Quotes & Sayings About Accurate History

I will only mention that the independent power of words to affect the writing of history is a thing to be watched out for. They have an almost frightening autonomous power to produce in the mind of the reader an image or idea that was not in the mind of the writer. Obviously they operate this way in all forms of writing, but history is particularly sensitive because one has a duty to be accurate, and careless use of words can leave a false impression one had not intended. — Barbara W. Tuchman

The business of a novelist is, in my opinion, to create characters first and foremost, and then to set them in the snarl of the human currents of his time, so that there results an accurate permanent record of a phase of history. — John Dos Passos

The Shriver Report presents an accurate and detailed portrait of American women and families at this transformational moment in our history. — Maria Shriver

No wonder oral history turns out to be more accurate than written history. The first is handed down from the many who were present. The second is written by the few who probably weren't. — Gloria Steinem

From Love In The Time of Apps:
Goodwin had little doubt that in the end he would lose his action for divorce. Where could he get a fair-minded jury? His public image was so tarnished at this point that he even received a letter from the Misogynist Society. For the first time in its history, the letter advised, the Society took the side of a woman. "Our vote," the letter closed with, "was unanimous." On the same day Goodwin received the letter, he saw his photograph on the cover of People Magazine's new line extension, Unpopular People Magazine. Below his photo was a banner proclaiming, "The Most Unpopular Man In America." Goodwin believed the tag to be accurate. — Jay Begler

Trade. They wrote down their history and had discovered a 365-day calendar that was more accurate than its European counterparts. One particular society - the Mayan - had also managed to come up with that beautiful concept of zero to which I alluded earlier, and without which mathematical computation is very difficult. It may — Christopher Hitchens

Brewing is mentioned rarely in accounts of the Industrial Revolution. Temperance pressures meant it was impolitic for brewers to boast of their achievements and innovations, and few accurate records exist of exactly how it performed in the 19th Century compared to those glamorous, sexy industries like coal mining and steel making. — Peter Brown

The mistake we all make is in assuming anybody remembers anydamnthing from one day to the next. If that were true, we'd stop getting involved with approximately the same kind of wrong lover each time, we'd learn the lessons of history, the death penalty would discourage those plotting murder, and George Santayana's famous quote would be about as popular as "the bee's knees." But few of us keep accurate records of what we've learned as we hobble through life barking our shins in the dark on experiences we've already had ... — Harlan Ellison

I am a twentiethcentury individual. I am working myself up to a point where I can exist beyond guilt, beyond blood, beyond the ridiculous past. Thank goodness for America. In this country there's a chance to accomplish such a thing. I want to look straight ahead. I want to see things clearly. I'd like to become singleminded and straightforward in the most literal sense of those words. History is no more accurate than prophecy. I reject the wrathful God of the Hebrews. I reject the Christian God of love and money, although I don't reject love itself or money itself. I reject heritage, background, tradition and birthright. These things merely slow the progress of the human race. They result in war and insanity, war and insanity, war and insanity. — Don DeLillo

[ ... ] from what I'd been able to ascertain online, the Swiss were a reassuringly practical people. They had a long, proud history of staying out of wars, preferring to devote themselves to more constructive endeavours like science, secure banking and building extremely accurate clocks. — Gavin Extence

Writing entails undertaking a spiritual journey, an exploration of the blemished self that is delightfully challenging, painfully arduous, and unfathomably rewarding. Writing allows an admittedly flawed person to artfully confront their inglorious personal history, examine the present, and cogitate upon the future. Thoughtful writing creates a person's own precursors: it revises a person's conception of the past into a more detailed, accurate, and comprehensive philosophical context, alters how a person perceives the "now," and alters the course and outcome person's future. Writing is the ultimate psychological experience and an immaculate method to examine a person's thoughts, debunk a person's delusion, and analyze a person's values. — Kilroy J. Oldster

