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Title: Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century by Barbara W. Tuchman ISBN: 0-345-34957-1 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 12 July, 1987 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.39 (69 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Personalized history
Comment: Tuchman's A Distant Mirror is not only a wonderful historical book, it is a work of art. Tuchman avoided the dryness and lack of "reality" that is common to many historical books that merely list past events and describe them from the author's vantage. By contrast, she used historical events and setting, and related what actually happened through the thoughts and [probably] spoken words of those alive at that moment in time. She humanizes history. Of course she did not have actual transcripts from the 14th century, but with great skill and eloquence she puts words, thoughts, and feelings into actual principles of history that she skillfully brings alive. This is not a historical novel in any traditional sense. Rather, I'd say, it's a factual description of the 14th century, as felt and lived by actual people of the time. In fact I believe A Distant Mirror is the first acclaimed book of this type that most historians acclaim as very worthy. It's a must-read for all who are interested in medieval times, especially, medieval France. It's very hard to put down, once started.
Rating: 5
Summary: Excellent History of Life Around the Hundred Year's War
Comment: Who is Enguerrand de Coucy and why should we care?
Coucy was a French noble whose life and position intertwined neatly with many of the momentous events that defined the 14th Century. He appears, Zelig-like, at the head of armies, at the elbow of both the Kings of France and England and in the great councils of state that determined the actions of a nascent French nation.
His story is remarkable and remarkably well documented. His life and actions serve as the central thread that ties the events surrounding the Hundred Year's War between England and France together in this marvelous book.
Tuchman displays this late Middle Age period in all of its nasty burtality. The Great Plague hit in several waves, reducing Europe's population by between one half and one third. A century of warfare left roving bands of knights and armed men loose in the countryside to pillage and destroy between summons to fight for king and country. The common man and woman, evolving from a status of near slavery to severe oppression, owed service to their lord and taxes to almost everyone.
Tuchman brilliantly weaves the above facts of life with the politics and struggles between rival nobles, kingdoms and a corrupt church. This book is very well written, as I had always heard Tuchman's works to be. She possesses the rare ability to write solid history -- this book is fact filled, and thoroughly documented -- in the manner of a great storyteller. Her characters and events, leavened by Tuchman's wry observations and logical conclusioins, are marvelously developed.
So much happened in this time period that it does bear scrutiny. Chivalry, the code of the Knight that was suppossed to benefit people in exchange for a life free from common worries, had denegrated into a corrupt facade that shielded ruthless brigands from law and sanction. The great Church, long the common denominator among disparate peoples became first hopelessly corrupt then divided for decades by rival popes more interested in Europe's balance of power among earthly kingdoms than in promoting the Kingdom to whom they suppossedly gave vasselage. Great landed nobility struggled with each other and began a transformation from nearly autonomous players in an ever changing system of alliances across nationalities to becomming the building blocks of the infant state. Policy and war rose and fell on the ability, whim and maturity of changing kings.
Although our own recently passed Twentieth Century could witness evil and bloodletting on a more sustained and organized basis than any that preceeded it -- hence the title "Through a Distant Mirror," Tuchman's work also illustrates how far society has come in those parts of the world where it is civil and grounded in natural rights. Thus, Tuchman's book shows both the constant danger through time of man's darker side as well as the progress earned by those who have managed to diffuse power and ground everyday people with a voice in their affairs and rights that can not be abrogated.
This is a marvelous work from every facet. I am now ordering other Tuchman books to see how she handles man's affairs in centuries distant from that enjoyed by Enguerrand de Coucy.
Rating: 4
Summary: Polished and Shiny
Comment: "A Distant Mirror" is about as entertaining as a history book can get. Barbara Tuchman is a captivating storyteller, and it speaks for the quality of her narrative history of France in the 14th century that the book remains in print after 25 years.
