There is no punctual moment of disaster; the world doesn’t end with a bang, it winks out, unravels, gradually falls apart. What caused the catastrophe to occur, who knows; its cause lies long in the past, so absolutely detached from the present as to seem like the caprice of a malign being: a negative miracle, a malediction which no penitence can ameliorate. Such a blight can only be eased by an intervention that can no more be anticipated than was the onset of the curse in the first place. Action is pointless; only senseless hope makes sense. Superstition and religion, the first resorts of the helpless, proliferate.
This sure sounds like a time and place I may be living in and living through, and I'm only a few paragraphs in.
That whole first chapter was a real fucking bonk on the head. The idea that "nothing is new" really resonates with me. I'm hyper aware of it in music, where a modern song will riff on a classic or incorporate a modified lick from a older song. Obviously TV and Movies are the most egregious examples with the endless rehashing of dead content. It's this feeling you have about all of it that the chapter so perfectly put into words.