The historical sublime is very good fun

Today I want to talk about the historical sublime - one of my absolute favourite concepts! I don’t think it’s as widely discussed as it should be. 

This post is compiled from my notes on the historical sublime, from digging around in some of my favourite theoretical books and relevant articles, and from messages I sent in discussions of the historical sublime when a couple of my friends asked me about it. 

Basically, the historical sublime is the element of chaos and uncertainty in history. 

It’s all fun stuff like incongruities and ambiguities, incomplete bits, disruptions, stuff that just doesn’t make sense, things that put the frighteners up most historians - “the idea that the past has neither rhyme nor reason to it; that it is grotesque, or absurd, or sublime” (p.137 of On “What is History?” by Keith Jenkins) and “… the anarchic, unfixed and unfixable nature of reality - the sublime …” (p.218 of The Routledge Companion to Historical Studies by Alun Munslow).

When you encounter something that you can’t get at - when a person of interest vanishes from the historical record, or things can’t be explained, or something seems uncertain, or if you can’t quite make out what that image is or what that word says, or you’ve got something you can’t communicate in words and it’s more of a vibe, or stuff just gets weird, or anything similar - that’s the historical sublime. It gives us an opening for more imaginative engagement with our case studies, our favourite historical people, our chosen events and situations. In my opinion, more imagination leads to more fun!

It’s hard to pin down exactly what the historical sublime is (which fits with the sublime nature of it) and it’s a big thing in my PhD, so I went through a few books where the authors discuss it and I borrowed some of their words. (If you ask, I can get you the citations for all of them, if you want!)

From what I’ve seen, some historians like to believe that they can find The (Most Likely) Story of What Really Happened - which isn’t necessarily the case! 

The historical sublime forces us to confront the fact that we can’t find that - there’s always going to be bits we’ll never know, and a lot of what we think we’ve ‘found’ can be reinterpreted - so, unfortunately, most traditional historians usually just ignore the sublime. (On a related note, a lot of traditional historians don’t like it when they have to acknowledge that they don’t find stories but create them, based on their interpretations of evidence - but I won’t get tangled up in that right now.)

The historical sublime can also be used by historians (and people from other disciplines who like to explore and experiment with history) in communicating their work.

From what I’ve seen, the discipline of history is set up to favour histories that are neat and tidy, have discernible narratives, and appear to show meaningful connections between things in the past. When the historical sublime pops up - if historians start doing narratives without any particular structure, or random bits of something else thrown in, or other postmodern fun - the disciplinary mainstream can start to get a bit upset.

Here’s Hayden White: “We require a history that will educate us to discontinuity more than ever before; for discontinuity, disruption and chaos are our lot.” (p.50 of Tropics of Discourse by Hayden White) 

        I love the idea of the historical sublime as a method of empowerment! And, of course, anything that historians use can be taken into any other discipline or genre or way of working or anything else that you like! Interdisciplinarity is the future!

According to Alun Munslow, Hayden White uses the term “historical sublime” to mean 

“the celebration of the undiscoverable, possibly meaningless, and open-ended nature of the past. Such a meaninglessness is the only invitation that potentially oppositional and dissenting groups of historians may get to challenge certaintist (e.g. fascist) history. They, and we, empower ourselves when we can find no objective certainty in the past - in the sense of a factual correspondence of evidence with Truth - that can be used to validate the authority of those in power over us.”  

(p.12 of Deconstructing History by Alun Munslow)

        So what we’ve got here is a concept that can be used by less privileged people to challenge dominant historical narratives. It also encourages our attempts to reach/ imagine lost voices of the past - the people whose stories never survived. They’ve gone into the historical sublime. Dominant ideologies might want us to just forget about them.

Let’s have a brief poke at earlier ideas about the word “sublime”, before it started hanging out with the word “historical”. 

In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the sublime was contrasted against concepts such as the picturesque and the beautiful. Those two are like when you encounter something that makes you go “That’s fantastic, I might have to paint that” whereas the sublime renders you awestruck and possibly a bit afraid but, like, in a good way. 

