Wooden-headedness, the source of self-deception, is a factor that plays a remarkably large role in government. It consists in assessing a situation in terms of preconceived fixed notions while ignoring or rejecting any contrary signs. It is acting according to… — Barbara Tuchman Copy Share Image
Policy is formed by preconceptions, by long implanted biases. When information is relayed to policy-makers, they respond in terms of what is already inside their heads and consequently make policy less to fit the facts than to fit the notions… — Barbara Tuchman Copy Share Image
While husbands and lovers in the stories are of all kinds, ranging from sympathetic to disgusting, women are invariably deceivers: inconstant, unscrupulous, quarrelsome, querulous,… — Barbara Tuchman Copy Share Image
Doctrine tied itself into infinite knots over the realities of sex. — Barbara Tuchman Copy Share Image
The fleet sailed to its war base in the North Sea, headed not so much for some rendezvous with glory as for rendezvous with… — Barbara Tuchman Copy Share Image
The poets have familiarized more people with history than have the historians. — Barbara Tuchman Copy Share Image
Money was the crux. Raising money to pay the cost of war was to cause more damage to 14th century society than the physical… — Barbara Tuchman Copy Share Image
Misgovernment is of four kinds, often in combination. They are: 1) tyranny or oppression, of which history provides so many well-known examples that they… — Barbara Tuchman Copy Share Image
We seem to be afflicted by a widespread and eroding reluctance to take any stand on any values, moral, behavioral or esthetic. — Barbara Tuchman Copy Share Image
The clergy [in the 14th century] on the whole were probably no more lecherous or greedy or untrustworthy than other men, but because they… — Barbara Tuchman Copy Share Image
Without books, history is silent, literature dumb, science crippled. — Barbara Tuchman Copy Share Image
![“The clergy [in the 14th century] on the whole were probably no more lecherous or greedy or untrustworthy than other men, but because they were supposed to be better or nearer to God than other men, their failings attracted more attention.” quote by Barbara Tuchman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/558/barbara-tuchman-3945_attention_the-clergy-in-the-14th-century-on-the-wh_159681.jpg)
