Abstract
In 'Bolshevism versus History,' Rafal Stobiecki attempts to reconstruct Bolshevik philosophy of history in light of the metaphors that constitute their conceptualization. Stobiecki understands metaphors as synonyms for concepts, fundamental in organizing the pattern of human thinking about the world. Stobiecki is particularly interested in metaphor as a category of epistemology, which makes it possible to search for deeper conditions of historical thought. Bolshevik theory of history developed by imbuing already existing categories with new meaning. Stobiecki divides the metaphors of Bolshevik historiography into two levels of generalization: the macrometaphor of science and operational metaphors (revolution, party, leader, and enemy). A different view of the Bolshevik vision of the world and man, one that could help describe how historians are embroiled in both culture and language, is that proposed by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, who assert that in all aspects of social life people define new reality in metaphorical terms and act according to the directions of these metaphors. The metaphors combine mind and imagination and constitute the central components of using the language; they influence ways of perceiving things and of acting. They play a fundamental role in creating both concepts and systems of concepts. Wojciech Wrzosek posits that the metaphors prevailing in the concrete culture are neutralized and objectivitized in the interpreter's thinking, meaning that metaphors steer the interpretation of phenomena. Historical schools impose their own perception of world phenomena. Fundamental metaphors, which create the past, determine all cognitive processes, and as a result a certain view of the historical world emerges. If they intrude into historical narration, they become the instruments of the construction of the image of the past.