ABSTRACT
The commonplace view, culminating in Carlyle’s book On Heroes, had long been that great figures—heroes—make history. The rejection of this view came with Spencer and Hegel, for both of whom impersonal forces rather than individuals make history. This view became the conventional one in the twentieth century. Where traditional heroes had long been god-like in their qualities, modern heroes have been the opposite: ordinary people, even anti-heroes. What is the relationship between history and myth? Can heroes be historical?