Kim called me a slut under her breath in H&P, and Mr. Wallace heard her and gave a lecture on the negative effects of labels, and how words like that serve to limit women's sexual expression, and how there's a whole history of words that basically mean slut8 and yet there are no equivalent epithets for men whatsoever, and didn't that say something about how women are viewed in our culture? He said a more accurate term could be: "a girl who's using sexuality in an attempt to gain approval from the opposite sex ... ." Or, if you look at it a different way, "a liberated, open girl who likes boys and feels comfortable expressing affection, but is misunderstood." Blah blah blah.
I'm sure he meant well, but I wanted to call Kim a megaslut right back and not think about it anymore — E. Lockhart

So why study history? Unlike physics or economics, history is not a means for making accurate predictions. We study history not to know the future but to widen our horizons, to understand that our present situation is neither natural nor inevitable, and that we consequently have many more possibilities before us than we imagine. For example, studying how Europeans came to dominate Africans enables us to realise that there is nothing natural or inevitable about the racial hierarchy, and that the world might well be arranged differently. 2. — Yuval Noah Harari

I like art history and art criticism. Leo Steinberg has always been my favorite. He's very original, very accurate and acute. — Helen Vendler

A sad Italian history of corruption by local leaders and exploitation by foreign dominators, all of which has generally led Italians to draw the seemingly accurate conclusion that nobody and nothing in this world can be trusted. Because the world is so corrupted, misspoken, unstable, exaggerated and unfair, one should trust only what one can experience with one's own senses, and this makes the senses stronger in Italy than anywhere in Europe. — Elizabeth Gilbert

When you read a history or biography you are entitled to imagine that it is as accurate as the authors can make it. That research has gone into it and we say "This is a history of the civil war, this is a biography of Lincoln" whatever. But you don't make any such supposition when you say "This is a historical novel." — Nicholas Meyer

There is no diffused light on anything international so that a comparatively whole scene may be observed. Light is sharply directed on one spot, leaving not only the greater part in darkness but also denying by implication that the great unlighted field exists. It is no longer profitable, with few exceptions, to ask people what they think, for you will be told what the wish, instead. Perhaps at no other period in the history of the world have people lived in such a dreamy state. People even waste time denouncing their enemies in open warfare for shooting back too hard, or too accurately. There is no attempt to be accurate as to truth, however. The whole idea is to be complimentary to one's self and keep alive the dream. The other man's side commits gross butcheries. One's own side wins smashing victories. — Zora Neale Hurston

Punk rock has never really had much patience with musical virtuosity. Actually, it'd be more accurate to say that for most of its history, punk has been actively hostile to virtuosity. — James Surowiecki

History may be accurate, but archaeology is precise. — Doug Scott

You cannot write an accurate history of The Holocaust without accounting for the Harvard students and professors that help make the science an acceptable world-wide movement. — A.E. Samaan

Smartass ice heathens from the north descended upon small-town America to laugh at the superstitious but numerically superior yokels of the heartland. In a breathtakingly accurate preview of things to come, the yokels actually won the trial, but history judged them the losers - thanks mainly to the flamboyant propaganda of a godless misanthrope named H. L. Mencken, the brilliant Darwinian ancestor of the modern liberal media. — Matt Taibbi

Writers the most learned, the most accurate in details, and the soundest in tendency, frequently fall into a habit which can neither be cured nor pardoned,-the habit of making history into the proof of their theories. — Lord Acton

12. Historians today rely on classics like Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War, Caesar's Gallic War, and Tacitus's Histories. The earliest copies we have for these date from 1,300, 900, and 700 years after the original writing, respectively, and there are eight extant copies of the first, ten of the second, and two of the third. In contrast, the earliest copy of Mark's gospel is dated at AD 130 (a century after the original writing), and there are 5,000 ancient Greek copies, along with nearly 20,000 Latin and other ancient manuscripts. The sheer volume of ancient manuscripts provides sufficient comparison between copies to provide an accurate reproduction of the original text. Ironically, a number of fashionable scholars attracted to the so-called gnostic gospels as an "alternative Christianity" have far fewer manuscripts, and the original writings cannot be dated any earlier than a century after the canonical Gospels. — Michael S. Horton

