Barbara Tuchman Quotes - Page 4

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• No more distressing moment can ever face a British government than that which requires it to come to a hard, fast and specific decision.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Government, Decision, Faces

  The Guns of August ch. 9 (1962)

  7 Copy quote

• To gain victory over the flesh was the purpose of fasting and celibacy, which denied the pleasures of this world for the sake of reward in the next.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Victory, Fasting, Purpose

  Barbara W. Tuchman (2011). “A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century”, p.36, Random House

  8 Copy quote

• Human beings of any age need to approve of themselves; the bad times in history come when they cannot.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Age, Needs, Bad Times

  Barbara Wertheim Tuchman (1980). “A Distant Mirror”, Ballantine Books

  4 Copy quote

• The reality of a question is inevitably more complicated than we would like to suppose.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Reality, Complicated

  5 Copy quote

• We seem to be afflicted by a widespread and eroding reluctance to take any stand on any values, moral, behavioral or esthetic.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Moral, Reluctance, Seems

  4 Copy quote

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

  Barbara Tuchman

  People, History, Poetry

  4 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

• 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

• 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

• 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

  8 Copy quote

• Money was the crux. Raising money to pay the cost of war was to cause more damage to 14th century society than the physical destruction of war itself.

  Barbara Tuchman

  War, Cost, Pay

  "A Distant Mirror". Book by Barbara Tuchman, p. 81, 1978.

  17 Copy quote

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

  Barbara Tuchman

  Writing, Conditions

  9 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

  5 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

  5 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

• 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

  9 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

  9 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 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

• 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

  5 Copy quote

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