“What kinds of problems, and what kinds of meanings, happen in the paint? Or as one historian puts it, 'What is thinking in painting, as opposed to thinking about painting?' These are important questions, and they are very hard to answer using the language of art history.” ThinkingKindArtImportantHardProblemHappensLanguageAnswersPaintingPaintHistorianArt HistoryImportant Questions Book:What Painting Is Source: What Painting Is
“I realized how valuable the art and practice of writing letters are, and how important it is to remind people of what a treasure letters--handwritten letters--can be. In our throwaway era of quick phone calls, faxes, and email, it's all to easy never to find the time to write letters. That's a great pity--for historians and the rest of us.” PeopleWritingArtImportantEasyPracticeLettersPhonesValuableI RealizedTreasurePityErasHistorianEmailPhone CallsFaxHandwritten Letters Book:I Love You, Ronnie: The Letters of Ronald Reagan to Nancy Reagan Source: I Love You, Ronnie: The Letters of Ronald Reagan to Nancy Reagan
“The first job of the historian and of the journalist is to find facts. Not the only job, perhaps not the most important, but the first. Facts are the cobblestones from which we build roads of analysis, mosaic tiles that we fit together to compose pictures of past and present. There will be disagreement about where the road leads and what reality or truth is revealed by the mosaic picture. The facts themselves must be checked against all the available evidence. But some are round and hard--and the most powerful leaders in the world can trip over them. So can writers, dissidents and saints.” WorldFirstsImportantHardFactsRealityTogetherJobsPastPowerfulLeaderFitTruth IsEvidenceRoundsSaintAvailableJournalistAnalysisMost PowerfulHistorianDisagreementPast And PresentDissidentsMosaicsPowerful LeadersTilesCobblestone Author:Timothy Garton Ash
“Once upon a time, a historian told me that the most important choice a new historian could make was of his or her specialist subject. Most of the good stuff was far too overcrowded, so you had to pick about in the exotic and extinct. His recommendations were the Picts or the Minoans, because hardly anything was known about them and you could spend a happy lifetime of speculation.” ImportantChoicesStuffKnownHistorySubjectsHumourPicksLifetimeHistorianHappy LifeSpeculationExoticOnce Upon A TimeSpecialistsRecommendationsImportant Choices Author:A. A. Gill