SOCSCI 1100: Readings in Philippine History

Reading 5
IMAGINATION IN HISTORY
Teodoro A. Agoncillo
Former Professor of History, University of the Philippines and
Former Commissioner, National Historical Commission

To any historian worthy of the name, imagination is as important is as important and necessary in
the writing of history as it is in the writing of fiction, drama, or poetry. Yet in the Philippines at least,
there is a widespread view, held by those who, in the memorable words of George Bernard Shaw, cannot
write and, therefore teach, that imagination in history is something to be deplored since history deals
primarily and supremely with facts. There is in this view an implied contempt for an element of historical
writing without which history will degenerate into mere cataloguing. When laid bare with a mental scalpel
the view is exposed to be nothing more than a gross misunderstanding of the nature history as a written
testament of past ages. This is because history, properly look upon, is not a matter of compiling and
reciting facts, of marshalling them in a time-sequence, and of allowing them to speak for themselves – as
if facts speak for themselves – but infinitely much more. It is a recreation of the past in such a manner as
to provide not only the bones, but also the flesh and blood of those moments which once were here but are
now only memories. As such, it provides the reader, within the range allowed by competent and verified
sources, with an accurate approximation of the past, which is the concern of history. To write this kind
of history requires a disciplined imagination and the ability to write with lucidity and with literary
freshness. History, thus conceived is a creative endeavor.

The ordeal of the historian begins not with its scientific aspects- the spade work and the
cataloguing of what maybe termed facts—but with its artistic aspect. Having gathered his materials, the
historian views and reviews his facts with feeling, nay, with passion, and tries to visualize them in such a
way as to fit each of them into its proper place or setting in the narrative. It is in the review of his facts
that the historian employs the historical imagination to the fullest extent allowed by his sources. One
might say that the facts are conditioned by the historian’s imagination, and the imagination is conditioned
by the facts. The two are inseparable and one cannot be wrenched from the other without seriously
affecting history as a finished product. Interpretation, which is an aspect of historical imagination, bears
upon the facts in such way that the latter becomes the tool, not the matter, of the historian. This is
obviously shown when two or more historians, given the same set of facts, arrive at different conclusions
or offer different interpretations. On the other hand, imagination not based on facts, or on fringes of facts,

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is wild and does not legitimately form any aspect of the historical imagination. It is in this area of the
imagination where the historian is less fortunate than his literary colleague, whether the latter is a poet, a
dramatist or a fictionist. The creative writer’s imagination is free to roam and to explore the conscious
and subconscious or even the unconscious, without being questioned as to its basis in actuality. Thus, a
fictionist may not use actual incidents or happenings to weave a plot for a novel or a short story. Or he
may use actual incidents as the core of his plot but modify them-- adding here, suppressing there—in
order to suit his literary purpose. Nobody questions him regarding the veracity or actuality of the
incidents he narrates in his story. This kind of freedom is not vouchsafed the historian, for his
imagination, unlike the literary imagination, is fettered (restrained) by the facts of actual events. Any
deviation from actuality would inevitably transmute history into imaginative literature.

I have been taught in college that imagination should not be employed in the service of historian
and that the historian’s task was -- and is – the narration of events without any embellishment. “Let the
facts speak for themselves.” I was warned by one of my professors who in his day was famous for being
the author of a little book on Philippine history in which we used in the Seventh Grade. Looking back at
those days, I cannot help feeling that with all his learning my former professor had a narrow view of
history. History as actuality is partially recaptured by the historian through a careful and judicious use of
data. Since history as a species of writing is a re-creation of the past, as much as the available and
verified facts allow, it is certain that written history can approximate the past only if the historian is
endowed with a lively imagination which recaptures, even in capsule form, the color, the atmosphere, the
action of past actuality. I said that past actuality can be recaptured only partially, for the function of the
historian is not to narrate every event that happened to every man every day of his life. To do so is not
only to fall into absurdity but also to perform Sisyphus’s task. It is for this reason that there is no such
thing as complete history. To say, as some book reviewers do, that a certain history book is the most
complete is to be stupid. There is not even a complete history to speak of, for not only does the historian
choose his facts out of the innumerable facts that constitute history, but also because no man or superman
can ever hope to read even one half of all available documents on any particular subject.

