Tuchman, Barbara

Tuchman, Barbara

 orig. Barbara Wertheim

Barbara Tuchman.

(credit: © Jerry Bauer)

(born Jan. 30, 1912, New York, N.Y., U.S.—died Feb. 6, 1989, Greenwich, Conn.) U.S. historian. She wrote for The Nation and other publications before beginning to write most of the books that made her a leading popular historian. Marked by a masterly literary style and a powerful grasp of complex issues, they include The Zimmermann Telegram (1958); The Guns of August (1962, Pulitzer Prize), on the first month of World War I; Stilwell and the American Experience in China, 1911–45 (1970, Pulitzer Prize), a study of the China-U.S. relationship; and A Distant Mirror (1978), concerning 14th-century France.

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Tuchman, Barbara (1912–89) historian; born in New York City. After graduating from Radcliffe College (1933) and reporting on the Spanish Civil War for the Nation (1937–38), she turned to the study of history. Her career as a nonacademic, best-selling historian began in earnest with her fourth book, the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Guns of August (1962). Stillwell and the American Experience in China, 1911–45 (1971) won a second Pulitzer. Her six best-sellers sold many millions of copies.