I wasn’t an academic looking in books for ideas. But I educated myself about historical work that was similar to mine, to provide a frame of reference that wasn’t the usual frame of reference of the New York art world and Europe.
Initial work is on period research where the historical markers are absolutely non-negotiable. Once that is established, a writer can take creative liberties in terms of chronology to suit the story.
I didn’t want to be an actor. I wanted to design historical movies like ‘Ben-Hur’. I saw this as my life.
It is important to remember that the Pacific Ocean covers a quarter of the world’s surface and that each Pacific country has its own cultural, historical and ethnic identity.
The person I respect most, in terms of historical figures, is probably Nelson Mandela. I just think that his tolerance in the face of extreme provocation is something every single person on the planet could learn from.
There’s nothing wrong with paying taxes; they should be paid in proportion to how rich you are. This idea that you’re going to get better growth by cutting taxes at the top has no historical justification. And it’s certainly not an argument in favor of capitalism.
In ‘Spinal Tap,’ there’s the fake historical quality of ‘Stonehenge.’ It’s something the musicians look at with a mystical reverence. In folk music, it’s the seriousness with which these people approach their ‘art.’
It is this conception of the unity of the human career which is perhaps the greatest achievement of historical study, since it gained a place analogous to that of natural science.
There is no self-knowledge but an historical one. No one knows what he himself is who does not know his fellow men, especially the most prominent one of the community, the master’s master, the genius of the age.
No historical analogies are exactly precise.
The way I sort of approach my work is that the historical and socioeconomic and cultural worlds that the music is exploring dictate the visual experience and the way that we approach it specifically on film.
We’ve all faced the charge that our novels are history lite, and to some extent, that’s true. Yet for some, historical fiction is a way into reading history proper.
I never wanted to be current in the sense that I follow the news, I follow the historical moment of the day. It was always, for me, to go back to the fundamentals.
There is a difference between what technology enables and what historical business practices enable.
The rise of the West is, quite simply, the pre-eminent historical phenomenon of the second half of the second millennium after Christ.
Confederate statues belong in a historical museum, not in a place of honor.
The very action of the proletariat is a determining factor in history. And although we can no more jump over the stages of historical development than a man can jump over his shadow, nevertheless, we can accelerate or retard that development.
So I’m working on another historical novel. This one’s a Franco-New Zealand novel, and it takes place at the time of the Rainbow Warrior bombing in New Zealand.
I’ve found that using historical material and being rooted in historical material is liberating because I always think to myself, ‘Well, this actually happened, and this is fantastic!’ That’s why I don’t like fantasy, in a way. Because it’s sort of in emptiness.
One of the great lessons I learned about historical fiction from writing ‘Loving Frank’ is that you don’t try to disguise what people did; my approach was to try to understand the characters and why they did what they did.
If we believe that the Bible is the inspired Word of God, then we shouldn’t be recognizing it only as a book of historical and economic significance.
Military leaders, many of whom were students of counterinsurgency, recognized the dangers of an incremental escalation and the historical lesson that ‘trailing’ an insurgency typically condemned counterinsurgents to failure.
There is a profound hypocrisy – and deep historical ignorance – when Europeans complain about the problems posed by the ethnic and religious minorities in their midst, for that is exactly what European colonial rule meant for peoples around the world.
Nothing will ever top ‘The Wire.’ It was historical. It was black cinema.
Statues and murals depicting historical figures, and even Jesus Christ himself, are being targeted by angry mobs of individuals looking to rewrite history.
I loved the idea of making history interesting for kids! When Scholastic approached me about ‘The 39 Clues’, I immediately started going through the ‘greatest hits’ from my years as a social studies teacher, and picked the historical characters and eras that most appealed to my students.
I could write historical fiction, or science fiction, or a mystery but since I find it fascinating to research the clues of some little know period and develop a story based on that, I will probably continue to do it.
At the close of my visit, my Hawaiian friends urged me strongly to publish my impressions and experiences, on the ground that the best books already existing, besides being old, treat chiefly of aboriginal customs and habits now extinct, and of the introduction of Christianity and subsequent historical events.
To have united the purposes of an entire Nation, is the great historical achievement of the man in whose strong hands our President has placed the fate of our people.
A historical romance is the only kind of book where chastity really counts.
I’ve always had strong ties with Delhi, and I do stay in touch with my friends and periodically visit the capital. I started my schooling at St. Columbus High School before I went to Mayo College. Delhi, for me, is a historical city with all its beautiful monuments.
No, this customary aim of research by excavators is completely foreign to the historical work with which I am occupied… my sole and only aim is to be able to establish a historical fact, on which I disagree with some eminent historians and geographers.
Historical change is like an avalanche. The starting point is a snow-covered mountainside that looks solid. All changes take place under the surface and are rather invisible.
Whenever I was encouraged by my elders to pick up a book, I was often told, ‘Read so as to know the world.’ And it is true; books have invited me into different countries, states of mind, social conditions and historical epochs; they have offered me a place at the most unusual gatherings.
Obama prefers to look forward, not back, as he has stated. So at least during his tenure, there will be no reliable record compiled as a cautionary tale for lawmakers and presidents in future times of crisis. This is the historical Obama.
I know the world of opera so intimately: historical sweep, sharply defined characters, not too rational an explanation of what’s going on. It’s a feast.
All truly historical peoples have an idea they must realize, and when they have sufficiently exploited it at home, they export it, in a certain way, by war; they make it tour the world.
To suggest that Quebecers willingly give up the chance to exercise fully their influence within the federal government would be to betray the historical role Quebec has always played in Confederation, and to undermine the legitimacy of their pride and ambitions.
The power of historical fiction for bad and for good can be immense in shaping consciousness of the past.
Historical fiction was not – and is not – meant to supplant literature from the period it describes. As a veteran of the Crimea, Tolstoy wrote ‘War and Peace’ to match his own internal sense of the truth of the Napoleonic wars, to dramatize what he felt literature from that period had failed to describe.
I felt in my bones that Alfred Kazin was right to suggest that ‘the deepest side of being American is the sense of being like nothing before us in history’ – a historical conceit that privileged biography as the narrative of the exceptionalist experience.
Just because a company falls doesn’t invalidate what we can learn by studying that company when it was at its historical best.
There is very strong historical data that suggests the way societies grow is by making large, long-term investments.
The creators of Wonder Woman had no interest in proving an actual link to the past. In some parts of the academic world, however, the historical existence of the Amazons, or any matriarchal society, has long been a raging issue.
Historical hypocrites have themselves carried out the very human rights abuses that they suddenly decide warrant intervention elsewhere.
So this was the big secret historians keep to themselves: historical research is wildly seductive and fun. There’s a thrill in the process of digging, then piecing together details like a puzzle.
A good monetary policy follows inflationary expectations and not historical numbers.
You simply can’t understand the present if you don’t understand the past. There is no more alarming case study of the consequences of historical ignorance than President Trump.
I love visiting Landmark Trust properties, which tend to be historical follies in extraordinary places.
The truth is I do take drag really seriously, and I think that there’s kind of a place for that – to see it as this political and historical art form, and to want to continue pushing it in new directions. And also honor the old directions as well. So I’m sort of like a drag intellectual/drag queen.
