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I was a narrative historian, believing more and more as I matured that the first function of the historian was to answer the child's question, What happened next?
A. J. P. Taylor
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A. J. P. Taylor
Age: 84 †
Born: 1906
Born: March 25
Died: 1990
Died: September 7
Historian
Historian Of The Modern Age
Journalist
University Teacher
Alan John Percivale Taylor
Firsts
Narrative
First
Function
Children
Answer
Believe
Question
Answers
Happened
Matured
Child
Historian
Next
Believing
More quotes by A. J. P. Taylor
In my opinion we learn nothing from history except the infinite variety of men's behaviour. We study it, as we listen to music or read poetry, for pleasure, not for instruction.
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When I write I have no loyalty except to historical truth as I see it and care no more about British achievements and mistakes than any other.
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Fascism was little more than terrorist rule by corrupt gangsters. Mussolini was not corrupt himself but he did nothing except to rage impotently.
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No matter what political reasons are given for war, the underlying reason is always economic.
A. J. P. Taylor
Like most of those who study history, he (Napoleon III) learned from the mistakes of the past how to make new ones.
A. J. P. Taylor
A master of improvised speech and improvised policies.
A. J. P. Taylor
We learn nothing from history except the infinite variety of men's behaviour.
A. J. P. Taylor
History is not another name for the past, as many people imply. It is the name for stories about the past.
A. J. P. Taylor
The God of Battles will throw the dice that decide.
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The greatest problem about old age is the fear that it may go on too long.
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Conformity may give you a quiet life it may even bring you to a University Chair. But all change in history, all advance, comes from the nonconformists. If there had been no trouble-makers, no Dissenters, we should still be living in caves.
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The crusade against Communism was even more imaginary than the specter of Communism.
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The present enables us to understand the past, not the other way round.
A. J. P. Taylor
Psychoanalysts believe that the only normal people are those who cause not trouble to either themselves or anyone else.
A. J. P. Taylor
George VI in the conventional parlance was a Good King who sacrificed his life to his sense of duty. If we are to have monarchs it would be hard to find a better one.
A. J. P. Taylor
The Foreign Office knows no secrets.
A. J. P. Taylor
History is the great propagator of doubt.
A. J. P. Taylor
History gets thicker as it approaches recent times: more people, more events, and more books written about them. More evidence is preserved, often, one is tempted to say, too much. Decay and destruction have hardly begun their beneficent work.
A. J. P. Taylor
History is not a catalogue but...a convincing version of events.
A. J. P. Taylor
All other forms of history - economic history, social history, psychological history, above all sociology - seem to me history with the history left out.
A. J. P. Taylor
