The proud tower
a portrait of the world before the war, 1890-1914
by Barbara Tuchman · first published 1959
80% recommend20% neutral
The fateful quarter-century leading up to the Great War comes magnificently to life in these pages. It was a time when the world of Privilege still existed in Olympian luxury and the world of Protest was "heaving in its pain, its power and its hate." The age was the climax of a century of the most accelerated rate of change in man's record, a cataclysmic shaping of destiny. In portraying this world Barbara Tuchman concentrates on society rather than the state. Her aim, as she writes in her foreword, is "to discover the quality of the world from which the Great War came." - Jacket flap.
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Many thanks for the recommendation; picked up a copy. Tuchman wrote Guns of August and The Proud Tower about the times immediately before, during and after the start of WWI. I found both outstanding reads and I can only think A Distant Mirror to be worth the time.
on “The expenses of Queen Eleanor of Castile” ↗Barbara Tuckman is more famous for writing the Guns of August, but she also wrote the the Proud Tower[0] about the (European) world in the 25 years leading up to WWI, and in the concluding chapter she talks about how before the war the people thought they were good, they were proud of the society they…
on “Part of Wright brothers' first airplane on NASA's Mars chopper” ↗Highly recommend Barbara Tuchman’s The Proud Tower if anyone wants to learn more about these years before WWI. The simultaneous rise of nationalism and global communism is fascinating. So much hope is placed in peace conferences, right up until the end.
on “Putin and Xi Exposed the Great Illusion of Capitalism” ↗For info on how the anarchists aligned with the left at the end of the 19th century, I recommend Barbara Tuchman's book, The Proud Tower[0]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Proud_Tower
on “Anarchy Works (2010)” ↗Any recommendations on a good book-length account of the Dreyfus Affair? I've read the chapter in Tuchman's Proud Tower. I've always loved her books, but this is just a short chapter in a longer book. (I also read Shirer's Third Republic, but that was so long ago I don't remember. It was just a chapter also.)
on “The Whistle-Blower Who Freed Dreyfus” ↗…catalyzes the opposition in the upcoming 2022 election cycle. My only salve has been reading Barbara Tuchman's account of the parliamentary overreach and reaction in turn-of-the-20th century UK in The Proud Tower.
on “New Texas Abortion Law to Unleash a Torrent of Lawsuits Against Online Speech” ↗I’ve read her WWI trilogy The Zimmerman Telegram, The Proud Tower, and The Guns of August. The Zimmerman Telegram and The Guns of August were both amazing, and The Zimmerman Telegram is short, to me it read better than any Tom Clancy novel. The Proud Tower is good but…
on “Ask HN: What's the best book you read in 2021?” ↗