example, recounts the shift from Saul to Paul, and political history the turning point of 1789 (or, more recently, of 1989). In each case, we are dealing with singular turning points that irreversibly define and launch pent-up processes. The same applies eo ipso to military victories or defeats that fundamentally altered the constellations from which they emerged, and to economic crises or discoveries in the history of technology or industry, where unique innovations have brought about irreversible results. We can thus consider such successions of singular events as linear, and locate all innovations upon such a time line. Progress is conceivable and possible because time, insofar as it is a succession of singularities, gives rise to innovations that can be interpreted as progressive.

2. This singularity is only half the truth, however, because history as a whole is based upon structures of repetition that are not exhausted in singularity. Take the banal case of the mail carrier who comes in the morning and brings you the message of a close relative’s death. You might be shocked or perhaps even pleased. In any case, this is a singular occurrence mediated to you via the mail carrier. But the fact that the mail carrier comes each morning at a specific time is a recurrent process, which is made possible, in turn, by a regulated postal administration and its budget that is renewed on a yearly basis. The mail carrier returns at the same time each day regularly in order to transmit singular messages. The same applies to all networks of transportation and communication. The fact that we are gathered together at this conference location and that we arrived at the same time, or at least on time, is based on train schedules that guarantee recurring processes in the railway system. Without the recurrence of the same, or at least of the analogical in planning, and without organization, singular events (such as our conference) could never occur. These might seem to be superficial, everyday occurrences, but more substantial proof exists of recurrence as a precondition for singularity.

Consider the relationship of speaking [Sprechen] and language [Sprache]. Whoever wants to make her- or himself understood uses the language that she or he already knows and with which her or his listeners will presumably be familiar; communication would otherwise not be possible. And even someone who wants to say something new must still make what she or he wants to say intelligible in a preexisting language. In order to make individual acts of speech understandable, one must be able to recall the entire preexisting linguistic inventory [Sprachhaushalt]. Singular acts of speech thus depend upon the recurrence of language. Speaking performs this recurrence again and again, which changes only very slowly, even when something entirely new is put into words.

To take a different example, the same applies to the relationship between laws and justice. Laws must be formulated generally enough to remain repeatedly applicable. They can only secure justice if they can be applied repeatedly. Individual cases might all differ in their singularity, but a minimum of recurrence is necessary if laws are to be applied to specific cases and if justice is to be guaranteed at all. This means that all theories of justice are based upon the relative longevity of laws and legal texts and their reapplicability. The same applies to theology and the Church, to rituals and dogmas, which only by virtue of their repetition offer guarantees of truth.

But enough examples. In all realms of life we can identify phenomena of recurrence that secure the condition of possible singularity. But then a difficult question immediately emerges, namely, whether and how these structures of repetition themselves change. In light of this, long-lasting structures of repetition, too, take on the character of singularity by revealing themselves to be alterable, at least in certain situations. And here we encounter the phenomenon that makes history so exciting: not only does the singularity of sudden events seem to bring historical changes with it, but longer-lasting structures that enable changes, but initially appear to be more static, are themselves also subject to change. The advantage of a theory of sedimentations of time lies in its ability to measure different velocities—accelerations or decelerations—and to thereby reveal different modes of historical change that indicate great temporal complexity.

A case that has been thematized often in recent years is that of the Wende in 1989 [preceding German reunification]. The GDR was incorporated relatively quickly into the old Federal Republic through processes, however contested, that made the former GDR into a durable part of the new Federal Republic. Constitutional history, as a history of events, leaves no doubt as to this fact. However, this view of the events does not apply when one examines the economic conditions and the mentality of former citizens of the GDR. The political act was performed quickly, in a short window of time, and with remarkable diplomatic skill, but it could in no way immediately transform economic conditions. Nor could it alter the mind-sets of the people living in the former East. The socioeconomic difficulties of conforming to the new order cannot be directly solved through politics. They can only be addressed through changes in behavior, acclimatizations, or processes of mutual attunement between the populations of the East and the West; in each case these processes seem to last longer than the time span of a half generation. We do not yet know how long exactly. Every empirical investigation of this topic would seem to need to work, at least implicitly, with a multilayered theory of time.

