Frank Ankersmit's Lost Historical Cause

The contemporary Dutch historical theorist and philosopher Frank Ankersmit, an erstwhile advocate and promulgator of what has become known as `the linguistic turn¿ in historical theory, is very well known within the discipline. His early position with regard to the historical text is frequently discussed and evaluated today, and his writings on the subject are often cited. However, this former narrativist position, so robustly defended by Ankersmit in the past, has been progressively marginalized by Ankersmit himself as his current and radically different theoretical position, most fully expressed in his recent publication Sublime Historical Experience, now takes precedence. Frank Ankersmit¿s Lost Historical Cause is a polemical account of, and a suggested explanation for, this Ankersmitean `trajectory¿ of thought which transported Ankersmit from the sustainable logic of his early work on the narrative form to the arguably unsustainable concept of sublime historical experience.