World Canonical Texts
I have been re-reading Sima Qian's Shiji and Voltaire's historical works, especially with an eye on what portion of their texts should be included in a selected volume of canonical texts. That gets me think more about the criteria for "canonical history texts" in general.
If a History text needs to be considered "canonical," ideally it can meet many of the following criteria:
1. Canonical
a. Recognized in tradition as important (as foundation and/or as peak of achievement)
b. Mental/conceptual view of history accepted later in the tradition
c. Structure/framework emulated subsequently in the tradition
2. As History
a. Content/scope covers area/period considered important in world history
b. Ideally covers a foundational period in the political formation in its world region
c. Ideally also covers the foundational intellectual history of the world region
3. Texts
a. Reads well - interesting to read
According to above 8 criteria, Shiji is clearly a very important canonical history text:
- It is recognized both as a foundation and as a peak of historical work in the Chinese tradition (1a)
- Broadly speaking, Shiji respects the Confucian tradition in a broad sense (though later dynastic histories might look at things in a narrower / stricter lens than how Sima Qian applied Confucian concepts) (1b)
- The chronological and biographical matrix structure is followed in all subsequent official histories until the 20th century (1c)
- Shiji covers the foundation period of the foundation of Chinese and East Asian civilizations (2a) - in fact, Sima Qian intends to cover from the earliest period up to his own time - could be right up to his time of writing (though when he finished his work is not clearly known)
- Clearly covers the foundation (and boundaries) of the Qin/Han Empire (2b)
- It gives a good view of intellectual history up to Sima Qian's time (2c)
- Great writings - generally agreed (3a) - even though the most appreciated passages might not be the most important historical content-wise.
How about Voltaire? (Most of these will need to be argued with more studies)
- Voltaire is considered an important historian, but as yet not considered foundational nor his achievement considered long-term. [Though I would personally argue that his history is indeed foundational] (1a)
- His concepts/worldview is similar to ours (cf. Braudel's Civilization & Capitalism Vol 1 Preface, p.27-28: "It is quite easy to imagine being transported to, say, Voltaire's house at Ferney, and talking to him for a long time without being too surprised. In the world of ideas, the men of the eighteenth century are our contemporaries: their habits of mind and their feelings are sufficiently close to ours for us not to feel we are in a foreign country. But if the patriarch of Ferney invited us to stay with him for a few days, the details of his every day life, even the way he looked after himself, would greatly shock us. ..." In fact, his overturning the Bible/Christian-centric world view is truly a foundation notion of modern historiography (1b)
- His Essays on Manners is very interesting in that the structure is like any current coffee table picture book on World History published by DK or National Geographic or similar press targeting general audience. His Precis (on Louis XV), at least in chapters 31-38 on the Seven Year's War, and French internal problems (Versailles vs. parliament, Damien assassination, expulsion of Jesuits), written by Voltaire in 1768 -- when I compare it with a modern book on 18th century France published in the 21st century (the one I have on hand is The Great Nation: France from Louis XV to Napoleon by Colin Jones, published in 2003), the structure of the discussion is actually not that different. (1c)
- He covers from the earliest time till 1774 when Louis XV died (of course the later years of Louis XV has been sporadic); Voltaire lives till 1778, and he was making edits on Precis at least till 1775. His scope is all inclusive, and his world is already "modern" - even though he does not live till industrialization, America Independence, and the French Revolution - he has lived through and documented the Seven Years' War, which, as the background of the domination of the British (which set the stage of British industrialization) and important causes of the founding of the US and French revolution - the historical content he covered is clearly important in world history. In fact, the Seven Years' War was one of the first major events in the world where a "world history framework" is really needed to cover it well. (2a, 2b)
- Voltaire clearly knows his intellectual history, and included something like that in the back part of The Age of Louis XIV, but he could be more focused on literature than on his siding with the empiricism of Newton/Locke that he already made clear in his 1733 Letters Concerning the English Nation. In his historical work, he focuses more on discussing the religious outlook - a topic where he has a point to grind. (2c)
- Voltaire writes well, and his history is definitely of some interest to read as literature (3a)
***********************
Fifty Key Works of History and Historiography (Routledge, 2011)
I come across this book - I don't necessarily find its selection well done, but it explicitly gives 6 criteria for selection:
1. Early examples of method and style in historiography
2. Select non-Western works for contrast with Western works
3. Issues of evidence, and the emergence and practice of critical historiography, by which is meant a self-conscious search for believable evidence needed to support generalizations about the past, and teh exploitation of new kinds of evidence
4. The expansion of historical subject matter, or genres of history-- women, inorities, science, technology, ideas, broad interpretations
5. Works that take on generous chunks of the past
6. Problematic historiography, or eccentric works that rest uneasily in the familiar domain of history