The red thread that runs through her book is the folly, pride and irrationality of behavior that she sees as characteristically human: "For mankind is ever the same and nothing is lost out of nature, though everything is altered," as the quote from John Dryden says on one of the first pages of the book. The title itself reflects this philosophical position: the 14th century as a distant mirror for the 20th century. To be honest, I found this a bit far-fetched. The two centuries do not share that many similarities. Of course, human nature as such has not changed in the course of six centuries, and the madness of the two world wars is comparable to that of the Hundred Years' War (1337-1453). But the 20th century, for example, saw no epidemic like the plague that killed off more than one third of the population; on the contrary, the discovery of penicillin in 1928 and its application as an injectable drug in 1941 improved the chances of surviving a serious illness dramatically. More importantly, the 20th century did not see the first signs of disintegration of an established political order that would later give rise to a new one (the replacement of feudalism by the nation state); on the contrary, democratic states successfully withstood the challenge from totalitarian systems.
Where the book really shines, is the narrative. Barbara Tuchman gives a vivid and detailed picture of life in the 14th century, in particular the life of the nobility. She does not leave out the scandals or the slaughter of battles, the machinations of nobles greedy for power and the suffering of the peasants. Her style is descriptive and detailed. She does not simply tell that, say, realism was the desired effect of miracle plays and mysteries staged for the populace in the 14th century, she shows it in unforgettable detail: "When John the Baptist was decapitated, the actor was whisked away so cunningly in exchange for a fake corpse and fake head spilling ox blood that the audience shrieked in excitement."(311/312) Her style is also not without the occasional wink at the reader. A fine example for her subtle sense of humor is the list of possessions of the Duc de Berry (famous for the illustrated book "Les Tres Riches Heures" he commissioned): "He owned one of Charlemagne's teeth, a piece of Elijah's mantle, Christ's cup from the Last Supper, drops of the Virgin's milk, enough of her hairs and teeth to distribute as gifts, soil from various Biblical sites, a narwhal's teeth, [and some more unique curiosities]"(427).
While I found the story telling absolutely captivating, there are two things about "A Distant Mirror" that made me choose four rather than five stars. One is the lack of analysis, the other Ms. Tuchman's occasional lapses into pop psychology.
The peripheral role of analysis in the book is perhaps a consequence of her narrative style. While Ms. Tuchman feasts on descriptions and details, she does not really want to dwell on the technicalities of changes in technology (other than those in the art of battle), medicine and economics, or on theories that try to put these developments in a broader perspective. At its worst, the reluctance to use analytical tools produces a kind of historical mysticism: "Times were to grow worse over the next fifty-odd years [after 1400] until at some imperceptible moment, by some mysterious chemistry, energies were refreshed, ideas broke out of the mold of the Middle Ages into new realms, and humanity found itself redirected."(581)
The lapses into pop psychology happen when Ms. Tuchman generalizes; for example, when she concludes, "Human beings of any age need to approve of themselves, the bad times in history come when they cannot."(451) Or when "pride and folly" become driving forces of history, because "Vainglory, however, no matter how much medieval Christianity insisted it was a sin, is a motor of mankind, no more eradicable than sex."(577)
On the whole, though, "A Distant Mirror" is a pleasure to read, and I am sure the book will continue to find readers who enjoy the colorful and vivid stories Ms. Tuchman unfolds about the "calamitous" 14th century.
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Title: Guns of August by Barbara W. Tuchman ISBN: 034538623X Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 08 March, 1994 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Proud Tower by Barbara W. Tuchman ISBN: 0345405013 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 27 August, 1996 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
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Title: A World Lit Only by Fire : The Medieval Mind and the Renaissance - Portrait of an Age by William Manchester ISBN: 0316545562 Publisher: Back Bay Books Pub. Date: 01 June, 1993 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
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Title: The March of Folly : From Troy to Vietnam by Barbara W. Tuchman ISBN: 0345308239 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 12 February, 1985 List Price(USD): $16.95 |
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Title: Bible and Sword : England and Palestine from the Bronze Age to Balfour by Barbara W. Tuchman ISBN: 0345314271 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 12 February, 1984 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
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