Historical imagination has several aspects each of which is relevant to and necessary in the partial
re-creation of the past.

Let me begin with what may be termed imaginative understanding. When a historian has
finished gathering his data of facts, he does not immediately piece them together in chronological or
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topical order but studies them thoroughly and intensely in order to go into or to participate in the events or
in the lives of men he intends to write about. This is the kind of immersion that the historian undergoes
before sitting down to write. In the explanation of men and events it is not enough to rely on documents,
for documents, while important, leave out many things that men did, said and thought. They are the
bones of history, but the flesh and blood must be supplied by the historian through judicious use of his
imagination. Thus, while the documents are silent on why General Emilio Aguinaldo, after coming to
terms through Pedro A. Paterno, with Governor General Fernando Primo de Rivera in the now historic
Truce of Biyak-na-Bato, continued to harbor revolutionary ideas and in fact, kept the truce money for the
purposes other than those contemplated in the agreement, one is nevertheless led to the conclusion, on the
basis of Aguinaldo’s actions, that he had no faith in Spanish promises. The conclusion is arrived at
through the historian’s imaginative understanding of Aguinaldo’s psychology and the antecedent and
surrounding circumstances. Without this imaginative understanding, it would be impossible for any
historian to communicate with his subjects and, ultimately, to re-live the past. The historian, therefore,
must exert serious efforts to understand the mind and character of the person he is to write about if he is to
make the portrait of the man as close as possible to the original. In the words of Cambridge Professor
E.H. Carr, “History cannot be written unless the historian can achieve some kind of contact with the mind
of those about whom he is writing.”

The historical understanding that establishes contact between the historian and his subject has its
basis in logical imperative, which is to say, that the imagination is anchored not upon some personal
fantasy or whim, but upon a reasoning that issues from the nature of the subject under study. Thus,
Aguinaldo, who had experienced Spanish duplicity before, could not help suspecting inwardly that the
Spanish authorities, by offering money to get rid of him, had no intention of keeping his promise. He
might have been wrong in his suspicions, but this is beside the point. What matters is that by his actions,
Aguinaldo showed he had no intentions of abiding by the agreement he concluded with Primo de Rivera
through Paterno. He did not intend to honor the agreement because his previous experience with the
Spaniards gave him a warning signal, so to speak, not to rely on promises.

The question may be raised whether an event or a man’s action may warrant two or more
interpretations by the use of historical imagination. If so, would not this aspect of historical imagination
be a liability rather than an asset in writing? The answer to the first question is yes, to the second, no. It
is the truism that no two historians confronted with the same set of facts, would arrive at exactly the same
interpretation. The reason for this is that historians differ as much in their personality as in their
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background and mental make-up. Consequently, their interpretations differ from each other, even
assuming that they employ the same aspect of historical imagination.
The beauty, not necessarily the validity, of their interpretations also varies in proportion to their ability to
write effectively and clearly. As to the validity of their interpretation lies not so much in the stated or
given facts as in the temper and mood of a particular period. Which is also saying that each generation
writes its own history and contributes its own interpretations which are different from those of the
preceding generation. It is for this reason that what is valid today may be valid in the succeeding era.
Since history is continually being rewritten by successive epochs, it follows that there cannot be any
finality in historical conclusions.

