Write for God

Howard Zinn

Historian, essayist and rabble-rouser Howard Zinn died on Jan. 27 after a lifetime of writing books and essays that always challenged the status quo.

His best known book remains A People History of the United States: 1492-Present, the work that pointed out to many of us that history is always written by the victors.  Those who were left out of the textbooks we read in class found a vibrant life in Zinn’s inclusive history.

Zinn also wrote You Can’t Be Neutral on a Moving Train, which intertwines events in his life with the tangled history of the 20th century. He ends his memoirs with this message for the 21st century and beyond:

“To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.

“What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places — and there are so many — where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.

“And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.”