ABSTRACT
Even for a constructivist theory of history, focus on intentions and communication is essential to understanding the formal limitations of history as history rather than as simply another imaginary or fictional genre. As a result of commitment to faithful representation, historians produce historical narratives on the terms of the material they have available and not primarily as formal innovations with a focus on storytelling or aesthetic values. Conceivably, excessive focus on the question of the continuity of narrative forms across genres and assumptions of equal fictionality among all types of literary artefacts can lead to a mindset inappropriate to historical study. The disruption history brings to narrative is naturally most evident in the aesthetics of the resulting text, particularly in the limited level of aesthetic closure that the text can achieve. For defenders of history as just one "imaginary" among others, practical considerations are also significant.