There is another aspect of historical imaginations which the British philosopher-historian, RG

Collingwood, called “interpolation.” This is an insertion of statements between those made by a
historian’s authorities or sources. Thus, for instance, a contemporary account may contain a statement to
the effect that General Aguinaldo was in Cavite on such a day and in Biak-na-Bato on another day.
Obviously, there is a gap between the two dates. It is in the use of this aspect of historical imagination
that the historian inserts his own statements which are merely implied in the authorities or sources.
Interpolation reconstructs for example, the event or events that occurred between Aguinaldo’s stay in
Cavite on a certain definite day and his arrival at Biak-na-Bato on another day. The reconstruction, in this
case, is not arbitrary in the sense that the interpolated material or statements are the natural consequences
of the evidence. Suppose we say that General Aguinaldo traveled on foot from Cavite to Biak-na-Bato.
This interpolation is not arbitrary because experience and knowledge of the terrain show that it was
impossible from any man to sail a ship or to ride horses since, according to contemporary accounts,
Aguinaldo wanted his departure from Cavite kept secret, even from the townspeople along the route to
Biak-na-Bato. The use of horses would have been foolhardy, for the movements of the revolutionists
could not, in the circumstances, have been kept from the people along the route from Cavite to Biak-na-
Bato. The use of ship, on the other hand, is fantastic and belongs to that species of composition made
famous by the Grimm brothers.

On the other hand, it is not historical imagination to write, by way of interpolation, that
Aguinaldo met this or that man and conversed with him for an hour or so. This is so because neither
Aguinaldo nor the contemporary accounts mention such a conversation. Therefore, any interpolation that
is not necessitated by the evidence is not historical imagination but a literary one such as that employed
by fictionists, poets, dramatists and historical novelists.
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Allied to this aspect of imagination but dangerous in practice, is the recreation of atmosphere or
setting. The difficulty of employing this aspect of historical imagination lies not so much in the absence
of documentary evidence as in the lack of restrain on the part of the historian. His success in employing
this device depends primarily upon prior knowledge of a particular scene in its historical setting.
Ignorance of the setting should inhibit the historian from employing this device. The prime requisite,
therefore, in the successful use of this device or technique is prior knowledge of the scene not only at a
particular time, but at subsequent times. In the Revolt of the Masses: The Story of Bonifacio and the
Katipunan, I described the atmosphere that surrounded the Tejeros Convention of 22 March 1897, thus

The Delegates, mostly belonging to the Magdiwang, lazily trooped that sultry afternoon to
the spacious estate-house of Tejeros… They came from all directions: from Kawit, Noveleta and
Imus to the north; from Tanza to the west; and from San Francisco de Malabon to the northeast.

No contemporary account of the meeting of Tejeros mention the afternoon to be sultry, nor the
directions the delegates took in going to the former friar’s estate-house. It was, however, 22 March and
experience shows that late March in the Philippines is the beginning of the hot season. As to the
directions taken by the delegates, common sense tells us that no direction other than those mentioned
could have been taken. In both instances, the imagination follows the logic of the situation. The absence,
moreover, of any account, written or oral, about a shower having fallen in the afternoon of that particular
day justified my description.

The same technique was used by Catherine Drinker Bowen in her celebrated biography of the
great American jurist, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. she wrote:
On the evening of her husband’s birthday- March 8, 1881- Fanny Holmes brought out a
bottle of champagne. She and Holmes drank it, toasting the common Law, toasting to its author.
Draining his glass, Holmes picked up the empty bottle, carried it to the sink. He held the cork a moment
in his fingers, turned it over. Outside, March winds, whirling up the hill across the stones in Grany
Burying Ground, shook the windows….

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And again:

Holmes got his hat and coat. The two walked down the steps of Dane Hall, turned left on
Harvard Square toward the president’s house. The sky was brilliant blue. Gusts of dry snow,
blowing along the bricks, touched their faces.

