I am against inequality of the sexes, as much as I am against class privilege or colour prejudice. - A. J. P. Taylor

The Commune was...heroic, with its strange mixture of patriotism and working class idealism, a mixture which no historian will ever clearly resolve.

In my experience Communism is intellectual alcohol – nasty and harmful if taken neat, but an essential ingredient of every stimulating drink.

In 1917 European history, in the old sense, came to an end. World history began. It was the year of Lenin and Woodrow Wilson, both of whom repudiated the traditional standards of political behaviour. Both preached Utopia, Heaven on Earth. It was the moment of birth for our contemporary world.