The Creation of the Past

Michael Oakeshott has gained a considerable reputation in political philosophy. He the doyen of contemporary British idealism, and his idealist inclinations have led him to offer theoretical considerations on a wide variety of matters ranging from religion to horse racing.' One interest to which he persistently returns the philosophy of history, yet comparatively little attention has been given to this aspect of his work.2 This relative neglect surprising in view of the admiration of it by R. G. Collingwood, who says, for example, that the chapter on history in Oakeshott's Experience and Its Modes is the most penetrating analysis of historical thought that has ever been written.3 This considerable praise coming from one who was himself engaged in a lifelong project to give people a concrete methodology of present-day historiography, integrated in its own past.4 It my intention in this essay to ground Oakeshott's philosophy of history and interpretation in the context of the concerns of British idealism. Where it appropriate, and in the interests of elucidation, I shall, from time to time

Epistemology · Idealism · Philosophy · Philosophy, History, and Historiography

• The Voice of Poetry in the Thought of Michael Oakeshott

  Efraim Podoksik•Journal of the History of Ideas•2002

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• Michael Oakeshott and Hayden White on the practical and the historical past

  Jonas Ahlskog•Rethinking History•2016

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• Oakeshott's answer

  Alexander Lyon Macfie•Rethinking History•2010

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• Selection, presentism, and pluralist history

  Open Access•Hakob Barseghyan•Studies in History and Philosophy…•2022

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