[HN Gopher] Has Literature Ever Changed the Course of History?
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Has Literature Ever Changed the Course of History?
Author : lermontov
Score : 13 points
Date : 2022-02-12 15:43 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.historytoday.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.historytoday.com)
| avrionov wrote:
| There is a famous quote from Kenneth Clarke [1] that Charles
| Dickens did more for the poor people than Marx and Engels.
|
| Emile Zola was also very influential with his books.
|
| Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn made millions aware of the Gulags.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Clark
| flobosg wrote:
| The Catcher in the Rye has been linked to the murder of several
| people, including John Lennon and John F. Kennedy.
| jleyank wrote:
| How strict is the definition of "literature"? Does it include
| religious texts? Political texts? Scientific texts? Philosophical
| texts? Is science fiction literature? All of these have changed
| history.
|
| Things like Shakespeare and canterbury tales and those in other
| languages have modified language and blurred stories and
| politics. So I assume these count?
| gtsop wrote:
| Not one single thing changes the course of history on it's own. A
| bunch of factors need to come together to make that happen. Has
| literature (and arts in general I would add) been one of those
| factors? Totally so.
| rodgerd wrote:
| J'accuse led to anti-Semites creating the Tour de France, and one
| current French Presidential candidate is still battling to smear
| the reputation of Dreyfus.
| voakbasda wrote:
| How would we know? I suspect that Machiavelli had more influence
| on world politics than anyone can admit or imagine...
| chasil wrote:
| It is verily better to be feared than loved.
|
| Pity book.
| agumonkey wrote:
| Sun Tzu too ?
| chasil wrote:
| I hear a lot about "The Jungle" by Upton Sinclair, but I've never
| read it.
| [deleted]
| mrichman wrote:
| The Bible.
| lifeplusplus wrote:
| In same sense The Quran. Found really cool over the meal type
| of documentary style video introduction :
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2cEIDZwG5M
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=baHT2nR5Wr4
| inawarminister wrote:
| Even secularly, I need to agree. The Bible was swallowed by
| Roman Empire and tied to Roman greatness for the next half
| century, maybe millenium. The Qur'an made its own greatness,
| from heretofore a marginal people, who by their own
| admissions feared the Persians like falcons fear eagles ('O,
| lo, the Persians, whose destiny is millennia of greatness.
| Even when they fell, they reclaimed their imperiality' -
| paraphrased from pre-Islamic Arab poems) and Rome. (Though I
| don't find many Arabic poems of Rome, unlike Germanic epic
| poems about the Roman dragon, even if they hide it sometimes.
| Siegfried was likely mythical version of Arminius)
| archhn wrote:
| The question they really ask is "Has fiction ever changed the
| course of history?"
|
| Nothing has changed the course of history. We're in the midst of
| eternity. It's all an illusion.
| nefitty wrote:
| The universe is declarative. We just happen to be stuck with
| state machine interpreters in our skulls that can only parse
| one moment at a time.
| archhn wrote:
| Fiat lux! I dig it.
| [deleted]
| Mlller wrote:
| Since a change in the course of history has, as a rule, multiple
| causes, it is very unlikely a priori that a work of literature
| ever was the one sufficient condition for a change in the course
| of history.
|
| But as a contributing factor - why not, that is likely and IMHO
| attested. One example: A performance of the grand opera "La
| muette de Portici" is credibly said to "have sparked riots
| leading to the Belgian Revolution" as
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_muette_de_Portici puts it.
| plutonorm wrote:
| We are the music makers, And we are the dreamers of dreams,
| Wandering by lone sea-breakers, And sitting by desolate streams;
| -- World-losers and world-forsakers, On whom the pale moon
| gleams: Yet we are the movers and shakers Of the world for ever,
| it seems.
|
| With wonderful deathless ditties We build up the world's great
| cities, And out of a fabulous story We fashion an empire's glory:
| One man with a dream, at pleasure, Shall go forth and conquer a
| crown; And three with a new song's measure Can trample a kingdom
| down.
|
| We, in the ages lying, In the buried past of the earth, Built
| Nineveh with our sighing, And Babel itself in our mirth; And
| o'erthrew them with prophesying To the old of the new world's
| worth; For each age is a dream that is dying, Or one that is
| coming to birth.
| rkk3 wrote:
| I think you are asking about the ideas conveyed by the
| literature... but it used to be common for Politicians to fund
| their public-service career through books. Thats what Winston
| Churchill did. Not sure how important 'Mein Kampf' sales were to
| initially funding the Nazis.
| TigeriusKirk wrote:
| I think it's very likely Snow Crash has changed the course of
| Meta.
| hprotagonist wrote:
| That's just because no one speaks sumerian any more.
| RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote:
| One of the most famous works of literature in American history
| that had a huge impact was Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher
| Stowe
|
| >It is reported that upon being introduced to Harriet Beecher
| Stowe in 1862, Abraham Lincoln fondly commented she was "the
| little woman who wrote the book that started this great war."
|
| https://ehistory.osu.edu/articles/harriet-beecher-stowe-litt...
| nicbou wrote:
| Remember when some German guy nailed a rant to a church door?
| socceroos wrote:
| Perfect example.
|
| There was a lot of pre-reformation work that went on before it
| culminated in the 95 theses, but yeah, that was one of those
| watershed moments.
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