The sparkling conversation ranges back and forth over striking moments in the

past (chiefly the American and European past) and how one chooses to write about them; and over the current desire in the academy not to use the past, but rather to discard it. JH: "Europe, in effect, came to an end in 1940." ... FR: "I remember August 1914, and yet I remember it slightly differently with every decade, as things come on. It isn't the same 1914 for me in 1987 as it was in '67." ... WS: "Jeff talks about 1940 as a watershed year, a year that separates the past from the present absolutely in some way. Nostalgic historians are apt to locate that turning point wherever they want." WFB: "Wherever it's convenient." WS: "Well, it isn't just a matter of convenience, it's something the historian feels very deeply--that everything before that point is different from everything

after it."