History is a Seven act Play?

History is the seven act play of the heroic description of the past, golden ages, of the splendid and worst times, eras of the Past. History is about War and Peace, rage and hate, prejudice and grievance, hope and despair, tyrants and saints, geographers and plunderers, good, pure and true events of People, of their religions, cultures, a sort of scoreboard of achievements. Karl Marx felt that ‘history itself was nothing but the activity of men pursuing their purposes’. Another thinker, Ralph Waldo Emerson was of the view that there is properly no history but only biography. Cicero characterized History as the witness that testified to the Passing of time as illuminating reality. Wright Morris felt that past was useless which explained why it was called past. Arnold Tony bee, was of the opinion that, “civilization was a movement and not a condition, a voyage, not a harbour”. According to him, of the 22 civilizations that have appeared in History, nine-teen of them collapsed when they reached the moral state the United States is in now.

Then is History is a back dated memories of the past clad in antiquity. A sense of the Past. There have been great Historians and thinkers like Arnold Tony bee, AL Basham, Thomas Carlyle, HG Wells, and others, who wrote capturing poignant expressions of empires, rulers and the ruled emphatically. Would anybody for that matter call Antony and Cleopatra as fiction because, William Shakespeare wrote their history in prose. Crossing the Rubicon is ascribed to Julius Ceaser (49 BC) even though there might have been many who would have crossed the Rubicon. Ceaser’s crossing the Rubicon is an historic event. Edward Clalleth Carr would like to call it as ‘hist oriography’.Is American Revolution, really a revolution or a War of independence where the England troops led by Cornwallis lost to George Washington in the Batlle of York. America became a Free Nation. If British historians had no problem with American Revolution, why did they call the 1857 up-rising as a ‘mutiny in India’ and not first war of independence. Is today’s Indian National Congress a continuation of the Indian National Congress of 1885 founded by A O Hume? Carlyle wrote The French Revolution: the History and Charles Dickens had adopted many incidents for His Tale of Two Cities from Thomas Carlyle’s book. Fidel Castro made a great speech, concluding it as, “History will absolve me”. The same History, will it absolve Mikhail Gorbachev, who was responsible for sweeping reforms in USSR, but his successor Boris Yelstein was a willing tool to the West as he dissolved the Confederation, and followed the Politics of Dismemberment. The British Empire were sun never set, adhered to the Politics of dismemberment of India into India and Pakistan. Bangladesh broke away from Pakistan, even though the majority of people professed Islam, because they wanted Sonar Bangla. Korea, Vietnam, Germany, which was balkanized, turned one. Palstine is still vulnerable.

Did Liberty, Equality and Fraternity, the theme of the French Revolution, create stability in France after the Revolution. It required a Napoleon, who proclaimed himself as the Emperor to restore authority. Oliver Cromwell (1653-1658) ruled England as Lord Protector at the Head of the Commonwealth after beheading King Charles I in 1649. But was he not a greater autocrat than Charles?

Winston Churchill became the powerful Prime Minister of England on the resignation of Neville Chamberlin in Sept 1939. He was one of the greatest prime ministers Westminster had ever seen. Did he not lose elections to Labour enabling Clement Attlee to become Prime minister? Why did people loose faith in Churchill? Franklin Roosevelt was the President of America. But when the Second World War came to an end, it was a beaming Harry S Truman who represented America as its President. It has been said that Allies had powerful leaders like Churchill, Roosevelt, Stalin, and many others while Axis only had an Adolph Hitler. After War, Stalin who was a powerful ruler fell into infamy. Gandhiji was one of the greatest apostle of Peace yet he did not win a Nobel for Peace.

There were many who felt that China should not be awakened. Let the sleeping giant sleep. When Nixon and primarily Kissinger made the voyage to the country of Dragon, the country woke up. The Sleeping Giant woke up.

If Shakespeare’s work Ceaser and Cleopatra was the centre piece of history of the Romans in the remote days of the Christian era, likewise, Poet’s description makes up for many events re-constructed with the help of novels. Tolstoy’s War and Peace, Nehru’s Discovery of India and Glimpses of World History, whether they were plots from History or created plots for History, only researchers can pin point. Socrates was sentenced to death for asking provoking questions in pursuit of truth during the Golden age of Athens ruled by Periciles. Alexander in the remote time of History knew geography to invade India. Adi Sankara in the 8th century AD set up monasteries in different parts of India when travel was by Road, and he died when he was 32. Layfatte is said to have participated in both the French and American Revolutions. There is a Layfette square in New York. Cornwallis is said to have fought the Battle of York in New York against geogre Washington (defeated) and against Tipu Sultan in the Battle of Mangalore in 1799(won).

Samuel Johnson correctly stated that, there are in every age, new errors to be rectified and new prejudices to be opposed. Even though History may be history of men and matters, it shows precisely a different era, in different surroundings. History repeats!