A Distant Mirror

The Calamitous Fourteenth Century

By: Barbara W. Tuchman

Narrated by: Wanda McCaddon

Length: 28 hrs and 38 mins

Publisher's summary

A “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 The Guns of August

*Lawrence Wright, author of The End of October, in The Wall Street Journal

The fourteenth century reflects two contradictory images: on the one hand, a glittering time of crusades and castles, cathedrals and chivalry, and the exquisitely decorated Books of Hours; and on the other, a time of ferocity and spiritual agony, a world of chaos and the plague.

Barbara Tuchman reveals both the great rhythms of history and the grain and texture of domestic life as it was lived. Here are the guilty passions, loyalties and treacheries, political assassinations, sea battles and sieges, corruption in high places and a yearning for reform, satire and humor, sorcery and demonology, and lust and sadism on the stage. Here are proud cardinals, beggars, feminists, university scholars, grocers, bankers, mercenaries, mystics, lawyers and tax collectors, and, dominating all, the knight in his valor and “furious follies,” a “terrible worm in an iron cocoon.”

©1978 Barbara W. Tuchman (P)2005 Blackstone Audiobooks

Critic reviews

"Beautifully written, careful, and thorough in its scholarship.... What Ms. Tuchman does superbly is to tell how it was.... No one has ever done this better." (New York Review of Books)

"Barbara Tuchman at the top of her powers.... A beautiful, extraordinary book.... She has done nothing finer." (Wall Street Journal)

A window into the nasty world of the Middle Ages

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

Tuchman has the rare ability to make readers feel as if they are actually living in history. That ability is on display in this book, which took me into the reality of the Middle Ages as no other book has. Reading this book, you will learn that romantic fantasies like Game of Thrones bear little reality to the squalid, violent, chaotic reality. Life in Medieval Europe really was, as Hobbes described it, "nasty, brutish, and short." The 14th century was the point when it all came crashing down - when the repeated blows of plague, famine, and war knocked the struts out from under the rotting edifice of European feudalism. The following 500 years, of course, saw Europe's amazing rise - but to understand the magnitude of that rise, it helps to start at the bottom. And this book describes the bottom.

A History Written Like a Novel

I understand why some people gave this a bad review--there are a lot of names and places that are difficult to keep to track of via audio. But overall the book flows together very well. There are some really good episodes that Tuchman relates and the listener understands the motivations of the principle characters (primarily the kings and queens and nobles). I learned a lot about the 14th century and I found it enjoyable to listen to.

Amazing Life, Reads A Bit Like a Good Text Book

I learned a great deal from this book. I have been on a 14th Century Engalnd kick as of late, and this was a good book to explore the age from the French perspective. The main character lived through and experienced so many significant events.
The story gets a bit monotonous at times, especially in comparison to the book World Without End (on 14th Century England) that I read just before. A Distant Mirror is not a book you will be unable to put down. Still, I think it was a great complement to other books on the Plague and the 14th Century. There is also more real history here than in other selection on the period (e.g. The White Company & World Without End.)

Extremely interesting, but..

A very interesting book, but author seems at times too fixated on antisemitism of the age and treats the Church with outright disgust - it is the only character (if there are characters in a non-fiction book) for which there are no kind words. Pronounced bias detracts from overall quality in my opinion.

Amazing compilation of the 14th Century

I throughly enjoyed Ms. Tuchman style. Working with an incomplete record she weaves a magnificent account. Wonderful narration.

Calamitous is right!

This book took an broad, sweeping, disorganized mess of a century and turned into art (and mind you, the kind of art that someone can actually understand!). Had she lived during the middle ages, Tuchman probably would have been burned at the stake because there is some serious sorcery being done to turn so many details and events into a coherent story. I can't wait to read/listen to the rest of her stuff.

Indeed a mirror of the past

Barbara's works are always pieces of well researched historical documents. This is a work of an exceptional genius. Wanda's reading was marvelous.

Disjointed and lacking context.

I understand some history is bland... but this is BLAND. It feels like a list of events happening, with very little context or anthropological framework to help understand WHY this time period is somehow a "distant mirror."

I'm a relatively intelligent person and often found myself lost regarding who was doing what and more importantly, why.

The facts are all seemingly there, but there is very little connective framework to help a layperson.

A fund survey of the period

I am a fan of the author's approach to history and her delivery. The reader is pleasant and does a very good job in giving the words life they deserve.

Its one of the better survey books on history I have read thus far (by survey I mean its not focused on a specific event or specialty (military, social, etc)). The author is a good writer and incorporates sources well, the books doesn't spew out events and names at you, but really gives you an idea of the life at the time and in some cases the personalities involved in the events. A very useful and clear narrative full of life.

Riveting and unbelievable at the same time

Like the best science fiction, this book transports you to another world and invites you to immerse yourself in the lives of alien beings. And that's what the 14th century is to us -- literally another planet of ideas, social structures, relationships, diseases, professions and everything else that makes life interesting. The author has an artist's eye for the illuminating detail, and yet she tells enough of the history of the era to give you a complete picture of what is going on too.

If I had one complaint, it is that it's ridiculously difficult to follow the byzantine politics of city-state wars in 14th century Italy. So whenever the author gets into the thick weeds of this area, I kind of tune out the names, and it all ends up sounding like "so-and-so attacked whats-his-name, his uncle and former ally in the war against flibber-jibber, until dude #1 changed sides and joined his brother-in-law, dude #2, who was also his wife's cousin's stepfather." Seriously, it's that difficult to follow, and way too complicated to track in an audiobook.

Overall, this is really, really worth the credit, and you will enjoy spending time as a visitor to this distant century.