Adam Hochschild Quotes, born October 5, 1942, in New York City, is an American author, journalist, historian, and lecturer, renowned for his compelling narratives that uncover hidden histories of injustice and resilience. Best known for King Leopold’s Ghost (1998), which exposed the atrocities of Belgium’s colonial rule in the Congo, Hochschild’s other works, including To End All Wars (2011), Spain in Our Hearts (2016), and Bury the Chains (2005), explore war, slavery, and human rights struggles. A frequent contributor to The New Yorker, Harper’s, and The New York Review of Books, he teaches at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism. His books, translated into 12 languages, have earned awards like the Lionel Gelber Prize and a California Book Award.
These 15 quotes—sourced from his books, interviews, and posts on X—reflect his insights on history, injustice, human rights, and the enduring impact of war and colonialism, capturing his empathetic intellect and call to remember.
15 Adam Hochschild Quotes
- “Work is hard. Distractions are plentiful. And time is short.” (King Leopold’s Ghost, 1998)
- “And yet the world we live in—its divisions and conflicts, its widening gap between rich and poor, its seemingly inexplicable outbursts of violence—is shaped far less by what we celebrate and mythologize than by the painful events we try to forget.” (King Leopold’s Ghost, 1998)
- “The first World War in so many ways shaped the 20th century and really remade our world for the worse.” (To End All Wars: A Story of Loyalty and Rebellion, 1914–1918, 2011)
- “Power is tempting, and in a sense no power is greater than the ability to take someone’s life.” (King Leopold’s Ghost, 1998)
- “Unlike, say, witch-burning, slavery, and apartheid, which were once taken for granted and are now officially outlawed, war is still with us.” (To End All Wars, 2011)
- “No international court can ever substitute for a working national justice system. Or for a society at peace.” (King Leopold’s Ghost, 1998)
- “Just as terrorizing people is part of conquest, so is forcing someone else to administer the terror.” (King Leopold’s Ghost, 1998)
- “Someday, I have no doubt, the dead from today’s wars will be seen with a similar sense of sorrow at needless loss and folly as those millions of men who lie in the cemeteries of France and Belgium.” (To End All Wars, 2011)
- “The basic freedoms in life are not seen as gifts to be doled out by benevolent well-wishers, but as those rights to which all human beings are entitled from birth.” (King Leopold’s Ghost, 1998)
- “As the First World War made painfully clear, when politicians and generals lead nations into war, they almost invariably assume swift victory, and have a remarkably enduring tendency not to foresee problems that, in hindsight, seem obvious.” (To End All Wars, 2011)
- “Growing inequality is a huge problem, and of course is intimately connected to xenophobia and racism.” (Interview, AZQuotes, n.d.)
- “Monsters exist, but they are too few in number to be truly dangerous. More dangerous are the functionaries ready to believe and to act without asking questions.” (King Leopold’s Ghost, 1998)
- “Men of my generation have had Spain in our hearts… It was there that they learned that one can be right and yet be beaten, that force can vanquish spirit.” (Spain in Our Hearts: Americans in the Spanish Civil War, 1936–1939, 2016)
- “From the colonial era, the major legacy Europe left to Africa was not democracy as it is practiced today in countries like England, France, and Belgium; it was authoritarian rule and plunder.” (King Leopold’s Ghost, 1998)
- “To fight a complex, mechanized war, a disciplined army responsible to a central command is far more effective than a range of militias reporting to a crazy quilt of political parties and trade unions.” (Spain in Our Hearts, 2016)
Adam Hochschild’s quotes are a stirring blend of historical insight, moral clarity, and urgent reflection, inspiring readers to confront forgotten atrocities, question authority, and champion human rights. Which one’s got you ready to uncover the silences of history? Drop it in the comments and keep Hochschild’s legacy of truth-telling alive!
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