Quotes About Historian

Faced by the mountainous heap of the minutiae of knowledge and awed by the watchful severity of his colleagues, the modern historian too often takes refuge in learned articles or narrowly specialized dissertations, small fortresses that are easy to defend from attack.

there is inevitably something of "us" in the stories we tell about the past. This is the historian's predicament, and it is foolish to think there is some method, however well intentioned, that can extricate us from this predicament. (p. 10, paperback edition)

A good historian must combine the talents of the storyteller and the scientist. He must know what is likely to have happened as well as what some witnesses or writers said actually did happen.

For a man once called the Indian Obama by the historian and public intellectual Ramachandra Guha, the diminishing of Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar could not be more dramatic.

historian" of "America's Christian Founding.

Even in some older literature, such as in the writings of Byzantine historian Philostorgius in the fifth century, Ararat was suggested as the ark's landing site. After the 13th century a.d., more sources affirm this mountain as the landing site.

the historian's one alleged mention of Jesus of Nazareth — a little over one hundred notorious words in all — that was considered by Josephus scholars as a later insertion by an unscrupulous Christian scribe. Some historians believed that Josephus himself must have inserted the passage upon threat of his book being banned, or that it was inserted by later forgers. Ryan didn't know what to believe about the famous Testimonium Flavianum:

The historian, as an historian, has no categories that allow for the resurrection, ascension, and glorification of Jesus, and the possibility of the appearance of such a glorious heavenly being to human beings in history. There is, however, no adequate historical, i.e., human, explanation of Saul's Damascus experience

History always tries to understand the meaning of the events it reports; and the fact that a person has a viewpoint does not mean that person is a poor historian and distorts facts to support his or her interpretation.

In October 2014 files released from the National Archives revealed that MI5 'opened personal files on the popular historian A. J. P. Taylor, the writer Iris Murdoch and the moral philosopher Mary Warnock after they and [Christopher] Hill signed a letter supporting a march against the nuclear bomb in 1959'.

Popularizing - much less venturing beyond one's secure turf - was frowned upon for many years. I think I probably internalized the prohibition, even though I was - and knew I was - among the best speakers and writers of my age cohort. I don't mean I was the best historian - a quite different measure.

I worked for a brief spell as a journalist, but soon I discovered that I didn't want to be a journalist - I wanted to be a historian.

I really love acting, but I also really want to be a historian, so its really confusing.

For the average person, all problems date to World War II; for the more informed, to World War I; for the genuine historian, to the French Revolution.

The historian Howard Zinn's remarks about the South make sense: it is "not the antithesis but the essence of American society which could therefore function as a mirror in which the nation can see its own blemishes magnified."6 If the South is a mirror, Mississippi is a microscope.

Not only is it difficult for the journalist to think more like a historian, but it is, alas, the historian who is becoming more like the journalist.

Realism can be punishing. Probabilistic skepticism is worse. It is difficult to go about life wearing probabilistic glasses, as one starts seeing fools of randomness all around, in a variety of situations—obdurate in their perceptional illusion. To start, it is impossible to read a historian's analysis without questioning the inferences:

A historian who works for a bank: That's not the most likely background for someone who capers around the cosmos having adventures, is it?

In the final analysis, what stands out about Thucydides is not his weaknesses but his strengths as a historian. We note his omissions, but no account of the Peloponnesian War or of fifth-century Greece in general is more complete. Some scholars worry over his cut-and-dried heroes and villains. But is there much evidence to suggest that these assessments were fundamentally wrong? Others argue that his speeches are biased distortions, but no one can prove that any are outright fabrications.

A world, and a church, which is hooked on novelty like some cultural equivalent of crack cocaine needs the cold, cynical eye of the historian to stand as a prophetic witness against it.

It has been said that the Negroes do not connect morals with religion. The historian would like to know what race or nation does such a thing. Certainly the whites with whom the Negroes have come into contact have not done so.

The first duty of an historian is to be on his guard against his own sympathies.

Too rigid specialization is almost as bad for a historian's mind, and for his ultimate reputation, as too early an indulgence in broad generalization and synthesis.

In this regard, I like to quote a favorite aphorism from Oxford art historian Edgar Wind: "Mediocrity which claims to be intense has a peculiarly repulsive effect.