Barbara Tuchman Quotes - Page 4

Quotes about:

• The story and study of the past, both recent and distant, will not reveal the future, but it flashes beacon lights along the way and it is a useful nostrum against despair.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Past, Light, Despair

  Barbara W. Tuchman (2011). “Practicing History: Selected Essays”, p.55, Random House

  4 Copy quote

• The nastiness of women [in the 14th century] was generally perceived at the close of life when a man began to worry about hell, and his sexual desire in any case fading.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Women, Worry, Desire

  54 Copy quote

• Dead battles, like dead generals, hold the military mind in their dead grip.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Military, Mind, Battle

  The Guns of August ch. 2 (1962)

  7 Copy quote

• The poets have familiarized more people with history than have the historians.

  Barbara Tuchman

  People, History, Poetry

  4 Copy quote

• If all were equalized by death, as the medieval idea constantly emphasized, was it not possible that inequalities on earth were contrary to the will of God?

  Barbara Tuchman

  Ideas, Earth, Medieval

  "A Distant Mirror". Book by Barbara Tuchman, p. 375, 1978.

  4 Copy quote

• Doctrine tied itself into infinite knots over the realities of sex.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Sex, Reality, Doctrine

  Barbara W. Tuchman (2011). “A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century”, p.213, Random House

  4 Copy quote

• [T]he obverse of facile emotion in the 14th century was a general insensitivity to the spectacle of pain and death.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Pain, Emotion, Century

  4 Copy quote

• I have always felt like an artist when I work on a book. I see no reason why the word should always be confined to writers of fiction and poetry.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Book, Artist, Reason Why

  Barbara W. Tuchman (2011). “Practicing History: Selected Essays”, p.46, Random House

  5 Copy quote

• I want the reader to turn the page and keep on turning to the end.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Writing, Want, Pages

  Barbara W. Tuchman (2011). “Practicing History: Selected Essays”, p.89, Random House

  7 Copy quote

• Historians who stuff in every item of research they have found, every shoelace and telephone call of a biographical subject, are not doing the hard work of selecting and shaping a readable story.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Hard Work, Telephones, Stories

  7 Copy quote

• I have always been in a condition in which I cannot not write.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Writing, Conditions

  8 Copy quote

• No nation in the world has so many drastic problems squeezed into so small a space, under such urgent pressure of time and heavy burden of history, as Israel.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Israel, Space, World

  4 Copy quote

• The fact of being reported increases the apparent extent of a deplorable development by a factor of ten.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Tragedy, Development, Facts

  4 Copy quote

• In a country where misery and want were the foundation of the social structure, famine was periodic, death from starvation common, disease pervasive, thievery normal, and graft and corruption taken for granted, the elimination of these conditions in Communist China is so striking that negative aspects of the new rule fade in relative importance.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Death, Country, Taken

  Barbara W. Tuchman (2017). “Notes from China”, p.3, Random House

  8 Copy quote

• Christianity in its ideas was never the art of the possible.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Art, Ideas, Christianity

  Barbara W. Tuchman (2011). “A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century”, p.212, Random House

  4 Copy quote

• To ensure that no one gained an advantage over anyone else, commercial law prohibited innovation in tools or techniques, underselling below a fixed price, working late by artificial light, employing extra apprentices or wife and under-age children, and advertising of wares or praising them to the detriment of others.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Children, Light, Law

  4 Copy quote

• For most people reform meant relief from ecclesiastical extortions.

  Barbara Tuchman

  People, Reform, Relief

  Barbara W. Tuchman (2011). “A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century”, p.327, Random House

  8 Copy quote

• The costliest myth of our time has been the myth of the Communist monolith.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Communism, Communist, Myth

  Barbara W. Tuchman (2011). “Practicing History: Selected Essays”, p.292, Random House

  4 Copy quote

• For belligerent purposes, the 14th century, like the 20th, commanded a technology more sophisticated than the mental and moral capacity that guided its use.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Technology, Purpose, Use

  Barbara W. Tuchman (2011). “A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century”, p.426, Random House

  4 Copy quote

• The Church [in the 14th century] gave ceremony and dignity to lives that had little of either. It was the source of beauty and art to which all had some access and which many helped to create.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Art, Church, Littles

  Barbara Tuchman (2017). “A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century”, p.63, Penguin UK

  4 Copy quote

• For me, the card catalog has been a companion all my working life. To leave it is like leaving the house one was brought up in.

  Barbara Tuchman

  House, Leaving, Cards

  4 Copy quote

• Whatever solace the Christian faith could give was balanced by the anxiety it generated.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Christian, Giving, Anxiety

  Barbara Tuchman (2017). “A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century”, p.560, Penguin UK

  4 Copy quote

• The ills and disorders of the 14th century could not be without consequence. Times were to grow worse over the next fifty-odd years until at some imperceptible moment, by the some mysterious chemistry, energies were refreshed, ideas broke out of the mold of the Middle Ages into new realms, and humanity found itself redirected.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Years, Ideas, Humanity

  "A Distant Mirror". Book by Barbara Tuchman, p. 581, 1978.

  4 Copy quote

• Rome had Caesar, a man of remarkable governing talents, although it must be said that a ruler who arouses opponents to resort to assassination is probably not as smart as he ought to be.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Smart, Men, Rome

  4 Copy quote

• Human beings, like plans, prove fallible in the presence of those ingredients that are missing in maneuvers - danger, death, and live ammunition.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Missing, Ingredients, Danger

  Barbara Tuchman (2014). “The Guns of August: The Classic Bestselling Account of the Outbreak of the First World War”, p.295, Penguin UK

  4 Copy quote

Page 4 of 6

First

← Prev

1

2

3

4

5

6

Next →

• facebook
• twitter
• googleplus
• email
• linkedin