Antonia Fraser Quotes

I believe that historians and analysts of historical events need the authority of facts supplied by living witnesses to the events, which they make their subject.

In reconstructing the past, historians generally are compelled to rely on accounts written after the event by participants and witnesses, or on the hearsay versions of those who learned at second-hand what had occurred. Such writings are subject to the infirmities of recollection, or of bias arising from allegiance to one side or the other.

History consists of facts attested to by evidence.

It is impossible to write ancient history because we do not have enough sources, and impossible to write modern history because we have far too many.

The slave narratives, there is a wealth of research there, because you are hearing stories from the first person account, and that's a whole different thing than reading about it in the history books. You're able to really personalize it.

As a historian, you can only go as far as the evidence will take you.

With my research, I really need absolute confirmation of what actually happened, direct physical connections to the past.

We need to read history from the source.

One of the great challenges of being a modern historian is interviewing multiple people who were all there for something, some event. No one's version matches up 100% with other people's, even if it's three or four people on a conference call.

History, to be above evasion or dispute, must stand on documents, not on opinions.

Jeremy Popkin's collection of first-person narratives of the Haitian Revolution is an extremely valuable work, accessible, sound and intelligent. I only wish such a book had been available fifteen years ago when I was in the early stages of researching my series of novels. Popkin has been deft and tactful in stitching together these excerpts, and as a result, he manages to tell a complete version of the Revolution almost entirely in the words of the people who experienced it-this book engaged me deeply.

Authentic sources. Many authentic sources.

when I first began this diary I said I would give a record of my inner life. I begin to wonder if I have said anything about my inner life. What if I have no inner life?

On the subject of the history of the American Revolution, you ask who shall write it? Who can write it? And who will ever be able to write it? Nobody, except merely its external facts... all its councils, designs and discussions having been conducted by Congress [behind] closed doors - and no members, as far as I know, having even made notes of them. These, which are the life and soul of history, must forever be unknown.

There is not a single contemporary historical mention of Jesus, not by Romans or by Jews, not by believers or by unbelievers, during his entire lifetime. This does not disprove his existence, but it certainly casts great doubt on the historicity of a man who was supposedly widely known to have made a great impact on the world. Someone should have noticed.

For if I should not believe all that is written by Historians, of the glorious acts of Alexander, or Caesar; I do not think the Ghost of Alexander, or Caesar, had any just cause to be offended; or any body else, but the Historian. If Livy say the Gods made once a Cow speak, and we believe it not; we distrust not God therein, but Livy. So that it is evident, that whatsoever we believe, upon no other reason, then what is drawn from authority of men only, and their writings; whether they be sent from God or not, is Faith in men only.

The very idea of printing my diary has always struck me as completely superficial.

DIARY, n. A daily record of that part of one's life, which he can relate to himself without blushing.

I want people to see that all-important time in a different way-in the way it was. For of a number of reasons, including the absence of photographs, we tend to see the men and women of the Revolution as not quite real. And we have far too little sense of what they suffered.

It makes sense that that's part of the story and everything, but that's part of any story of any record - where was it record and how long and what were the people doing. I think people want to know where these events are made. That's why I like the word "record."

For historians ought to be precise, truthful, and quite unprejudiced, and neither interest nor fear, hatred nor affection, should cause them to swerve from the path of truth, whose mother is history, the rival of time, the depository of great actions, the witness of what is past, the example and instruction of the present, the monitor of the future.

The historian must not try to know what is truth, if he values his honesty; for if he cares for his truths, he is certain to falsify his facts.

What his imagination is to the poet, facts are to the historian. His exercise of judgment comes in their selection, his art in their arrangement.

Don't believe a thing unless you hear from me directly because there's a lot of bad info going on out there.