In his play The Tempest, William Shakespeare wrote, “What’s past is prologue.” In that play, it had rather sinister connotations--tied to the reflective musings of Antonio as he and Sebastian prepared for murder--but today, it means something completely different.

Today, the phrase is used to say that history gives context for and enriches the present, taking us to new places and understandings. Shakespeare himself pops up in English and literature classes across the globe; perhaps he predicted his own impact by commenting on the influential workings of our past. But I digress.

Call me a nerd, but I’ve always liked history. Yes, I know people think it’s boring. I know that people like George Washington are already dead and that times have already changed. I get that you have to move on some day and that nobody can live in the past.

But I think the reason why I along with many others like it so much is because human beings have this innate desire to look for answers and learn why certain things are the way they are. For some perspective, our country is one that has gone through various metamorphoses throughout its 100-year-plus existence; wouldn’t you like to know how we got to the place where we are today?

I do. And there will be a generation after me--and who knows how many generations after that--who will want to know too.

History is like that blunt friend who tells you things as they are, not how you’d like them to be. History compiles all events--even the murky, not-so-pretty ones that we’d rather not remember. So how do we deal with the knowledge of the Holocaust, the reign of Mao Zedong, or the socio-political strife of the Vietnam War era? What do we do with the knowledge that the human race is capable of atrocity, bigotry, hatred, and violence?

As much as it hurts, as much as it would be easy to look away, the only real answer is to learn about it. Why? So you can learn from it.

Removing or censoring facets of history doesn’t erase them from existence. They happened. All you’re doing through removal or censorship is plugging your ears, pretending not to see or hear the things around you. That’s called being closed-minded.

You can learn just as much from the bad parts of history as you can from the good parts. History, in its amoral and unbiased state, teaches you about the human race’s capacity for change, for innovation, for achievement and for making the world a better place. How do you learn these things from history’s darker parts? It’s simple, really; you probably know a few examples, in fact.

In the aftermath of the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s, people of all skin colors were able to walk in harmony, as they do today. During the presidencies of Nixon and Reagan, we put the Cold War to rest and staved off nuclear catastrophe for the sake of global peace and an international political climate that still abhors nuclear aggression. Even given our conflict with the Japanese during World War II, the country and people of Japan stand to this day as friends and allies.

History finds a way to turn bright again because people find a way to turn things around. People find the conviction and the courage to stare our grimy pasts in the face and say, “We will be better.” Nobody has to deface a statue, remove a monument or censor a piece of history to do it.

All they need to do is find it within themselves to do something positive for someone else. That’s the real intrigue behind history; showing how, ultimately, we as people move past adversity.

Our past is our prologue, and there’s no way we can erase, ignore or dismiss that reality. Those who have come before us have done both great things and terrible things; what we must do now is follow up on those great things and keep one another from repeating past mistakes or transgressions.

History is there to teach, not to harm or passively remind. It’s up to us to listen to the lesson.