Subjects:  1. Czechoslovakia    2. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    3. Ethnic relations    4. Europe - General    5. History    6. History - General History    7. History: World    8. Jewish - General    9. Jewish Studies    10. Former Czechoslovakia    11. History of specific racial & ethnic groups    12. Postwar period, 1945 to c 2000    13. Social Science / Sociology / General   

Subjects:  1. Canada - Atlantic Provinces    2. Canada - General    3. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    4. History - General History    5. Travel    6. History / Canada    7. History: Illustrated    8. History: Maritime    9. Lunenburg    10. Maritime Interest    11. lunenburg fisheries shipbuilding illustrated   

Reviews (2)

We Still Need A Good Introduction to Vaclav Havel
After the fiasco of John Keane's revisionist / slash-and-burn biography of Vaclav Havel, it is nice to read a book that tries to summarize the real contributions of this man without all the fuss. Sire makes an honest effort to grapple with the political and intellectual complexities of Havel's plays and treatises. He also correctly understands that the English-speaking world needs a short and sweet introduction that is accessible to a variety of non-specialist audiences. If you happen to be teaching a world drama or a comparative politics seminar, and you want to spend a week on Havel, you might want to assign this book to be read in tandem with The Memorandum or "The Power of the Powerless." However, the book has significant limitations. The main difficulty stems from someone whose ghost continues to inspire trouble:Martin Heidegger. Sire is quite right to situate Heideggerian categories like "the horizon of Being" as central to Havel's thought and work. Unfortunately, he has a weak grasp on this discourse, both philosophically and historically. The result is that Sire tends to portray Havel as a kind of mystic throughout the book. Couple this with Sire's wish to offer an "appreciation" of Havel, and the result is a hagiography of an already familiar kind. A Good Starting Place
For the person who knows nothing about Vaclav Havel, Sire has written a very good, basic introduction to the writings and actions of one of the most amazing thinkers in the world today.In a short space the reader is quickly introduced to the plays, politics, and philosophies of the absurdist playwright and political dissident who became the president of the Czech Republic. While there are a few points at which it seems that Sire may be imposing some of his own American Evangelical definitions on the terms that Havel uses, overall the book works well as a guide for the beginning Havel reader. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Biography & Autobiography    2. Biography / Autobiography    3. Biography/Autobiography    4. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    5. Havel, Vaclav    6. Havel, Vâaclav    7. Historical - General    8. Literary    9. Ontology    10. Philosophy    11. Presidents & Heads of State    12. Havel, Václav   

Reviews (6)

Could Have Been Better
Great story, heroic people, tragic ending.Unfortunately, this great story was very hard to read for a number of reasons.First of all, I counted over a dozen typographical errors.Whomever edited this book did a very poor job.Secondly, the author mentions too many people.He would have made the book much easier to follow had he only focused on the main characters, and some minor ones.Instead, I found myself trying to figure out who half of the people mentioned were.It's almost like I needed a score card.Finally, the sub headings in each chapter destroyed the flow of the story and, in my opinion, were not necessary.The author obviously did a great deal of research and I commend him for this.I just feel that the book could have been a bit more user friendly.However, I would still recommend it to anyone interested in WWII.

The OSS in Slovakia during the Second World War
The true report of OSS operations in Slovakia reads like a fictional narrative. There are heroic agents, dogged villains, hair breadth evasions, missed opportunities for rescue, tragic deaths, and miraculous escapes. Little known, and until now, forgotten
The story of a little-known episode of World War II, in a forgotten corner of Europe, American OSS, British SOE (including Palestinian Jews) covert operators are sandwiched between the Slovaks, in rebellion against their former German Allies, and the brutal reaction of the SS and Abwehr bent on crushing the uprising, and Soviet partisans who had their own agenda.Read more

Subjects:  1. History - Military / War    2. Military - World War II    3. Campaigns    4. Germany    5. Office of Strategic Services    6. Secret service    7. Slovakia    8. Special operations (Military s    9. United States   

Reviews (2)

Slovakia - the beautiful
As someone frequently traveling in Slovakia, I can only recommend this wonderful collection of pictures about this small, East Central European, young country; as I recognize something from my time spent there in every picture. The next best thing to being there!
Slovakia: A Photographic Odyssey is the collaborative efforts of compiler Eugen Lazistan, essayist Fedor Mikovic, English translator Anna Jureckove, and twenty-seven gifted photographers. A vivid and superbly presented survey of Slovakia's natural wonders, architecture, art, landmarks, and museum treasures, this memorable compendium of photographs is enhanced with a brief and informative account of Slovakia's culture and history. Captions and double-page maps enable the reader to easily locate and identify the physical and artistic wonders of this unique and ancient Easter European country. Ideal for the armchair traveler, Slovakia: A Photographic Odyssey is the next best thing to being there! ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    2. Eastern Europe - Czechoslovakia    3. History - General History    4. Photo Essays    5. Photoessays & Documentaries    6. Photography    7. Pictorial works    8. Slovakia    9. Other prose: from c 1900 -    10. Photographic reportage   