Very little comes easily to our poor, benighted species (the first creature, after all, to experiment with the novel evolutionary inventions of self-conscious philosophy and art). Even the most "obvious," "accurate," and "natural" style of thinking or drawing must be regulated by history and won by struggle. Solutions must therefore arise within a social context and record the complex interactions of mind and environment that define the possibility of human improvement. — Stephen Jay Gould

That's what drives science though: trying to find out the way things are, the way they were, and the way it really works. If that is your goal, then you want to make sure that your information is accurate, and if it's not, then it doesn't matter how much you liked that old urban legend or fictional factoid you once bought into. You will discard it, and be embarrassed by it, seeking instead for truth. — Aron Ra

Literature makes history come to life. It is maybe the most accurate depiction of history, especially literature that was written in the time period depicted in the story. — Amy Harmon

The casting of the brash United States Army Air Force officer Colonel Robert E. Hogan and the pompous German Luftwaffe officer Colonel Wilhelm Klink was inspired. For this series - a comedy with the serious backdrop of war - to succeed, the lead players had to be the perfect fit. The dynamic portrayal of this military odd couple had to be articulate, accurate, and precise. For the show to work, for the concept to be accepted, for one of the most outlandish premises in television history to be believed, the actors signed to play the two leading characters not only had to bring these extreme individuals to life with broad, fictional strokes, they had to make them real in the details. — Carol M. Ford

One of the first things we teach medical students is to listen to the patient by taking a careful medical history. Ninety percent of the time, you can arrive at an uncannily accurate diagnosis by paying close attention, using physical examination and sophisticated lab test to confirm your hunch (and to increase the bill to the insurance company). — V.S. Ramachandran

The foregoing history may not be precisely accurate in every particular; but I am sure it is sufficiently so, for all the uses I shall attempt to make of it, and in it, we have before us,
the chief material enabling us to correctly judge whether the repeal of the Missouri Compromise is right or wrong. — Abraham Lincoln

In any case, Cide Hamete Benengeli was a very careful historian, and very accurate in all things, as can be clearly seen in the details he relates to us, for although they are trivial and inconsequential, he does not attempt to pass over them in silence; his example could be followed by solemn historians who recount actions so briefly and succinctly that we can barely taste them, and leave behind in the inkwell, through carelessness, malice, or ignorance, the most substantive part of the work. — Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra

Stuart Clark's The Sun Kings is undoubtedly the most gripping and brilliant popular-science history account that I have ever read. It is informative, accurate, and relevant. Clark's ability to write so vividly makes me seethe with jealousy. — Owen Gingerich

Vadderung grinned. I've never heard it phrased quite like that, but it's accurate enough. In any event, overcoming that inertia requires tremendous energy, will, and a measure of simple luck. If one wishes to alter the course of history, it's a far simpler matter to attempt to shape the future. — Jim Butcher

Let the Bible be the Bible. It's not about science. It's not accurate history. It is a grab bag of religious fantasies written by many authors. Some of its myths, like the Star of Bethlehem, are very beautiful. Others are dull and ugly. Some express lofty ideals, such as the parables of Jesus. Others are morally disgusting. — Martin Gardner

Ottoman provinces were re-formed and cobbled together into states. The region was carved up with little regard to ethnic, religious, or territorial concerns. The flawed and cavalier treaties of World War I explain to a large degree why the Middle East remains unstable and angry today. Every Muslim schoolchild is taught this arc of history and resents it: Islam's golden era of the Arab caliphate, the Crusades, the Mongol devastation, the rise of the Ottomans, World War I, the carving up of the Middle East by Europe, and the poverty, weakness, and wars in the Muslim world of the last century. This is the basic and sad narrative taught at every mosque, and it has the benefit of being broadly accurate. — Richard Engel

