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Tony Judt Biography

Tony Robert Judt, FBA (/dʒʌt/ JUT; 2 January 1948 – 6 August 2010) was a British historian, essayist, and university professor who specialised in European history. Judt moved to New York and served as the Erich Maria Remarque Professor in European Studies at New York University, and Director of NYU's Erich Maria Remarque Institute. He was a frequent contributor to the New York Review of Books. In 1996 Judt was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and in 2007 a corresponding Fellow of the British Academy.

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Tony Judt Quotes

The rottenness of politics in Yugoslavia didn't come as a surprise. The main lesson is that this is a war which could have easily been stopped by Europe. What was lacking was any will to do so. It's an irony of the achievement of Europe that it had lived for 40 years under the assumption of the unimaginability of internal wars, so it didn't know what to do with it when it was confronted with one close up.

Achievement, Easily, Irony, Lacking, Lived, War

At a certain point, to remain slightly tangential to wherever I was became a way of 'being Tony': by not being anything that everyone else was.

Became, Certain, Everyone, Way, Wherever

As citizens of a free society, we have a duty to look critically at our world. But if we think we know what is wrong, we must act upon that knowledge.

Citizens, Duty, Our World, Society, Think, Thinking

We know what things cost but have no idea what they are worth.

Ideas, Cost, Knows, Know, Things

American social arrangements, economic arrangements, the degree of inequality in American life, the relatively small role played by the government in American public life and so forth, compares to exactly the opposite conditions in most of the European societies.

Conditions, Degrees, Forth, Government, Opposites, Public

The military system of a nation is not an independent section of the social system but an aspect of its totality.

Independent, Military, Section, Social, Totality

Contrast 1968, when the CEO of General Motors took home, in pay and benefits, about sixty-six times the amount paid to a typical GM worker. Today the CEO of Wal-Mart earns nine hundred times the wages of his average employee. Indeed, the wealth of the Wal-Mart founder's family in 2005 was estimated at about the same ($90 billion) as that of the bottom 40% of the US population: 120 million people.

Amount, Average, General, Home, People

Reality is a powerful solvent.

Powerful, Reality, Solvent

I do think we're on the edge of a terrifying world, and that many young people know that but don't know how to talk about it.

People, Terrifying, Thinking, World

It does irritate me when I am described as a controversialist and commentator on Israel.

Commentator, Commentators, Doe, Irritate, Israel

Today, neither Left nor Right can find their footing.

Footing, Left, Right, Today

I don't believe that one should have one-size-fits-all moral rules for international political action.

Believe, International, Moral, Political, Should Have

History always happens to us and nothing ever stays the same.

Happens, History, Nothing, Same, Stays

The American financial and military commitment really only kicks in with Korea. Not that Korea was the real game for the Americans; their real fear was that this was just the prelude to a second Korea in Germany. We now know from the Soviet archives that the last thing Stalin was going to do was start a war in Central Europe. The Americans didn't know that, and it was the fear that he might which transformed NATO from a sort of shell game into a real military alliance. That total commitment basically transformed the Marshal Plan into military aid.

Alliance, Americans, Marshal, Military, Real, War

Love consists in leaving the loved one space to be themselves while providing the security within which that self may flourish.

Consists, Leaving, Providing, Self, Space

My history writing was based on what I saw in strange, exotic places rather than just reading books.

Book, Exotic, History, Reading, Writing

If we have learned nothing else from the 20th century, we should at least have grasped that the more perfect the answer, the more terrifying its consequences. Incremental improvements upon unsatisfactory circumstances are the best that we can hope for, and probably all we should seek.

Answers, Grasped, Improvement, Improvements, Nothing, Perfect

The people whose necks hurt when I write about the Middle East tend to live in Brooklyn or Boca Raton: the kind of Zionist who pays another man to live in Israel for him. I have nothing but contempt for such people.

Brooklyn, Contempt, Hurt, Men, Nothing, Writing

Unlike memory, which confirms and reinforces itself, history contributes to the disenchantment of the world.

Confirms, Disenchantment, Memories, Reinforces, World

All modern U. S. presidents are perforce politicians, prisoners of their past pronouncements, their party, their constituency, and their colleagues.

Constituency, Party, Past, President, Pronouncements

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