EPIC events move the broader world into history and literature. The act may either be ruminative or reflexive — the former done by those who want depth and context related to the epic event, the latter by those who want quick information for instant illumination.

The election of Donald Trump in 2016, for example, pushed people to read on the rise of aberrant populists. On the literature side, there was a palpable rise of interest in the works of Orwell, Roth and Atwood. The current pandemic moved people to read Camus, articles on the Bubonic plague and the Spanish flu, and the Scriptures, with particular focus on the passages pertaining to plagues and damnation.