ABSTRACT
Philosophers have always betrayed a certain scorn for both history and romance. In recent years, however, there has come into being a new and still developing interest among philosophers in what is called (rather misleadingly) the logic of narration. The clearest and most influential systematization of the view that philosophy is the logical analysis of scientific procedure has been that self-designated as logical empiricism, né “positivism.” The change is from a preoccupation with theory to an interest in narrative: “narrative explanation” is no longer a contradiction in terms. For comprehension, of course, there is a similar array of descriptions for every incident and character. They are not imperfect substitutes for more sophisticated forms of explanation and understanding, nor are they the unreflective first steps along the road which leads toward the goal of scientific or philosophical knowledge.
