{"product_id":"a-distant-mirror-the-calamitous-14th-century-9780345349576","title":"A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century","description":"\u003cb\u003eA \"marvelous history\"* of medieval Europe, from the bubonic plague and the Papal Schism to the Hundred Years' War, by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of \u003ci\u003eThe Guns of August\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003e*Lawrence Wright, author of \u003ci\u003eThe End of October, \u003c\/i\u003ein\u003ci\u003e The Wall Street Journal\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e The fourteenth century reflects two contradictory images: on the one hand, a glittering age of crusades, cathedrals, and chivalry; on the other, a world plunged into chaos and spiritual agony. In this revelatory work, Barbara W. Tuchman examines not only the great rhythms of history but the grain and texture of domestic life: what childhood was like; what marriage meant; how money, taxes, and war dominated the lives of serf, noble, and clergy alike. Granting her subjects their loyalties, treacheries, and guilty passions, Tuchman re-creates the lives of proud cardinals, university scholars, grocers and clerks, saints and mystics, lawyers and mercenaries, and, dominating all, the knight--in all his valor and \"furious follies,\" a \"terrible worm in an iron cocoon.\" \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cb\u003ePraise for \u003ci\u003eA Distant Mirror\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \"Beautifully written, careful and thorough in its scholarship . . . What Ms. Tuchman does superbly is to tell \u003ci\u003ehow \u003c\/i\u003eit was. . . . No one has ever done this better.\"\u003cb\u003e--\u003ci\u003eThe New York Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"A beautiful, extraordinary book . . . Tuchman at the top of her powers . . . She has done nothing finer.\"\u003cb\u003e--\u003ci\u003eThe Wall Street Journal\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \"Wise, witty, and wonderful . . . a great book, in a great historical tradition.\"\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e--Commentary\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBarbara W. Tuchman \u003c\/b\u003e(1912-1989) achieved prominence as a historian with \u003ci\u003eThe Zimmermann Telegram \u003c\/i\u003eand international fame with \u003ci\u003eThe Guns of August\u003c\/i\u003e--a huge bestseller and winner of the Pulitzer Prize. Her other works include \u003ci\u003eBible and Sword, The Proud Tower, Stilwell and the American Experience in China \u003c\/i\u003e(for which Tuchman was awarded a second Pulitzer Prize), \u003ci\u003eNotes from China, A Distant Mirror, Practicing History, The March of Folly, \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eThe First Salute\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Random House Trade","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50612375257362,"sku":"9780345349576","price":17.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_85fcfb62-c916-4793-b741-3d652d2ad3d3.jpg?v=1732373983","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/a-distant-mirror-the-calamitous-14th-century-9780345349576","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}