socialism, can sail clear of the wandering rocks of positivism, idealism, mechanical materialism, and formalism of whatever variety, Such a history treats art in relation to the substructure, though not in a mechanistic fashion, realizing fully well that for Marx ideology has no history independent of that of the superstructure. If I cannot refer to any such history in English, it is more a comment on the state of literary history than on the concept itself. I have tried to suggest a few principles in the light of which literary history could be restructured. Unfortunately, even if I could refer to a model — Lukacs The Historical Novel is a good starting point for prospective historians - what we must realize is that Lukac's is not a product like a MIG or a Jaguar that can be assembled in the backwoods of India. He is an heir to certain central and East European traditions, the mo^t important of which are the German historical revolution, German classical scholarship, German idealism and Marxism-Leninism: he stands on the shoulders of several generations of scholars. If we want to assimilate this or any other European model so that what we produce is not a cheap imitation in the notorious Indian tradition but a genuine creation, certain minimum requirements must be satisfied. I would rather stress this than construct a model in an intellectual vacuum. In the context of literary history in Marathi I shall detail these conditions in the form of a few questions which, I think, should be raised. I am doing so mainly because this discussion, I hope, has a certain validity going beyond Maha-rashtra and Marathi. 1) Have we an unbroken tradition of historical writing worth "the name? I don^t mean histories based on secondary sources but histories in the style of Ranke, Mommsen, Stubbs and Maitland. It is perhaps a comment on our attitude towards history that the last one hundred years have seen only one original essay in Marathi on the .philosophy of history. (The essay, which in not easily available, is written by Rajwade). After the generation ofRajwade and Ketkar there has been a near anarchy at the popular level history. (Obviously, I am not referring to the greatest Indian historian of modem times, D.D. Kosambi). This anarchy is reflected in several histories which have a given subcaste as a subject. There are thus histories of the Chitpavanas, Kayasthas and so on. There is also a form of popular history called the Kul Vrittanta. These histories are usually accounts of people claiming the same family name. You thus have an Apte Kul Vrittanta or a Raste Kul Vrittanta and so on. Mostly, these familes whose histories are celebrated in big fat volumes have been feudal parasites trying to extend their glory to modern times. 2) Have we the kind of economic history of Maharashtra which would compare with, say, Clapham's Economic History of England? 3) Have we a social history of Maharashtra of the 20th century which would compare with, say, Halery's six-volume History of the English People in the 19th Century? January—March 1984 73