It is obvious that Bowen used her lively imagination to re-create the local color of a particular
place and time which does not appear in any document or eyewitness account. One does not have to rely,
however, on documents to show, first, that the month of March in the United States along the Atlantic
seaboard is late winter or beginning of spring and that during this time of the year, wind blows hard
enough to shake the windows; and second, that in December, the month of the second scene, snow falls
on the ground. The author, then, is justified in recreating the atmosphere of the two scenes described
above, because experience shows that the winds and snow are invariably connected with winter. The use
of this aspect of historical imagination is important not only in literature, but also in history. For history,
is not a mere compilation of cut-and-dried facts and piled one on top of another, but a recreation of what
the historian believes to be significant events based not only on documents, or first-hand accounts, but
also on common experience. To the matter-of-fact writer of history whose imagination is either
submerged or inhibited, such descriptive passages as Bowen’s are nothing but embellishments whose use
is not only unjustified but useless. It is such beliefs as this on the part of a great majority of writers of
history books that drove --- and still drive --- people to read fictionized history or journalistic history.
History, to be worthy of its name, must be written with imagination, with verve and color as
primary sources would allow. It is no wonder that the best history books have been written not by
candidates for a Ph.D. degree and by unimaginative chroniclers, but by writers with a sense of life ---
writers like James Gibbon, Theodore Mommsen, Thomas Macaulay, Francis Parkman, one of the greatest
American historians.
… More than eight months had passed since the catastrophe of St. Joseph. The winter was
over, and the dreariest of seasons had come, the churlish forerunner of spring. Around Saint
Marie the forests were grey and bare, and in the cornfields, the cozy, half-thawed soil, studded
with sodden stalks of the last autumn’s harvest, showed itself in patches through the melting
snow…

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Parkman’s beautiful description of the desolate scene is not based on any documentary evidence or
eyewitness account, but anybody with a keen eye for detail cannot fail to note that the forests are grey and
bare after winter and that in the fields such as those Parkman described one could see the sodden stalks
showing themselves through the melting snow. This is a common experience shared by most, it not all,
Americans with two keen eyes, an experience that has not been changed by vicissitudes.

A similar experience led George F.Kennan, an American diplomat, to describe vividly a World
War I scene on the Russo-Finnish border that he did not actually witness or read from any first-hand
account. On the last page of his book, The Decision to Intervene, he wrote:
For an hour and a half Wardwell and Davidson sat forlornly on the railway ties of the little
bridge … confined between the two strife-torn worlds of thought and feeling which no one had
been able to hold together.
This was a moment which, in view of the danger and strain and anxiety of the recent
weeks, one had long looked forward; yet now that it was here it was like death. The sky was
leaden; a cold wind blew from the northwest. The wooden shelter on the Finnish side was
deserted. Above, on the Soviet side, the figure of a Red Guard, rifles slung on shoulder, greatcoat
collar turned up against the wind, was silhouetted against the low scudding clouds. The little
stream, hurrying to the Gulf of Finland, swirled past the wooden pilings and carried its eddies
swiftly and silently away into the swamps below. Along the Soviet bank a tethered nanny goat,
indifferent to all the ruin and all the tragedy, nibbled patiently at the sparse dying foliage …

Kennan did not actually witness the scene he described in his book; nor had he any documentary
evidence to prove his statement about the cold wind blowing from the northwest, or that the greatcoat
collar of the Red guard was “turned up against the wind,” or that a tethered nanny goat “ nibbled patiently
at the sparse dying foliage” and such other details of a winter scene near the Russo-Finnish frontier. To
the unimaginative, Kennan is guilty of writing fiction into history. But let us hear Kennan’s plea. While
admitting that he had no documentary evidence to support his vivid description, he was nevertheless
familiar with the scene and, in fact, never saw such a scene in Russia without a nanny goat. He had
crossed the same boarder at precisely the same time of the year several times and always saw that a goat
was always tethered at the same time nibbling at the sparse foliage. Since such a scene was--- and is ---
constant, Kennan concluded that it could not have been otherwise. Had he not been to Russie, and, more
explicitly, to that particular place at that particular time, his description, no matter how vivid, would not
have been invalid as a historical construct.
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Constancy, or invariability, of a scene, therefore, is a primary factor to be considered in

determining the validity or “historicity” of a description. On the basis of this assumption, the last part of
the following description cannot be accepted as valid.