Thinking about the time when these concepts were really hot, “[Hayden] White argues that … [when history was developing as a discipline in the 19th century] narrative history took on the form of the ordered, the measured and the beautiful, as opposed to a view of a past that lacked these aesthetic proportions, so that the aesthetic tamed the irregularities and grotesqueness of the sublime.” (p.141 of Jenkins, On “What is History?”) 

As far as I’m concerned, the past (and representations that we make about it) should be allowed to be wild and prolific in its sublimity, exuberant in its mysteries, while efforts to control it (such as attempting to insist on One True Story at the expense of others) should be scuppered. By not imposing a single narrative on the past, more people can be empowered to build their own past-based narratives! 

So there’s a kind of optimistic overview of the historical sublime. I need to do more research into it (I want to do a postdoctoral thing on it) but yeah! Enjoy!

How to cope with doing a thesis

I'm in the middle of doing my thesis and it is an absolute ride!

These things (not shown in any particular order) are all things that (usually) work for me - not everything works for everyone, but they might give you some ideas. 

(Also you might be doing a dissertation or a giant essay or something else arduous)

Stretch your damn hands

    Make sure you do it safely!

    Go on YouTube and look for wrist stretches, hand stretches, etc. You’re typing for a long time and it’s not doing you any favours. Here’s some stretch videos I've tried. (I'll keep updating that playlist as I try more!)

    Also stretch your neck and any other body parts that might get upset - stand up regularly - I’ve got a standing desk (actually an old teacher’s desk) - move about, dance, get the blood flowing.

    “But it’ll interrupt my glorious academic work!” Oh you silly twit. Stretching will take a couple of minutes, and your hands need to remain functional. Your health is worth more than some expensive letters after your name. Damaging yourself for the sake of achievement is not a good look.

[ALL CAPS SHOUTY BRACKETS]

    When I’m writing, when I don’t know something and I need to keep going but I can’t be bothered to leave the document/ break the flow/ try finding whatever missing piece of information, I use these. It’s just square brackets [SHOUT AT YOURSELF TO FIX THE SENTENCE OR WHATEVER] and continue like nothing’s happened. 

[INSTRUCTIONS FOR ME FOR LATER]

    Later, when you’re checking your draft and finding things to fix, these stand out!

Lists

 

    I go through each chunk/ chapter/ whatever of my thesis, and I make lists of the bits that need fixing. I do exactly the same when my supervisors read the thesis extracts that I send them - they give me feedback, which I turn into lists.

    Then I go through the lists - I usually tackle the easier stuff first - then that stuff is gradually eliminated, and the harder stuff ends up having easier bits - it’s all relative. 

Some days are better than others and that's ok

    I colour-code my lists so I know what I did and when I did it. This is just for my own amusement, and I can see how many things I crossed off at the end of each day’s work. I like a different colour pen each day! (If you haven’t got many pens, or don’t like the multicoloured look, you could make up a snazzy new pattern for crossing out every day - +|+|+|+, o0o0o0o, *∆*∆*∆*∆*, +x+x+x+ - whatever.)

This list is for things that need citing. When I've found something and shoved it in a footnote, I give it a 🛸 flying saucer. If I still need to find it, I give it a 👻 ghost.

    Sometimes you find a thing on your list that doesn’t even need doing! Some redundant paragraph that needs fixing - actually, it doesn’t fit there - rip it out! And that is quite satisfying. 

Saving stuff for later

    When you rip things out of your thesis (sentences, quotations, paragraphs, massive chunks, etc.) - save them! Make a new document and stick them in there. Sometimes you might need to refer to them later. It’s satisfying to hit delete, but very Not satisfying when you know you had something useful and you cannot find it anywhere FFS why, where the hell is it, If Only I’d Saved It [screaming]

I go into the Notes app, I search for the word "pulled", and I get all sorts of stuff!

    Similarly, every time I start a new draft, I make a duplicate of the current draft - which then becomes the old draft, and the duplicate becomes the new draft. I work on the new draft, and save the old drafts. 

