The Natures of History and Fiction

The following is my response to the question "how is history distinct from fiction?":

Before considering the differences between history and fiction, we should look at the similarities between the two. For one thing, they both strive to say something significant; there's a sense of importance when we come across anything written down or orally passed through generations. Furthermore, both history and fiction say something about our world--which is vague, I know. What I mean to say is that they both describe something recognizable, something unmistakably human. They represent the way we perceive things, our feelings and reactions, and the nature of humanity in general. Even science fiction, for example, has recognizable, human, elements to it. After all, can something written by a human, no matter how alien, say absolutely nothing "true" about the world we live in? In fact, I doubt we would even be willing to read, let alone consider, any piece of literature which we didn't understand in the context of our world. History tells us about all that is purportedly "true," and thus we take it as fact. Yet with history, too, there are many different points of view.

History and fiction both strive to mark the significant and bring to light the "true," with true being that with which we can relate and recognize. They do so in different ways, and this is the main distinction between them. While fiction uses fictional characters, settings, etc. to describe decidedly recognizable/true dynamics, history examines the situation and chooses a particular assessment to present as the truth. While fiction relies on the reader to recognize what they feel is true, history draws upon assessment to display a facet of a dynamic.