Historical Representation in Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke

Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell depicts a past that could not possibly happen but supports it with an astonishingly detailed apparatus of documentation, evidence and proof. The novel, with its obvious fictional status, reveals the processes of writing history. The theories of Hayden White and F. R. Ankersmit provide the background for understanding these methods of truth-fabrication. The multiplicity of representations, as a consequence of the above, can be found both in the theories mentioned above and in examples from the novel. Relating to the past involves a need for harmony with it, especially in the case of the approach of Jonathan Strange, which results in a continuous line of desired, ‘always already’, mythical pasts, maintained throughout history. It also indicates that although that past seems lost –or non-existent–, it can always be re-presented because it is not so far from us. It is only right beyond our reach: “wherever magicians used to go. Behind the sky. On the other side of the rain.” (Clarke 1000)Bscanglisztik