Those documents beginning with the word "pulled" are full of bits I've pulled out of each chapter.

    And also back everything the hell up! My mum, who is a strong technophobe, knows that technology is not to be trusted, and regularly reminds me to back everything up. I keep backups on iCloud and on a USB stick.

    Regarding the bits that you’ve pulled out and saved: even if you don’t use them in your thesis, you’ve got the entire rest of your life to do stuff with them if you want. They could spark off your future publications. If you don’t use them, that’s ok - they’re just practice, like rough drawings in sketchbooks. 

Regular breaks

    When I get my teeth into something, I push hard. When I started the PhD, I was taking no breaks, and I was courting burnout. Now, I make sure I have two days off a week (which are for Me and nobody/ nothing else). My pattern each week is work for three days, day off, work for two days, day off. The days off allow my brain to settle/ stew, and I come back fresher.

    If you have an intense stint, or you’re coming up to finishing a list, once you’re done, Leave It Alone. Just leave it for a week. Let your brain settle. Do something else - if you can’t leave the entire damn PhD alone (like me), there’s plenty of other stuff you can do: relevant reading, go over some older work and evaluate it, make new work, make blog posts/ other content about your work, etc. Resist the temptation to go back to your thesis! 

    Meanwhile, somewhere in your head, your brain is making connections and doing other incredible brain stuff (don’t ask me) and, when you come back to your thesis, you’ll be able to look at it with better clarity. 

    My therapist told me about the fertile void which is (sometimes) when you take a break which helps you come back with more energy. You’re not just hurtling from one thing to another - you’re able to process stuff. 

    Taking breaks is good for you!

Communication/ rants

    Other people’s viewpoints are incredibly useful! Even just a brief chat with your mate (make sure you ask them if they’re willing to hear thesis misery) can lead you to “Hang about, that’s a good point and I’ve seen literature on that, I need to stick that in”.

    A really good thing that my dad pointed out: the thesis is the hardest piece of writing I’m ever going to do. Once it’s over, I can do anything I like.

Looking at the document is Hard

    Sometimes I have these horrid psychological blocks where I can’t even open up the thesis document. Sometimes, I can open it, but I can’t look at the words - it’s weird, it’s like it makes me feel ill, but like not physically? It’s like Bad Vibe [indistinct groaning] I can’t describe it in words.

    There’s several things you can do here. (Or several things that I can do. I dunno if they’d work for anyone else, but they might be worth a try.)

• Break time. Leave it alone. Try again later.
• Stretch!
• Do something else PhD-flavoured: read a chapter of that book (you never know when an author’s gonna save your arse), go trawling for papers on your university library website/ JSTOR/ ResearchGate/ Academia.edu/ T&F/ wherever else, have a vague no-pressure think about some postdoctoral stuff or ideas for further research (write it down and you could stick it in your conclusion later), whatevs.
• Do something else PhD-flavoured but sideways: for example, if you’re doing something with a specific historical case study, find music or recipes contemporary with that. I like reading magazines and educational materials contemporary with my lot (but I have to stop because I find it all hilarious and it turns into a distraction).
• Remember your achievements! You started [however many] years ago and now you’re Here. Look at your older work - this is something else I love, I get out old sketchbooks and look at my old drawings, and yeah, they’re alright, then I get out my newer stuff and believe myself to be an absolute genius because of how much I’ve improved. (And I intend to keep improving.)
• Choose one tiny thing to fix. One small citation, or a fragment of a footnote, or something. Just do that. This can give you a bit of momentum to do another tiny thing, which is excellent! If not, never mind and congratulations! You just improved your thesis! Every tiny thing is still progress!
• Leave your desk! Time for a walk! Or something else that helps you calm down/ gives your brain time to reload!

Change the font/ paper colour/ highlight colour/ whatever

    Words still difficult? Does it all look the same all the damned time? This tricks your brain into thinking that you’re looking at a new/ different piece of work.