We have spoken thus far of singular events and of structures of repetition without which such singular events would not be possible. In both cases, these different layers of time have been connected to the ways in which individuals or generations living together as a group accumulate experience. Let us take a closer look at this connection. The singularity of a sequence of events can be empirically located at the point when one experiences surprise. To experience a surprise means that something happened differently than one had thought. “First, it comes differently, second, not as you think,” Wilhelm Busch observes. Suddenly one encounters a novelty, that is, a temporal minimum generated in the space between before and after. The continuum between previous experience and the expectation of coming events is breached and needs to constitute itself anew. It is this temporal minimum of an irretrievable before and after that inscribes surprises into our bodies, which is why we are always trying anew to interpret them. Historians in particular ask, not simply what has singularly been the case, but also how it could have come to happen the way it did. Hence historians seek causes whose evidential proof lies in their repeatability. Singularity can only be made plausible through causes if these causes repeat themselves. We confirm our recognition of such causes with expressions such as “Aha, I should have known that before,” or “One thing leads to another.” Therein lies the retrospective reaction that already refers back to causes that can always be called upon. Yet from a strictly historicist perspective, there are also singular causes that seek to gather explanations on the temporal level of pure succession. At any rate, the one-time experience of surprise adds up to a growing knowledge of the possibilities of such singular surprises. Becoming old means to be less surprised than the young. Increase in age is therefore characterized by a decrease in the potential for surprise. The more one internalizes an inventory of possible surprises, the less one is able to be surprised, a characteristic of youth. This is a biological aspect of the human experience of history, which cannot be simply subsumed into political or economic history.

To be sure, the arrogance of age can quickly lead to self-delusion because the resistance to surprise limits possible experiences. By repeating familiar modes of experience, opportunities to perceive anything new are squandered. To this extent, historical times are grounded in biological finitudes. The accumulation of experiences and the ability to process singular surprises create a finite inventory that spans from a person’s birth to death, and that cannot be overstretched or overburdened. Not every person can process everything. Herein lies an individual generational determination that can easily be extended to everyone alive at the same time who shares similar social conditioning or thresholds of political experience. This is how generational groups are formed, even if birth and death constantly change the makeup of such groups. Everything that can be said about the experience of repetition and the processing of singularity also always applies to generational groups living together for whom it is plausible to assume that they can communicate with each other.

3. The outlined biological grounding and simultaneous limitation of possible historical experiences point to an additional sediment or layer of time. Some historical times point beyond the experience of individuals and generations. This pertains to preconditions of experience that are in effect before their respective generational cohorts, and that will most likely continue after these cohorts pass on. Continuous, biologically conditioned reproduction is one especially basic and evident case of this, which is always in play over and above any specific groups of shared experience or action. This is the truly recurrent cycle from conception to birth and death, in which all stories of love and hate, all intergenerational conflicts are imbedded. This biologically grounded cycle has recurred in specific rhythms without undergoing fundamental change as long as the human race has existed, at least in this biological sense.

However, as soon as we move from biological to cultural questions, processes of recurrence that die off more quickly come into view. Nonetheless, many structures of repeatability exist that reach far beyond a single generation, as well as beyond any form of generational succession that can be experienced first hand, that is, where generations can communicate with each other face-to-face. Such phenomena of repetition that go beyond everyday experience might be called “transcendental.” This is the realm of religious or metaphysical truths that are based on foundational statements that have been modified over the course of millennia but that remain accessible, even if all people do not share them. We are familiar with the succession of magical modes of behavior and with different religious or modern, scientific attitudes that all span multiple generations. These kinds of human conceptions of the world repeat themselves in rhythms too slow for specific generations to directly experience their alteration over time. These long-term, recurring foundational assumptions only change at a creeping pace, and it is in this sense that they can be called transcendental; they are “transcendent,” not in the sense of otherworldliness, but in the sense that they reach beyond and undergird multiple generations. All groups with shared experiences possess a certain minimum need for transcendence: without it, there is no final explanation—however provisional it might be—and it would be impossible to translate experience into knowledge [Wissenschaft].

What can be defined, then, in everyday language as long-, mid-, and short-term provokes a complex theory of historical times. To propose the existence of different sediments of time makes it possible to grasp different speeds of change and transformation without falling prey to the false alternative between linear or cyclical temporal processes.²

2

Fiction and Historical Reality

Anyone engaging today with the question of the relationship between fiction and historical reality faces a twofold challenge. Tradition poses the first challenge, for the antithesis between res factae and res fictae belongs to the basic topoi that have been parsed in ever-new ways since antiquity. Examining the history of these topoi allows us to recognize the transformation of what in each case is experienced as historical reality. And, in the process, one also finds that this experience is not independent of what in each case is understood as fiction, especially in the realm of poetry.

The second challenge, which this essay addresses in more detail, takes as its point of departure the current discussion of how historical reality conditions fictional texts, and how this reality is in turn affected by them. This question is new, insofar as it has only become possible to ask it in such a pointed way since the Enlightenment, with its philosophy of history. Of course the notion that this question is particularly current is itself part of a tradition, for the categorization of res factae as res fictae once belonged to the realm of rhetoric and thus (to put it in modern terms) to an eo ipso socially and politica...