Fernand Braudel
French · 1902–1985
French historian and leading figure of the Annales school, author of The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II and Civilization and Capitalism, who transformed historical thinking with his concept of the longue durée.
Wikipedia ↗“La Méditerranée parle de mille voix; elle est une somme d'histoires individuelles.”
French
“The Mediterranean speaks with many voices; it is a sum of individual histories.”
“Les événements sont la poussière de l'histoire; ils traversent sa scène comme des lucioles, à peine entrevus avant de retomber dans l'ombre et, le plus souvent, dans l'oubli.”
French
“Events are the ephemera of history; they pass across its stage like fireflies, hardly glimpsed before they settle back into darkness and as often as not into oblivion.”
“L'histoire des civilisations, c'est l'histoire de leurs emprunts mutuels au cours des âges.”
French
“The history of civilizations is the history of their borrowings from one another over the ages.”
“Je suis, par tempérament, un « structuraliste », peu tenté par l'événement, ou même par la conjoncture de courte durée qui n'est après tout qu'un groupement d'événements.”
French
“I am by temperament a "structuralist," little tempted by the event, or even by the short-term conjuncture which is after all merely a grouping of events. But the historian's time is not the geologist's time.”
“La vie quotidienne, ce sont ces petites choses qu'on ne remarque guère dans le temps et dans l'espace.”
French
“Everyday life consists of the little things one hardly notices in time and space. The more we reduce the focus of vision, the more likely we are to find ourselves in the realm of material life: the broad sweep that encompasses all of our actions, habits, and constraints.”
“Le capitalisme est potentiellement visible dès l'aube de l'histoire et il s'est développé et grandi aux côtés de l'humanité.”
French
“Capitalism has been potentially visible since the dawn of history, and it has developed and grown alongside mankind; but in certain periods and certain places it is more forceful than in others, for reasons that must be explained.”
“Toute société doit redistribuer la richesse qu'elle produit. Les modes de redistribution définissent la nature de la société elle-même.”
French
“Every society has to redistribute the wealth it produces. The methods of redistribution define the nature of the society itself.”