Literature: Words across the Universe

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page 2 by Jessica Oseguera Freshman Nursing Major Instructor: Harlan Stelmach Everything has an origin story, whether it is from the moment you were born or from when everything came to be.

1 page 2 by Jessica Oseguera Freshman Nursing Major Instructor: Harlan Stelmach Everything has an origin story, whether it is from the moment you were born or from when everything came to be. You can look at anything, object, person, or idea and it will have its origins in the emergence of the universe. Look at literature, for example; it has been around for ages but longer than you may think. The creation of bound books is only half the story. Its words, ideas, and chemical make-up have been among us since the start of time. For me, literature has always been there, like a companion you can escape to. It gives you the option of fleeing the troubles of your life for a moment and seeing the life of another through their perspective. If you stop to think, literature can be found through all eight thresholds of Big History. From the Big Bang that started it all to the modern era that continues to develop, I will illustrate the interconnection between the formation of the world today and the beginnings of literature as we know it.

2 page 3 In a world full of bustling activity, there is always something to do and so much to see. It wasn t always like that. There was a time when everything was nothing and all there was, was darkness. That all changed when the Big Bang occurred. There was now energy and matter, helium and hydrogen being the sole elements in existence. With energy and matter now existing, everything else could too. Big History: Between Nothing and Everything, by David Christian, Cynthia Brown, and Craig Benjamin, states everything in our universe is made from two fundamental types of stuff : (1) matter, or physical stuff, and (2) energy or the ability to make things happen, to do work (1). This statement holds true. Most would think that literature is just something we acquired over time and has no business being anywhere near the Big Bang. Wrong. There is energy and matter involved with literature. For there to even be literature, someone must write it. Someone must form it, create it and interpret it to others and find a way to spread it to people from other parts of the world. That takes energy. Then comes the fact that literature s solid form is matter. It is tangible; you can touch it, hold it, and carry it. It is physical and that is all thanks to the energy that was put to create it. Energy and matter come hand in hand and without it, literature would not have ever been. Without the Big Bang and the beginning of the universe as we know it, everything, like literature, would not exist. Hydrogen and helium being the only elements created from the Big Bang, there was nothing complex about the beginning of our universe. That all changed when

3 page 4 hydrogen and helium began to interact with each other. Our simple universe took on a whole new complexity with the rise of galaxies and stars, as stated in Big History: Between Nothing and Everything (15). With this new complexity, galaxies paved the way for the complexities we have today. Literature itself is complex. It can be interpreted in many ways to people and at times can be hard to figure out. Like hydrogen and helium coming together to make stars, hydrogen bonds with other elements to make things, literature for example. Paper is needed to create literature. It is the basis for how to start. You grab a pen and paper and a masterpiece is created. Paper is composed of hydrogen atoms that bond to other elements like oxygen. Paper itself came from trees where they needed the interaction of oxygen and carbon to survive. These elements were made possible thanks to the beginning of the first two elements. The stars they formed released light elements like nitrogen, oxygen, and carbon that became the fundamental building blocks for literature to begin. Stars may be composed of helium and hydrogen, but the products they produced brings up whole new possibilities. Stars give off energy and give the universe light. But it is not always burning. There comes a time when stars must burn out. A star will burn for millions of years but when so much hydrogen has turned into helium, a star dies (22). Hearing death or die may seem negative but this is actually a good thing. With the death of stars, new elements are created. Actually, elements in the periodic table from iron (26) to uranium (92) are created (23). This

