Dull is good. That was the motto of a history professor I once had. Mr. Hickey trotted this maxim out periodically. Usually, whenever a student gushed about how they would have loved to live—add whatever historical period you wish. After a while, we’d deliberately bait him. We hoped to get a story like the death of Napoleon’s Old Guard at Waterloo. Thousands marched abreast into the enemy. This gave rise to the legend that the Guard dies but does not retreat: La Garde meurt, elle ne se rend pas!“
But after the glory came the descriptions of rigid rows of corpses lying abreast where they’d fallen and the miserable succor and aid available to the wounded afterward.
For most of us, lessons like this had the desired effect. We stopped glorifying past events and considered the actual cost of brave but futile actions.
Seeing the gleam in his eyes, we chided him, “Mr. Hickey, surely you’d have loved to see the actual events!” He’d stop and glare at us. Then one time, he got earnest and said, “D-Day was all the blood and glory I’ll ever need.”
The lessons learned in those classes had the desired effect on me. I ceased romanticizing the past. If we were there, we’d be participants liable for the full impact of, say, life in Europe at the time of the Inquisition. Or life during the Black Death, War of the Roses, or the Hundred Years War. Yes, you say so, but what about seeing this or that event? Well, if you saw that you were there when that nasty little bug, Yersinia pestis, was causing the plague. Thanks, I’ll pass on that one.
I’m all for exploring the past, but safely and at arm’s distance.
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Oh yes the darkest parts of human history are definitely best visiting from a distance. I fear some of our near future might as well! Great post Lou.
Thanks, Mason.
Never felt the urge to romanticize the past. Present is hard enough to deal with
Very true. Especially recently!
This is a great reflection! And I agree, the people living through those historical times probably weren’t as fascinated as we are by them! It makes me wonder how our descendants will feel when they study the history we are creating right now.
What a wisdom packed response, Lou… thank you! Hugs
I have a distinct preference for the ages when there were antibiotics.
Me too!
So with antibiotic resistance now so prevalent, one can envisage a future where the plague is rampant again. You thought that, right?
In the American West, there is already a reservoir of plague, and several cases occur yearly. The best phrase for developing new antibiotics seems to be “too little, too late.”
I romantasize the past all the time, and I appreciate this reminder. Not that I ever wish to be at the Battle of Waterloo, or to watch as people died of the Black Plague. But I catch myself thinking that it would be fun to live in a castle or something along those lines. But nope, it would instead be cold, cramped, and dirty, and toilets would be either out of doors or glorfied holes in the wall, and always smelly. There would be lice and mice. And most likely I would only be there as a servant. So yeah…more fun to read about it or see it on a screen. 🙂