Reviews (2)

a competent job
Telling ninety years of a national history is no joke.You can fill up hundreds of pages about a single individual after all.So, when you set out to tell the modern history of a nation that has not been peripheral to 20th century history, but rather, right spang in the middle of it, you have to make a lot of hard choices.If you plan to confine your history to 167 pages, then you REALLY have to select carefully and must be ready to gloss over a huge amount of material.Still, if you don't at least refer to a number of topics, critics will have your hide; readers with special interests will complain or trash your book.Given these points, I think Dowling has done an excellent job with CZECHOSLOVAKIA, part of Arnold Press' series called "Brief Histories".
Psychologically inaccurate, but historically helpful.
Dowling presents a predominately accurate picture of the C/S unions and occupations, along with political commentary and insight.Her fault lies in consistently portraying CS as a bridge between east and west.True they are a 'eastern' people and they maintain 'western' style democracy, but there is no indication, rather a rebuffing of such mediator sentiment (shown in Stein's "Czecho/Slovakia"), that makes Dowling's often invoked theme an ambiguous one.I applaud her for her brief history of the state, but care not for her use of such ideologies which lead the reader on a quest to draw conclusions about intentions of Czechoslovakians based on little proven (almost manufactured) beliefs.The fact that the book does nothing to explain the lives of Czech and Slovak republics after the split is understood due to the title of the book, focusing only on the state of Masaryk's creation, but as a small history under Austria-Hungarian rule was necessary to introduce the nation, a mentioning of the divided republics would send the combined state to the graveyard of memory with some further dignity.All in all, the book definitely presents history for the reader, but the views presented can lead to inaccurate conclusions. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    2. Eastern Europe - General    3. History    4. History - General History    5. History: World    6. 20th century    7. European history: from c 1900 -    8. Former Czechoslovakia    9. History / Europe / Eastern    10. History, World | European | Eastern Europe   

Subjects:  1. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    2. Eastern Europe - General    3. History    4. History - General History    5. History: World    6. Slovakia   

Subjects:  1. 1968-1989    2. 1989-1992    3. Czechoslovakia    4. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    5. History - General History    6. Politics and government    7. Politics/International Relations    8. Revolutions    9. Former Czechoslovakia    10. Marxism & Communism    11. Political structure & processes    12. Revolutions & coups    13. c 1980 to c 1990    14. c 1990 to c 2000   

Subjects:  1. Description and travel    2. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    3. Eastern Europe - General    4. Europe - Eastern    5. History    6. History: World    7. Pictorial works    8. Prague (Czech Republic)    9. Travel - Foreign    10. Czech Republic    11. Photographs: collections    12. Travel / Europe / Eastern    13. Sale Books   

Reviews (1)

Opens up ordinary Czech life outside Prague
I read this after checking it out of a library on special order, so my recollections are hazy. Part of the account's interest is that much of it takes place in a smaller town, outside of Prague. This attention to details of life beyond the narrow perspective adopted by most non-Czech chroniclers makes it a valuable, if rather rambling, narrative. Czech-American Novak and his family go back for a year to what was still then, but not for long, Czechoslovakia, and the tensions that split the nation receive attention here. There was not as much on his family as would be expected, and I recall a lot that at the time intrigued me about wheeling and dealing in the black market trade that has kept so many Czechs solvent despite often officially precarious economic regimes, pre-and post-Wall.
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Subjects:  1. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    2. History - General History    3. History: American   

Reviews (2)