4 page 5 is the emergence of chemical complexity. These elements came from stars known as supernovas. Literature, down from the paper needed to write on and the pencil used as to create it, came from a supernova. In a pencil, lead is what is used to write and create the words you have in your mind. That would not have been possible without the death of a supernova. Without the lead created from supernovas, there wouldn t have been any of the early written literature we have today. 4.6 billion years ago our universe was not as lonely. The solar system had emerged. With the solar system Earth had finally come to be and with it the Sun. Photosynthesis is credited for Earth s acquiring the atmosphere we have today. This is a key factor for the reason the Earth has life. The Earth s surface was shaped thanks in part to plate tectonics. These created much of the geological regions and seasons that we have today. Due to the creation of different regions in the world, this greatly affected the type of literature written. What was going on in that region or what the writer could see affected what was written. In England, there was literature that dealt with the monarchs and with colonization as that was what was happening in the region. In the United States, literature dealt with how it was after its colonization and heavily laced with religious views. With these different geological regions, literature was able to expand and be diverse. The Earth s surface is created, but it s barren. 3.8 billion years ago things began to change. Life had arrived and with it new living species had emerged. Plants and

5 page 6 animals flourished on planet Earth. What were once single celled organisms had now evolved to multi-celled organisms full of variety. To get here, there first came the single celled organisms known as prokaryotes. They divided and multiplied and did not die. With this ability there was no need for them to reproduce. Some of these organisms later turned into what we now know as plants. They could obtain energy and food through the sun by a process known as photosynthesis. This new process allowed plants to not have to depend on anything else to gain their sustenance. Later on, organisms developed that used the opposite of photosynthesis: respiration. These organisms developed into the animals we have today, not to mention the human species now. But these organisms could not reproduce the same way that prokaryotes could. These organisms, known as eukaryotes, needed to sexually reproduce to continue their species. They did not reproduce with just any member of their species. They chose the mate that would better guarantee survival and ensure a continuation of their offspring. Much in the same way life evolved on Earth, so did literature. It begins as a single thing, an idea, and then evolves to a brainstorm or outline. It then goes from an idea from the mind to words on paper. Just as multi-celled organisms went through natural selection to spread and expand their species so does literature. Authors must choose a publishing company to publish and manufacture their work. They do not pick the first company that comes their way. They select the one that will better represent their book and ensure its successful reproduction of the work.

6 page 7 Literature, for it to spread, does go through its own little natural selection. All these organisms depend on each other for energy and food, and effect the other s survival. Though literature is non-living, it does not mean that it does not have its own effect on living things. A work of literature can be seen as a means of escape and way for people to adventure. It also is a source of entertainment that can bring imagination and creativity to those that read it. The rise of the Homo sapiens brought literature to life, literally. These great ancestors of ours evolved from the tree-dwelling primates that began to maneuver upright. They developed their own means of communication and way of obtaining food and shelter. Much of this was due to collective learning, the passing down of information and learning from it. With the beginning of early speech, Homo sapiens were able to talk to one another orally, no longer depending on hand gestures. This communicational breakthrough is important to the beginnings of literature as we know it; its very early beginnings start here. Through orally passing down information, Homo sapiens could also tell stories. Just as it is used today, stories are a source of entertainment and a way to escape into a different world much different than ours. Just like fairy tales, oral tradition was a way to pass down information and stories to later generations so that they would not be lost. A Critical History of Children s Literature by Corneila Meigs states, during that time, long before there were books for anyone to read the basic foundation of taste and imagination and recognition of truth

7 page 8 wherever it was encountered which one generation was to pass on to another (5). Stories were the early forms of literature where they mostly relied on helping children with learning from right and wrong. This way of communicating and teaching illustrates collective learning that Homo sapiens relied on to help them evolve. Literature had its own part in the evolution of man, and in the coming years experienced its own evolutions. The Homo sapiens nomadic way of life began to disappear. Humans began settling down into areas where they could live year round and not worry about the seasons harming them. The drawback with this is that they used to travel around due to following the migrations of herds. Now, how were they to find a new source of energy? This problem was easily solved with the introduction of agriculture. Though not entirely known how this began and who came up with the idea, agriculture brought on a new way of cultivating energy and survival. Humans began growing their own crops and domesticating livestock. Humans, crops, and the animals all need each other to survive. All three in their own way are extracting energy from each other. The livestock gets food and shelter from the farmers. The crops are given areas to grow and prosper and humans get an easy source of nutrients. Agriculture plays an important role with literature. The cultivation of plants and crops is connected to the production of literature. As stated before, paper is needed for literature. Well, paper comes from plants, trees in fact. By having these products taken care of and ensuring

