Friday, February 28, 2025
Dangerous Books
Arnaldo Momigliano (1908-1987), "Some Observations on Causes of War in Ancient Historiography," Studies in Historiography (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1966), pp. 112-126 (at 112-113):
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[T]here is a third, even worse, category of books and papers: the category of the books that inspired wars and were themselves causes of wars. No international enterprise as yet has taken the initiative in collecting the hundred most dangerous books ever written. No doubt some time this collection will be made. When it is done, I suggest that Homer's Iliad and Tacitus' Germania should be given high priority among these hundred dangerous books. This is no reflection on Homer and Tacitus. Tacitus was a gentleman and, for all that I know, Homer was a gentleman too. But who will deny that the Iliad and the Germania raise most unholy passions in the human mind?
