The ascent of Big History

Unlike conventional history, which deals with relatively small chunks of humanity divided by nation and sub nation, Big History deals with the entire species

A Big History Of Everything

David Christian

Allen Lane

368 pages 

Rs 699

Big History, as formalised in this book, is a new area of research but the basic concept dates back to science fiction writer and philosopher-at-large, H G Wells. In his Outline of History, written just after World War I, Mr Wells pointed out that a complete history of humanity would have to reach back in time to the origin of the species and ideally, even further back, to the origin of life and perhaps even further back, to the origin of the universe. 

Weaving a single coherent narrative across such a broad sweep