The Historian's Craft [Mass Market Paperback]

Marc Bloch (Author), Peter Putnam (Translator), Joseph R. Strayer (Introduction)

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 197 pages
• Publisher: Vintage (March 12, 1964)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0394705122
• ISBN-13: 978-0394705125
• Product Dimensions: 4.2 x 0.6 x 6.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #24,771 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #17 in Books > History > Historical Study > Study & Teaching

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Customer Reviews

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71 of 75 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars History IS a Craft, May 4, 2003

By 

Jeffrey Leach (Omaha, NE USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Historian's Craft (Mass Market Paperback)

Historian Marc Bloch was Jewish. Under normal conditions this would not be a problem. But Bloch lived in France when World War II started; when the Nazis invaded and began to round up every Jew they could get their hands on. After refusing to leave France, Bloch joined the French Resistance to drive the occupiers out of the country. The Germans eventually captured Bloch and after a lengthy detention that involved torture, executed him. Bloch was a well known historian who wrote several studies on French medievalism, most notably `La Societe Feodale.' His importance, other than this book, revolves around his association with the Annales School of historical inquiry, a school that also included historians Lucien Febvre and Fernand Braudel. `The Historian's Craft,' written while Bloch was imprisoned and never completed, has become a staple in the study of history since its publication.

`The Historian's Craft' transcends any specific field of historical study. This is not an examination of French medievalism or Russia in the 19th century; it is not about the history of the American West or African slavery. Instead, the author looks at the techniques of historical inquiry. He tries to help the beginning researcher and writer of history develop a mindset of questions and tactics that would be helpful in studying the past. Any history student who reads this book at first does not understand why the book is such a big deal. `I know all of this already,' is probably a common response to Bloch's book. Then you realize that the reason you know this is due to the importance of what the author wrote. You absorbed it from professors who learned it from reading this book.

This French historian deals with a massive amount of information useful to the budding historian. Sections on perspective, sources, statistics, criticism, and analysis contain page after page of wise, insightful information. When discussing fraud and error in historical sources, for example, Bloch points out how historians too often accept at face value government documents or legal sources. Any student of history worth his salt should always question his sources not only to discover their veracity but also to uncover possible motivations for falsehood when the document turns out to be a forgery. If this sounds like detective work, it is. One of the most important things a historian will ever do is work out every angle in his research. This is not always possible, of course, but the best historians generally tend to be the ones who ask the most nuanced questions about their sources.

The most serious drawback to this book is the uneven translation. Some sections are the height of clarity; others are cloudy and nearly unreadable. The best example of haziness is in the part about statistical study. I strongly feel that the translator did not understand what the author attempted to say in the original French. I reread this part at least twice and still am not sure what it meant. It is time for a new translation. A lesser problem concerns Bloch's citations of French historians. If you have never heard of Thiers, Mabillon, or Fustel de Coulanges, you should probably look them up in an online encyclopedia and read about them. These arcane references are certainly not the fault of Bloch; he is only citing historians he was familiar with in the course of his own work. For American students, some of these guys are extremely obscure.

This book, despite the limitations placed upon it by a poor translation, is an absolute must read for serious students of history. At the very least, one must recognize this man's name so that they do not look like an ... when it comes up in conversation. Bloch has performed a great service to the study of history, and he richly deserves his position in posterity.

28 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars History explained, briefly and eloquently, May 31, 2001

By 

Edward Bosnar - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Historian's Craft (Mass Market Paperback)

Any book that ends with an ellipsis is frustrating, but this little gem by Marc Bloch, one of the 20th century's great historians before his tragic death at the hands of the Nazis in 1944, is a wonderful explanation of history as a social science and scholarly pursuit. Even in its unfinished form, "The Historian's Craft" provides useful working definitions of history as an academic subject, and some of the general guidelines that should be adhered to by historians. Rather than being a dry, jargon-filled text, the writing style here is very readable and engaging - thus, even though professional historians or history students would be the most interested in its content, it can be read and enjoyed by non-historians (for whom I believe Bloch intended it to a certain extent). This book should definitely top the reading list of any college student even thinking of majoring in history.

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Analysis of the Historian's problems when writing history, September 2, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Historian's Craft (Mass Market Paperback)

Regretably unfinished, The Historian's Craft attempts to show the importance of historical study. It addresses issues ranging from the reasons for historical study to the problems encountered by historians in analysing evidence left by the past. It considers historical criticism and revisionism, showing the reader what types of revisionism is acceptable and what types are to be feared. Bloch died before completing the work, and the missing chapters on the causes of history and applying historical lessons to the future are greatly missed. The text is very readable, with many anecdotes to drive a point home. The lack of footnotes is due to his untimely death, but the purity of his vision and clarity of his logic eliminate the need for full documentation.