Tropika diskursu:Kulturně-kritické eseje – White Hayden (2010)

This Czech-language book by Hayden White, known for his concept of “metahistory,” which emphasizes the narrative nature of historical discourse, is considered a classic in the humanities. In a sense, it is the author’s original “discourse on method,” a theory of what might be called tropological understanding. Its significance extends far beyond the techniques of literary analysis or the interpretation of history: at its foundation lies a philosophically grounded, synthetic conception of the cognitive relationship to reality, mediated precisely through “discourse.” In this respect, White’s book offers a distinctive and important alternative both to traditional and modern hermeneutics, such as that of H. G. Gadamer, and to Ricoeur’s narrative understanding. For White, a trope is neither a figure of speech nor a technique limited to artistic language, but a tool whose function is to seek a more adequate grasp of the reality being described. The interpretation of historical, literary and theoretical texts thus appears not as a subjective limitation, but as a general condition of cultural rationality.