Barbara Tuchman
Barbara Tuchman
Barbara Wertheim Tuchmanwas an American historian and author. She won the Pulitzer Prize twice, for The Guns of August, a best-selling history of the prelude to and the first month of World War I, and Stilwell and the American Experience in China, a biography of General Joseph Stilwell...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionHistorian
Date of Birth30 January 1912
CountryUnited States of America
loss thinking barbarians
I ask myself, have nations ever declined from a loss of moral sense rather than from physical reasons or the pressure of barbarians? I think that they have.
strong power thinking
Strong prejudices in an ill-formed mind are hazardous to government, and when combined with a position of power even more so.
thinking causes command
The power to command frequently causes failure to think.
thinking government self
Wooden-headedness, the source of self-deception, is a factor that plays a remarkably large role in government. It consists in assessing a situation in terms of preconceived fixed notions while ignoring or rejecting any contrary signs. It is acting according to wish while not allowing oneself to be deflected by the facts.
bankers books books-and-reading humanity treasures
Books are companions, teachers, magicians, bankers of the treasures of the mind. Books are humanity in print.
writing conditions
I have always been in a condition in which I cannot not write.
writing sentences satisfying
Nothing is more satisfying than to write a good sentence.
across alive arouse carry consciousness constantly desk die emotion image man phrase reader searches sees unless wants word writer writes
No writing comes alive unless the writer sees across his desk a reader, and searches constantly for the word or phrase which will carry the image he wants the reader to see, and arouse the emotion he wants him to feel. Without consciousness of a live reader, what a man writes will die on his page.
teaching learning faculty
Learning from experience is a faculty almost never practiced
eye honor different
Honor wears different coats to different eyes.
responsible forgiven persons
To be right and overruled is not forgiven to persons in responsible positions.
technology use purpose
For belligerent purposes, the 14th century, like the 20th, commanded a technology more sophisticated than the mental and moral capacity that guided its use.
war sea history
The fleet sailed to its war base in the North Sea, headed not so much for some rendezvous with glory as for rendezvous with discretion.
age needs bad-times
Human beings of any age need to approve of themselves; the bad times in history come when they cannot.