I've got used to reading stuff on this background

Oh my days, it's completely different! (Haha my brain fell for it, and now I can get on with my work)

    The good people of Reddit have more on this.

Break it into chunks

    A huge massive thesis document can get overwhelming. Chop it up - have a few documents, perhaps one each for the introduction, chapters, conclusion, etc. Put it back together again later.

I like to print mine out and annotate them

    If you print them out, sometimes it's easier to compare your sections rather than switching between windows on a screen. Also it's fun to pretend that you're a detective and you've got to deal with reports. 

Don’t be a perfectionist (especially at the start)

    Get stuff written down/ drawn/ whatever! If you have an idea, get it down before you forget it! Write really rubbish stuff in your first draft - don’t mess about trying to get the perfect turn of phrase or whatever - that can be fixed later. Loads of mine has broken sentences, things written how I speak in real life, all sorts of nonsense, immediately followed by [SQUARE BRACKETS REPHRASE LATER GET CITATION WHATEVER] and all that sort of thing. Here’s some good words from Neil Gaiman. 

Bulk and cut

    Basically, stealing and adapting part of a strategy that some people use in training, and applying it to word count. This article explains more on the physical side. (I’ve never seriously done it in my own training, partly because I don’t fully understand it - I just use it as a metaphor.) In a bulk phase, you’d take on surplus calories, and in a cut phase, you’d aim to be in a deficit - apply that to words.

    Surplus: bulk the thesis up - I pack it full of words, I fill it with almost-stream-of-consciousness writing, I pile in loads of spicy quotes from elsewhere.

    Deficit: after leaving it alone for a bit, I cut it down. I go in and streamline it.

    Never mind if the words in your bulk phase are silly - get the word count up. There will be rubbish in there - this is where it diverges from the physical version, where you’re only meant to eat good stuff in your bulk phase, but in a thesis, just slam everything in there. You’re after the word count target.  

I like to think that I'd be a nicer trainer than this. Sometimes I shout at my thesis and make it lift books.

    When you’re bulking your thesis up, you can see the word count rising massively, and this feels great! When you’re cutting it down, you know that you’re getting rid of any unnecessary stuff and you’re improving the quality of the thing, and this also feels great!

One rep at a time

    Even adding one citation, fixing one sentence, etc., is something - you’ve done something and improved your thesis. Even if you later pull that bit out (save it for later!) you’ve still gained experience at learning what works and what needs improvement.

    This is a thing I learnt from lifting - if it's super hard, just focus on one rep at a time. (Make sure it's decent - maintain good form, don't swing your dumbbells, etc.) Then another one. Then another one. Before you know it, the timer goes off and you can rest!

    In thesis terms, focus on one tiny bit at a time. Are you editing/ proofreading? Here's a sentence. Tighten it up. Move onto the next one. Then the next, and the next, and - suddenly, you're at the end of the section and you've done some quality work!

Decent playlist

    I find that music (or lack thereof) influences what I make, whether it’s images or words. I’ve got specific playlists for drawing different characters or vibes. Same with the thesis - I like EDM with no/ few words. (Current fave: No Mana's What's Your Wifi.) Some people prefer video game soundtracks, which are designed to be motivating but not distracting. 

    Also, when you need a break, stick your favourite songs on and have a dance! Alternatively, before you start, listen to music that gets you hyped and makes you want to fight your thesis - currently I'm enjoying Blind Channel's Balboa (violent pop/ sort of nu-metal, nicely aggressive with very relevant lyrics about overcoming challenges) and Kasabian's Switchblade Smiles (electronicky indie-ish rock, slow build that increases in intensity, generally uplifting vibe).

Alrighty, that's some of my best Hot Thesis Secrets! Hopefully there's something useful in here that can help you push through. COME ON YOU CAN DO IT 💪

(I’m not saying how to cope with writing a thesis - not all of us do 100% written thesiseseseses that is a silly word, and I hate “thesi” because it sounds pretentious, and I hate the plural “theses” because it’s begging for a poo joke, although I suppose there is a great deal of satisfaction in finishing, ok never mind)