Abstract
The article discusses essays on literature and history by Jacques Rancière and Hayden White. The author discusses his personal relationship with deceased historian Siegfried Mattl, the role of narrative in the writing of history is examined, and information is offered on the relationship between literature and historiography. An article in the history periodical "Historische Zeitschrift" on White's book on the aesthetics of historiography "Metahistory. The Historical Imagination in Nineteenth-Century Europe" is criticized.