You can learn as much about the history from reading about the present as you can vice versa, that is learning about the present through history, which is what I do for a living.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
I try to learn from the past, but I plan for the future by focusing exclusively on the present. That's where the fun is.
I like reading about the past. I'm definitely not a history buff, but I do read a bit of history now and again, and to do that for work is really exciting.
Reading a book is like re-writing it for yourself. You bring to a novel, anything you read, all your experience of the world. You bring your history and you read it in your own terms.
History provides a sense of where we've been and lessons that can be taken forward.
Even in high school I was very interested in history - why people do the things they do. As a kid I spent a lot of time trying to relate the past to the present.
No one ever really 'learns' from history, because choices never present themselves in exactly the same way, and because you can always choose similarities and differences to fit current needs.
I think you can learn from history.
I consider myself a writer who happens to write about history, rather than a historian. I was an English major in college. What I've learned about history is in the field, so to speak. Going into the archives and working with it directly.
My whole life, I had been taught to read and study, to seek understanding in knowledge of history, of cultures.
If you want the present to be different from the past, study the past.