8 page 9 that they are being produced, literature itself holds a symbiotic life with humans. Literature needs humans to strive. A person is needed to create the literature. Not only that, but its production as well. People themselves use literature. It s a release from the norm and an escape from their world. They feed off each other and their energy. In this time, you see also the beginnings of warfare and bloodshed. Having villages attacked and robbed were common acts that occurred. These incidents breathed life into literature. Tales like King Arthur and plays like Romeo and Juliet illustrated the common daily issues that people struggled with during the era. The topics of kings and the relationships they held with their people were popular subjects authors picked at to poke fun at the monarchs or describe the injustice of their reign. The main subject of social standing and how society viewed you dealt with not only in literature but around it as well. Female authors were not common but during the Elizabethan era, women had a chance to publish and write. They were given more opportunities and were able to go above what was expected of them. In the website, Internet Shakespeare Edition, it states that women gained status and opportunities for education during this time (Best). Literature itself was evolving and, with it, starting revolutions in the arts. In the modern era, there was great innovation with the production of books. In the industrial revolution you saw the rise of printing and the creation of actual bound books. The use of fossil fuels is important in the production of literature. They are

9 page 10 needed to fuel the factories that manufacture the machines that print the works. An environmental effect that literature does produce is the depletion of trees. Trees do get cut down to produce paper, but this harms the animals that use trees as their homes. They lose their habitats and we as humans are losing our major source of oxygen. As populations grow, so do new people that will share their creativity with the world, be it by plays, poetry, or novels. Much like how technology fueled the industrial revolution, literature fueled its own revolutions. The enlightenment period, romanticism and gothic, poetry, Victorian era, and modernism were great revolutions in the different transformations that literature underwent. Our world has itself has undergone many transformations and improvements but with it, it has brought destruction. War increased and two great wars have come out of it within the 20th century. Hard to imagine but literature has followed the path that our history takes. Literature has immortalized different parts of our history and captured the feelings that people had as well as the events that occurred during that time. Author Ernest Hemmingway himself has written novels that embody the times of war and soldiers. F. Scott Fitzgerald, another author of the 20th century, based his novels after the times of the roaring 20s. Not only have authors helped literature to rise, but technology has been able to turn great works of literature to life. The creation of movies and theatres has brought entertainment to people and introduced them to literature they ve never read. Literature, since its beginning, has been a source of

10 page 11 entertainment and continues to grow as technology grows. As long as there are those that will share their creativity, there will be literature. As long as there are those that are interested and enjoy stories, literature will continue. Everyday a new generation is being introduced to literature, either from the past, present, or the upcoming future. Literature does not seem to be slowing down any time soon. It continues to give people joy and entertainment. Look around you and you will find and notice that everything that is found in this world has come from the creation of the universe. You may not think it, but as you break down the object or idea and take it down to its miniscule and simple form, you can find it since the beginning of creation. Literature has been able to retain its existence throughout the years and has literally and figuratively made its part in the history of our universe. It is even having its own way with what may possibly occur in our near future. From the particles of its creation down to its impact on society, literature has its own little big history.

11 page 12 Works Cited Best, Michael. Women Writers. Internet Shakespeare Editions. University of Victoria, 1 Apr Web. 19 Nov Christian, David, Cynthia Brown, and Craig Benjamin. Big History: Between Nothing and Everything. Boston: McGraw-Hill, Print. Fowler, Alastair. A History of English Literature. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, Print. Meigs, Cornelia. A Critical History of Children's Literature: A Survey of Children's Books in English from Earliest Times to the Present. New York: Macmillan, Print.

Anthro 1401, University of Utah Evolution of Human Nature Study Guide. Alan Rogers

Anthro 1401, University of Utah Evolution of Human Nature Study Guide Alan Rogers October 16, 2007 Chapter 1 First Half of Course In what follows, I will try to indicate important issues in a general way.