On Easter Sunday, March 31, 1521, mass was celebrated in Limasawa, attended by
Magellan, Rajah Siago and their men… The straight brown trunks of the palm trees stood around
them like columns of choir; through the dark leaves the yellow sunlight fell in moving splashes on
the vestment of Rev. Pedro de Valderama… the people of the village stood at a respectful
distance, watching breathlessly, their eyes bright with excitement, there was no sound but the
voice of the priests; not a leaf stirred in the green forest.

Pigafetta, the chronicler of the Magellan expedition, is matter-of-fact on this point. The author of
the preceding passage has definitely improved upon the ancient chronicler. I can believe and accept the
description of the straight coconut trees and the sunlight falling “ in moving splashes on the vestment of
the Rev.Pedro de Valderama” and that the people, naïve and not surprisingly awestruck, were standing
silently,” their eyes bright with excitement”--- for after all, the Roman Catholic Mass, the most poetic
symbolism ever invented by the human mind, was a novelty to them. But I cannot accept the description
that “there was no sound but the voice of the priest” and that “not a leaf stirred in the green forest.” The
possibility, even the probability, of absolute silence is questionable, for it is a common experience that
outdoors, absolute silence cannot be attained. Experience shows that even in a hot summer day in the
Philippines, soft winds blow and, blowing rustle the leaves of trees. When, on top of this, one considers
that the first Mass in the Philippines was said near the Limasawa beach, one is indeed constrained to
reject the author’s description as invalid and, therefore, unhistorical. Here the author’s imagination passes
from the historical to the artistic.

There was a time, more than fifty years ago, when the writing of history was considered a science.
The advance of the scientific spirit, particularly after Darwin, led to the adoption of the positivistic
doctrine of the scientific method in history. Historical methodology was taught and studied with an
enthusiasm that was worthy of a scientist working laboriously in his laboratory to discover some law of
Nature. The university classroom became the center of the “new” history whose orientation was based on
absolute accuracy and narrow specialization. The obsession of the academic historians was the mechanics
of history, and, thus obsessed they forget or deliberately submerged the equally important element of art
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in history. The result was deplorable: while it led to more and more knowledge of the less and less, it also
atrophied the artistic function of the historian. This, in turn, resulted in a plethora of unreadable and
undread history books and dissertations which gathered dust in the stacks. I was one of those
innumerable students who suffered from such books. It was only after leaving college that I began to
study Gibbon, Mammsen, Prescott, Macaulay, Trevelan, Parkman, and a few others who have made the
writing of history an art. Mere reliable history books which have no art in them have their uses, but in
the history of historiography they have very little, if any, value.

The danger of overemphasizing the value of accurate but nevertheless dull and uninspired
history books --- or nonbooks--- lies in this: that it tends to stifle the creative spirit of the student whose
minds are drowned by facts and facts and yet more facts without being allowed to weave them into an
artistic whole. It is unwise, I suppose, to insist that the young students should be taught only how to
gather facts, how to verify them and how to string them together like beads of rosary. It is equally
important, to my mind, to develop the student’s artistic sense. For history, in the sense that it is an
accurate record and interpretation of the past, is more of humanities than of science. The only scientific
part of history is that which deals with spade work and the sifting of facts, the rest belongs to the
humanities. It is for this reason that I consider the discipline of history not a part of social but of the
humanities.

Let me end by quoting two great historians, each a recognized master in his own field. Said
Ernest Renan, the great French biographer of Jesus Christ.
History is not one of those studies in antiquity called umbratiles, for which a calm mind
and industrious habit suffice. It touches the deepest problems of human life; it requires the whole
man with all his passions. Soul is as necessary to it as to a poem or work of art, and the
individuality of the writer should be reflected in it.

George Macaulay Trevelyan, the brilliant historian of nineteenth century Britain, wrote:
“The poetry of history does not consist of imagination roaming at large, but of imagination
pursuing the fact and fastening upon it… Just because it really happened, it gathers around it all he
inscrutable mystery of life and death and time. Let the science and research of the historian find
the fact, and let his imagination and art make clear its significance.”