Narration is historically possible only in concrete dramatic moments

Evidence

Yet for Lukács the symbolic mode of presentation is itself merely a symptom of some deeper underlying mode of apprehension which he will call description, that is, a purely static contemplative way of looking at life and experience which is the equivalent in literature to the attitude of bourgeois objectivity in philosophical thought. For the realistic mode of presentation, the possibility of narration itself, is present only in those moments of history in which human life can be apprehended in terms of concrete, individual confrontations and dramas, in which some basic general truth of life can be told through the vehicle of the individual story, the individual plot. — Fredric Jameson, Marxism and Form, 401

Categorization

• DEFINE: Distinguishes description (static contemplative, ideological) from narration (possible only when history affords concrete individual drama) — a core Lukácsian pairing.
• XREF: The description/narration opposition connects to Adorno’s critique of Lukács and to the broader Frankfurt debate over aesthetic form vs. ideology. — connects to: Ordinary continuous life lacks events substantial enough for historical narration — Fredric Jameson, Marxism and Form, 519; Historical events only reach audiences after being transformed into narrative form; Historical events become communicable only by being turned into stories. (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Historical events become communicable only by being turned into stories. #corroborates (0.82)
• Historical events only reach audiences after being transformed into narrative form #expands (0.78)
• Historical writing begins only when events close enough to permit backward analysis #qualifies (0.75) — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 35
• Historical fiction offers a subjective interpretation rather than a photographic replica #qualifies (0.72) — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 766