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Book Cover for: A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century, Barbara W. Tuchman

A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century

Barbara W. Tuchman

"Wise, witty, and wonderful . . . A great book, in a great historical tradition." Commentary
The 14th century gives us back two contradictory images: a glittering time of crusades and castles, cathedrals and chivalry, and a dark time of ferocity and spiritual agony, a world plunged into a chaos of war, fear and the Plague. Barbara Tuchman anatomizes the century, revealing both the great rhythms of history and the grain and texture of domestic life as it was lived.

Book Details

  • Publisher: Random House Trade
  • Publish Date: Jul 12nd, 1987
  • Pages: 784
  • Language: English
  • Edition: undefined - undefined
  • Dimensions: 8.20in - 5.50in - 1.70in - 1.35lb
  • EAN: 9780345349576
  • Categories: Europe - MedievalSocial HistoryWestern Europe - General

About the Author

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.

Praise for this book

"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