Frequently issued with the same ISBN but with slightly differing bibliographical details.
Two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Barbara Tuchman proves her talent for seeking out characters at all levels of society in this beautifully repackaged and reissued edition of her grand portrait of 14th-century Europe.A "marvelous history" of medieval Europe, from the bubonic plague and the Papal Schism to the Hundred Years' War, by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Guns of AugustLawrence Wright, author of The End of October, in The Wall Street JournalThe fourteenth century reflects two contradictory images- on the one hand, a glittering age of crusades, cathedrals, and chivalry; on the other, a world plunged into chaos and spiritual agony. In this revelatory work, Barbara W. Tuchman examines not only the great rhythms of history but the grain and texture of domestic life- what childhood was like; what marriage meant; how money, taxes, and war dominated the lives of serf, noble, and clergy alike. Granting her subjects their loyalties, treacheries, and guilty passions, Tuchman re-creates the lives of proud cardinals, university scholars, grocers and clerks, saints and mystics, lawyers and mercenaries, and, dominating all, the knight-in all his valor and "furious follies," a "terrible worm in an iron cocoon."Praise for A Distant Mirror"Beautifully written, careful and thorough in its scholarship . . . What Ms. Tuchman does superbly is to tell how it was. . . . No one has ever done this better."-The New York Review of Books"A beautiful, extraordinary book . . . Tuchman at the top of her powers . . . She has done nothing finer."-The Wall Street Journal"Wise, witty, and wonderful . . . a great book, in a great historical tradition."-Commentary
Winner of National Book Awards 1980
“"Beautifully written, careful and thorough in its scholarship . . . What Ms. Tuchman does superbly is to tell how it was. . . . No one has ever done this better." -- The New York Review of Books”
“Beautifully written, careful and thorough in its scholarship . . . What Ms. Tuchman does superbly is to tell how it was. . . . No one has ever done this better.”—The New York Review of Books
“A beautiful, extraordinary book . . . Tuchman at the top of her powers . . . She has done nothing finer.”—The Wall Street Journal
“Wise, witty, and wonderful . . . a great book, in a great historical tradition.”—Commentary
Barbara W. Tuchman (1912-1989) achieved prominence as a historian with The Zimmermann Telegram and international fame with The Guns of August-a huge bestseller and winner of the Pulitzer Prize. Her other works include Bible and Sword, The Proud Tower, Stilwell and the American Experience in China (for which Tuchman was awarded a second Pulitzer Prize), Notes from China, A Distant Mirror, Practicing History, The March of Folly, and The First Salute.
The 14th century reflects two contradictory images: on the one hand a glittering time of crusades and castles, cathedrals and chivalry and the exquisitely decorated Books of Hours; on the other, a time of ferocity and spiritual agony-a world plunged into chaos. Barbara Tuchman anatomizes the century, revealing to us both the great rhythms of history and the grain and texture of domestic life as it was lived: what childhood was like; what marriage meant; how money, taxes, and war dominated the lives of serf, noble, and clergy alike. Here are guilty passions; loyalties and treacheries; political assassinations; sea battles and sieges; fear of the end of the world; corruption in high places and a yearning for reform; satire and humor; sorcery and demonology; lust and sadism on the stage. Here are proud cardinals, beggars, bailiffs, feminists, Jews, university scholars, grocers, bankers, clerks, sorcerers, mercenaries, saints and mystics, lawyers and tax-collectors, and, dominating all, the knight in his valor and "furious follies," a "terrible worm in an iron cocoon."
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