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Barbara Tuchman

Barbara Tuchman Quotes

Historian

Barbara Tuchman was an American historian renowned for her in-depth research and vivid narrative style. Her works covered historical events from the Roman Empire to the 20th century, with 'Guns, Germs, and Steel' and 'The Guns of August' being particularly notable.

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Famous Barbara Tuchman Quotes

“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.”

World Problem Nations Space Pressure Israel Burden Heavy Urgent Drastic Heavy Burdens

Author:Barbara Tuchman

“After absorbing the news of today, one expects to face a world consisting entirely of strikes, crimes, power failures, broken water mains, stalled trains, school shutdowns, muggers, drug addicts, neo-Nazis, and rapists. The fact is that one can come home in the evening, on a lucky day, without having encountered more than one or two of these phenomena.”

World Two Facts Home Today School Faces Water Crime Broken Drug Lucky News Train Strikes Evening Coming Home Nazi Addict Absorbing Drug Addict Muggers Lucky Day Power Failure

Author:Barbara Tuchman

“Diplomacy means all the wicked devices of the Old World, spheres of influence, balances of power, secret treaties, triple alliances, and, during the interim period, appeasement of Fascism.”

World Mean Secret Power Influence Balance Periods Wicked Devices Spheres Fascism Diplomacy Alliances Treaties Old World Appease Appeasement Balance Of Power Sphere Of Influence Interim

Author:Barbara Tuchman

“The muffled tongue of Big Ben tolled nine by the clock as the cortege left the palace, but on history's clock it was sunset, and the sun of the old world was setting in a dying blaze of splendor never to be seen again.”

World Bigs Left Sun Dying Tongue Nine Setting Settings Clock Sunset Palaces Splendor Old World

Book:The Guns of August: The Outbreak of World War I; Barbara W. Tuchman's Great War Series

Source: The Guns of August: The Outbreak of World War I; Barbara W. Tuchman's Great War Series

“The open frontier, the hardships of homesteading from scratch, the wealth of natural resources, the whole vast challenge of a continent waiting to be exploited, combined to produce a prevailing materialism and an American drive bent as much, if not more, on money, property, and power than was true of the Old World from which we had fled.”

Source: Practicing History: Selected Essays

“No less a bold and pugnacious figure than Winston Churchill broke down and was unable to finish his remarks at the sendoff of the British Expeditionary Force into the maelstrom of World War I in Europe.”

World War Force Figures Europe Down And British Broke War Of The Worlds World War I Remarks Maelstrom

Author:Barbara Tuchman

“Books are the carriers of civilization. Without books, history is silent, literature dumb, science crippled, thought and speculation at a standstill. Without books, the development of civilization would have been impossible. They are engines of change (as the poet said), windows on the world and lighthouses erected in the sea of time. They are companions, teachers, magicians, bankers of the treasures of the mind. Books are humanity in print.”

“In April 1917 the illusion of isolation was destroyed, America came to the end of innocence, and of the exuberant freedom of bachelor independence. That the responsibilities of world power have not made us happier is no surprise. To help ourselves manage them, we have replaced the illusion of isolation with a new illusion of omnipotence.”

World Made Ends Helping America Responsibility Illusion Independence Surprise Destroyed Manage Innocence Isolation Replaced April Bachelors Omnipotence World Power

Author:Barbara Tuchman

“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.”

World Purpose Next Pleasure This World Victory Gains Rewards Sake Flesh Denied Fasting Celibacy

Book:A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century

Source: A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century