You can latch onto theological ideas that are, in fact, not accurate, and refuse to let them go. I think we've seen this a few times in church history. — Frederica Mathewes-Green

In the Nazi Arbeit [work] camps back in '44 when a man was caught smoking one cigarette, the whole barracks would die," a patient, Ralph, once told me. "For one cigarette! Yet even so, the men did not give up their inspiration, their will to live and to enjoy what they got out of life from certain substances, like liquor or tobacco or whatever the case may be." I don't know how accurate his account was as history, but as a chronicler of his own drug urges and those of his fellow Hastings Street addicts, Ralph spoke the bare truth: people jeopardize their lives for the sake of making the moment livable. — Gabor Mate

Black people don't have an accurate idea of their history, which has been either suppressed or distorted. — Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

It's all in Hogwarts, A History. Though, of course, that book's not entirely reliable. A Revised History of Hogwarts would be a more accurate title. Or A Highly Biased and Selective History of Hogwarts, Which Glosses Over the Nastier Aspects of the School." "What are you on about?" said Ron, though Harry thought he knew what was coming. "House-elves!" said Hermione, her eyes flashing. "Not once, in over a thousand pages, does Hogwarts, A History mention that we are all colluding in the oppression of a hundred slaves! — J.K. Rowling

The history of the astronomy of the nineteenth century will be incomplete without a catalogue of his labours. He was one of the founders of the Astronomical Society, and his attention to its affairs was as accurate and minute as if it had been a firm of which he was the chief clerk, with expectation of being taken into partnership. — Augustus De Morgan

The bulk of the world's knowledge is an imaginary construction. History is but a mode of imagining, of making us see civilizations that no longer appear upon the earth. Some of the most significant discoveries in modern science owe their origin to the imagination of men who had neither accurate knowledge nor exact instruments to demonstrate their beliefs. If astronomy had not kept always in advance of the telescope, no one would ever have thought a telescope worth making. What great invention has not existed in the inventor's mind long before he gave it tangible shape? — Helen Keller

Writing historical novels can be dangerous. We need to be as accurate and as fair about the historical record as we can be, at the same time as creating our fictional characters and, hopefully, telling a good story. The challenge is weaving the fiction into the history. — Edward Rutherfurd

There were the events of 1968 when young people began to ask their parents, what did you do in the war? And since the middle- or late-'70s, the French have been absolutely obsessed with the Vichy regime. They have an institute of contemporary history that turns out first-rate scholarly work. Their textbooks are accurate. Whether the students actually read them is another matter. — Robert O. Paxton

Perhaps the most telling witness against the claim of accurate history for the Bible comes when we read the earliest narrative of the crucifixion found in Mark's gospel and discover that it is not based on eyewitness testimony at all. — John Shelby Spong

What about snipers?" I once asked someone. He said, "Oh, most of the snipers have automatic weapon. They arent very accurate. — P. J. O'Rourke

Laughing,I poked him for his embarrassingly accurate imitation of my southern accent.
He continued in my voice, "Then one day my boyfriend was being an ass and I challenged him to a comp.I had to do a front 1080 off a jump just to show him up,and the rest is history."
"I hope so."
"I know so." He kissed my cheek.
I reached back to run my fingers through his long hair. "Right now I want to lie low,have a normal life,and hang out with my boyfriend. I'll meet you in People in a few years."
He chuckled, making my insides sparkle with anticipation. "It's a date. — Jennifer Echols

She meant that they'd never used words like "separation" and "divorce" even in their worst screaming matches. They yelled things like, "You're infuriating!" "You don't think!" "You are the most annoying woman in the history of annoying women!" "I hate you!" "I hate you more!" and they always, always used the word "always," even though Clementine's mother had said you should never use that word in an argument with your spouse, as in, for example, "You always forget to refill the water jug!" (But Sam did always forget. It was accurate.) — Liane Moriarty