“The more history I learn, the more the world fills up with stories”–Sarah Vowell
I am a history major because of two books. The first was this stupid “Royal Diary” about Elizabeth I I read when I was 10. It was for pre-teens, and therefore light on historical accuracy, but there was some historical information in the back, and I remember thinking “Well, Elizabeth is interesting enough, but that thing about her dad having six wives is really interesting.” And that began my love of history. It also spoke to what sort of history I’m interested in; I’ve always been drawn to the more gossip-y, tabloid history. Whenever I hear people talk about the declining state of morals in today’s society, it’s comforting to go back and look at the reign of George IV, who is said to have had the doors of Westminster Abbey shut in his estranged wife’s face during his coronation. I love reading about things like that. I love the crazies, the weird marriages, the hundreds of royal mistresses. I love history if only for the selfish reason that it’s really fun to read about.
The other book that made me love history was Sarah Vowell’s Partly Cloudly Patriot. Vowell is an essayist who writes about family, history, and politics, and this book contained an essay called “God Will Give You Blood to Drink in a Souvenir Shot Glass.” It was about her visit to Salem Massachusetts and was about how one deals with tragic history like the Salem Witch Hunt. I know that sounds like kind of a downer, but it was a very funny essay. It was also the first time I had ever read something that said “Loving history may make you a ‘nerd’, but life is so much more interesting that way.” I had always loved history, but up until that point I hadn’t thought that reading weird stories about the past was an option. I knew that history was fun, but I never thought that it could be professionally fun.
So, to sum up the above rambling, I’m a history major because I love reading interesting stories, and history is just one big interesting story. I want to spend the rest of my life doing that.
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