I've had to read a number of books on the nature of history over the years, and particularly while study for my Masters in History at UNE. I didn't have to read Marc Bloch's The Historian's Craft as part of the course, but my interest in the Annales led me to find out something of his life and I became a bit of a fan of his intellect, his integrity and his moral courage. There are not many historians who are recognised as heroes and martyrs of the Resistance! Bloch drafted the book in the period between his demobilisation after serving as a staff officer in the French Army in 1939–1940 (having already served as an infantry officer in the First World War), and his engagement in the Resistance in Vichy France and execution by the Gestapo. Perhaps the least formal and most personal of all such books (even more than Carr's lectures), Bloch's passion for his craft and insight into the key philosophical and methodological problems of doing history shine over the seventy years since Lucien Febvre rescued the manuscript and published as an homage to his colleague and friend. Bloch's professional life predates the challenges of Foucault and postmodernism, but much of his advice transcends debates over language and form and provides a clear guide for the practitioner and anyone who reads engages in historical enquiry.

lo releí para la universidad esta vez con el contexto de la realidad de bloch y lo disfruté ( y entendí) mucho más. qué carta de amor más grande a tu oficio abocarse a la tarea de defenderlo ante la sociedad en tus últimos momentos.

I hated this book when I was first assigned to read it in graduate school, and I still hate it today. It is poorly written, meandering nonsense masquerading as deep thoughts. Don’t waste your time. Avoid at all costs.

This book offers a reflection on some fundamental aspects of the historical profession, with valuable insights. But it is rather unsystematic, and clearly unfinished. Especially his assertion that sources, or traces as he calls them, are more useful as indirect witnesses, namely to extract things out of them there that were not intended by the witness, is a bit too extreme. This is true in the field of mental history (histoire des mentalités), but it neglects a very wide domain of the historical métier.

Occasionally there was a surprising insight, as for example the statement that there is only a gradual difference in the investigation of the far past and that of the recent past, because also the present is sometimes only very imperfectly knowledgeable, through lack of testimonials and communication flaws, so that even a reconstruction of very recent facts can only be but imperfect.

Bloch defends in this booklet the these that history is a science, albeit with its own methodology and with the limited expectations that you may impose on all human sciences. A somewhat ambiguous position this is, in the then (mid-20th century) still furious discussion with positivism. The booklet contains many valuable insights, but the meandering style makes the reading (in French) not easy; in defense of Bloch: he wrote this in captivity in 1942-43, without access to a library. To reread.

Needs a good chunk of time to read, as doesn't work well as a boom to dip into.

Thought-provoking and truly interesting arguments.