(Re-)Writing History: Literature as Historiography and the Construction of an Anglo-Saxon Literary Imaginary

When the early medieval English past does surface in contemporary culture, it often does so with less than savory effects. Nationalist and white supremacist groups invoke Old English literature in their reading materials, far-right politicians ground their policies in “Anglo-Saxon” history and institutions, and academic historians make mainstream news headlines with contentious debates over abandoning racist terminology. One of the reasons why untangling the ideologically fraught narratives of this period has been such a tumultuous project is that narratives of national origin and identity are not simply “misappropriations” of history, but a manifestation of an orientation towards that history that is equally evident in much of the academic scholarship on the period. By attempting to critique one form of narrative while reifying the other, an epistemological crisis unfolds in which scholars attempt to prove the invalidity of certain historical narratives through the use of methodologies that are themselves based on those very narratives. This dissertation argues that the dominant narrative of the early medieval English past is one rooted in nationalist origin myths that posit a definition of Englishness reliant on race-based articulations of an “Anglo-Saxon” identity, and that this narrative is perpetuated just as powerfully through literature as through academic historical and political discourses. This Anglo-Saxon literary imaginary entrenches variations on a single narrative of racial supremacy as the only historically valid interpretation of the early medieval English past, suppressing any evidence or interpretation that may counter that narrative. Literary history is particularly situated to critique this imagined past because its interest is not on the veracity of particular facts, but the way in which narratives of the past are constructed in historical discourse.

中世纪早期英格兰的历史形象在当代文化中浮现时，往往伴随不良影响。民族主义与白人至上主义团体在其读物中援引古英语文学（Old English literature），极右翼政客将政策锚定在“盎格鲁-撒克逊（Anglo-Saxon）”历史与制度之上，而学院派历史学家则因围绕摒弃种族主义术语展开的争议登上主流新闻头条。厘清这一时期意识形态层面充满争议的叙事之所以是一项极为棘手的工作，原因在于：民族起源与身份认同叙事并非仅仅是对历史的“挪用”，而是一种对待该段历史的立场的体现——这一立场在该时期的大量学术研究中同样显而易见。学者们一边试图批判某一类叙事，另一边又固化另一类叙事，由此引发了一场认识论危机：学者们试图借助本身就基于这些叙事的研究方法，来证明某些历史叙事的无效性。本论文指出，当前占据主导地位的中世纪早期英格兰历史叙事，植根于民族主义起源神话——这类神话将英格兰身份的定义建立在以种族为基础的“盎格鲁-撒克逊”身份表述之上；且这一叙事通过文学、学术历史与政治话语得到了同样强有力的延续。这种“盎格鲁-撒克逊文学想象”将单一的种族至上叙事变体固化为中世纪早期英格兰历史唯一符合历史真实性的解读方式，压制了所有可能与之相悖的证据与解读视角。文学史研究尤其适合批判这种被建构的历史想象，因为其关注焦点并非特定史实的真实性，而是历史话语中过去的叙事是如何被建构的。