Booksontape.com : The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam by Barbara W. Tuchman

The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam * Available on Tape.

By Barbara W. Tuchman (© 1984)
Read by Grover Gardner (Amer.)
1990 Books on Tape, Inc.
Unabridged
History And War > History - Social History

An analysis of folly in high places, from antiquity to our own times. So long as human nature remains unchanged, folly will remain with us.

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Title Description
The folly of the title is a staple in human affairs. It flourishes everywhere, not least in the halls of government.

It is institutionalized folly against which the author inveighs. She quotes enough examples throughout history to make us uncomfortable in our own time, and very pessimistic about our children's.

To make her case, Tuchman analyses the Trojan War, the splintering of Christiandom, King George's misrule of his colonies, plus our own desperately inept Vietnam War. What emerges is a chronicle of self-hypnosis, cynicism and concern about the competence of government, no matter whose and no matter where.

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Reviewer: Anonymous

October 5, 2006

This book will be eternally relevant, given the unchanging essence of man's nature and his inability to deal with logistical and strategic problems without the bias of predetermined biases. The book is excellent, and this reading is okay, though not inspired. The previous reviewer is apparently unable or unwilling to note the contemporary relevenace of Ms. Tuchman's primary thesis, but I think an open minded reader will judge this to be an important though disenheartening work.

Book rating: Reader rating: Reviewer: Andrew Alan Feinstein (see other books I've reviewed)	July 10, 2002
Two thirds of this book -- the portions on the Renaissance popes and on the British government leading to the American revolution -- are superb. The final third on Vietnam is polemical and too selective to serve as great history. The central thesis -- that human arrogance and misjudgment cause national folly -- borders on the banal.