Who makes history? What is power? Is there
a God? Those are just a few of the fundamental questions of humankind that
Tolstoy addresses in his Magnus Opus “Peace and War”(1869). Following a
narrative of the French invasion of Russia and surrounding events from the
perspective of Russian aristocrats Tolstoy dives into a philosophical discussion
of historiography. The conundrum surrounding human free will and deter-minism
lies at the centre of his epilogue furnished with an abundance of metaphors. Tolstoy
starts off with a radical critique of modern historians who have fallen prey to
the same pitfalls as ancient historians. Thus, their search for causes of
historical events focusing on
great man guided by national goal such as civilization is futile. According to
Tolstoy, their limited understanding makes humans as unable to grasp the
purpose of a bee as the complexity of causality underpinning the movement of
nations. As an object of time and space themselves historians are left with the
task of describing the laws that they observe from history. But doesn’t the
existence of objective laws governing human affairs contradict our subjective perception
of a free will? Tolstoy introduces a set of equivalent dialectic relations that
are immanent in conceptions of human action to varying proportions: reason vs. consciousness, determinism
vs. free will, objectivity vs. subjectivity, form vs. content but offers little
to their resolution. Instead he seems to settle for a deterministic vision of
history by calling for a Copernican revolution in its study. Just like the
subjective impression that the earth does not move has for a long time
nourished the belief in a cosmic anthropocentrism so does the subjective
conviction of our freedom of will impede us to recognize our dependence upon an
inevitable historical trajectory. Thus, Tolstoy concludes by demanding us to
abandon the illusion of free will and submit to our determined role in some
greater cause beyond human agency. What has conventionally been attributed to
free will only outlines the limits of our understanding, what we don’t know and
cannot explain. Hence, recognizing what we don’t know we come closest to grasping
the complexities of history. Yet, Tolstoy’s conclusion of determinism seems to
contradict his own narrative. The novel’s swirl of historical events and
fiction reflects the same dialectic relationship as above swinging between
“‘swarmlike’ historical movement” and “the most personal details of human life”,
as Erin Greer points out. Given Tolstoy’s demand for the renunciation of free
will, his focus on the intensity of life may be seen as a nostalgic clinging to
the illusion of free will and above all to the possibility of “life” that
according to Tolstoy is contentless if subject to determined laws. Like in the
novel fiction comes in where totality is beyond human grasp, the fiction of
free will is used by historians to fill the gaps of human comprehension. Moreover,
Greer uses Tolstoy to criticise the narrative surrounding the 18 days of
protest in Tahrir square in Feburary of 2011 that preceeded the fall of
Egyption president Mubarak. In these days, the “great man” Mubarak is
reluctantly disillusioned. Only the rising storm makes the ruler realize that
the ship of the people has an enormous independent course and that he never
directed it. Yet, this metaphor raises the question as to who brought about the
storm or, in other words, who initiated the revolution? If the ship and its
movements represent the Egyption people and the sea history, the cause of the
storm must evidently be a force beyond human agency that outlines the
historical trajectory. Although Greer uses this comparison to expose Mubarak as
a “slave of history” while arguing that revolutions emerge from the collective
will of the people the unknown nature of the storm suggests that this
collective will is just as well subject to an incomprehensible force. Similary,
Greer criticises the central role of social media as mirroring the inadequate
attention to the ruler bemoaned by Tolstoy. As Greer emphasizes, Twitter and Facebook
has been unduly given a causal role in the Western media distracting from the initiative
and agency of the people. Consequently, Greer calls for a Tolstoyan narrative
of Tahrir square, illustrating the intersection of independent fictional
biographies with the greater revolutionary movement. However, the emphasis on collective
human agency that Greer tries to put into focus by renouncing the role of
rulers and social media is similarly diminished by Tolstoy’s demand for the
renunciation of free will and hence human agency of any kind. Greer’s final allusion
to the people’s souls suggests that she as much believes in a divine force to
be pulling the strings as Tolstoy may.
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