The cubism of Braque or Picasso, the dissonant compositions of Schoenberg or Stravinsky, the free-flowing and often erotic choreography of Isadora Duncan and Nijinsky - these were acts of rebellion against the certainties and traditions of the old world. — Margaret MacMillan Copy Share Image
The Italian futurists, the German expressionists, and the British vorticists were fascinated by speed and the ways the modern world was shattering conventions. The old ways of painting, writing, sculpting, and composing no longer seemed adequate to capture the world. — Margaret MacMillan Copy Share Image
Some might argue humans are hard-wired to fight. I don't agree: we are conscious beings who have the capacity to make decisions. — Margaret MacMillan Copy Share Image
I wish we could see understanding the First World War as a European issue, or even a global one, and not a nationalistic one. — Margaret MacMillan Copy Share Image
Theodore Roosevelt's policy to build a two-ocean navy confirmed that the old-style isolationism of the founders had not survived the modern, increasingly globalized world. — Margaret MacMillan Copy Share Image
Individual lives remind us that there is something called a common humanity and that, over the centuries, there have been people who have lived… — Margaret MacMillan Copy Share Image
The 1898 annexation of the Hawaiian Islands merely formally recognized what had long been American domination. — Margaret MacMillan Copy Share Image
“There are only two perfectly useless things in the world,” he quipped. “One is an appendix and the other is Poincaré!” — Margaret MacMillan Copy Share Image
“Nationalist movements often overlapped with economic and class issues: Rumanian and Ruthenian peasants, for example, challenged their Hungarian and Polish landlords.” — Margaret MacMillan Copy Share Image
How curious that such an outsize man, in physique as well as personality, should be remembered today mainly for giving his name to a… — Margaret MacMillan Copy Share Image
“Part of Nietzsche’s appeal was that it was easy to read a great deal into his work, and people including socialists, vegetarians, feminists, conservatives… — Margaret MacMillan Copy Share Image
If we do not, as historians, write the history of great events as well as the small stories that make up the past, others… — Margaret MacMillan Copy Share Image
Many in the English-speaking world came to agree with the Germans that the Treaty of Versailles, and the reparations in particular, were unjust, and… — Margaret MacMillan Copy Share Image