Don't Stand so close to Me
This is not a very good book, but in the absence of anything else in English it will have to do.Abby Innes is a lecturer of "political sociology" who argues that the 1993 partition of Czechoslovakia was not inevitable.Instead it was in fact the result of the cunning of the Czech Vaclav Klaus and his Civic Democratic Party using and relying on the opportunist Slovak Vladimir Meciar and his Movement for a Democratic Slovakia.Although an overwhelming majority of people in both countries showed no desire for independent states after the 1992 parliamentary elections, Klaus refused to cooperate.Instead of compromising on a new federal structure or rearranging his economic reforms to take into account Slovakia's special needs, he refused to negotiate.Meciar played into his hands by demanding either an extremely loose federalism or independence, which Klaus used as a pretext to partition the country.Klaus also blocked all possible compromises, including a referendum and proposals to get around the deadlocked presidential elections which left the position vacant.He did this supposedly to grant Slovakia's long lasting wishes, but in reality to maximize his own power, to remove any opposition to his Thatcherite policies and to relieve himself of the burden of the poorest third of the country. Splitting a state - Germany's role?
Innes' fascinating book seeks to explain why Czechoslovakia split into two states. She shows that whatever else caused the split, it was certainly not re-emergent nationalisms.Read more

Subjects:  1. 1989-1992    2. 1993-    3. Contemporary Politics - Eastern Europe    4. Current Affairs    5. Czech Republic    6. Czechoslovakia    7. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    8. History - General History    9. International    10. Political    11. Politics and government    12. Politics/International Relations    13. Slovakia    14. History / General   

Reviews (1)

Uniquely Insightful History of WW II From a Firsthand Perspective
A powerful epoch told from the perspective of a 15-year-old boy forced to manhood by war and genocide, written 62 years later by one of this century's greatest thinkers.Following the capture and eventual murder of his family by Nazis in 1944 Slovakia, 15-year-old Paul seeks out and joins a band of partisan forces (anti-Nazi insurgents with minimal support of Stalin and Soviet forces.He miraculously survives raids and guerrilla attacks they initiate, despite being seriously outgunned.
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Subjects:  1. History / Europe / General    2. Partizan warfare; Slovak Uprising; Train demolition; Holocaust in Slovakia; Teen-age warrior   

Reviews (2)

A reappraisal of the appeal of communism in the Czech lands after WWII
This volume is part of the Harvard Cold War Studies series and is a valuable reappraisal of communist electoral strength in the Czech lands following World War II. The text is scholarly, heavily researched, well documented, and erudite. At times, a desire for completeness and detail conflict with readability but overall the text reads well.
Fascinating, infuriating
The 1948 Communist seizure of power was the only time when Communism came to power in a country with strong democratic traditions.Previously, it has been the leading member of the democratically elected coalition government that had ruled the country since 1945.During the cold war, American and emigre scholars argued that this was a classic example of Communist subversion, of how it pretended to offer a democratic visage while plotting to install totalitarian government.As time went on, some scholars were skeptical of this, wondering whether if it had not been for the cold war the coalition government might have been continued.Bradley Abrams seeks to look at this period again in a new book, whose focus is fascinating and infuriating.Abrams' argument is that a key reason why the Communists were successful in 1948 was because they were able to construct intellectual debate in such a way as to give them a decisive advantage.Although Abrams doesn't use this term, the CPC had a hegemony in Czech political life.Partly this was the result of the shock of Munich, which ruined the image of the West in Czech eyes, as well as the Nazi occupation.But by looking at such issues as the widespread socialist consensus, the need for a new national consciousness, the generation of 1945, and the reputation of the first republic, we can see the Communist advantage in one arena of debate after another.Abrams looks at three groups:the "democratic socialists" who ended up accepting too many of the Communists' premises, the Czech Protestants, who enthusiastically endorsed more of them, and the Czech Catholics, who were properly skeptical and reasonable, but who were too weak to have sufficient influence.Abrams is useful in providing a good comparative account of Eastern Europe, both in its war experiences, as well as the strength of local Communist parties, based on the latest research.Nor were the CPC's claims for a moderate, parliamentary road to socialism mere subterfuge, though obviously they were not sincere enough.There is one particularly useful passage about 1948 Czech opinion.For many years people thought independent opinion polls showed that Communist support was falling noticeably from the 38% it won in 1948, and that is why the carried out the Prague coup.But Abrams notes that the Communist polls suggested they would win a majority in 1948, while other scholars suggest that their support was stable.In general, Abrams provides new detail and information about the 1945-1948 period.
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Subjects:  1. Anthropology - Cultural    2. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    3. History - General History    4. Political History    5. Political Ideologies - Communism & Socialism    6. Social Science    7. Sociology    8. Czech Republic    9. History / Europe / Eastern    10. Marxism & Communism    11. Sociology, Social Studies   

Reviews (1)

An invaluable, informative, historical overview.
Images Gone With Time: Photographic Reflections Of Slovak Life 1950-1963 is a fascinating and visual historical and anthropological record of a place and way of life now gone. Igor Grossman's starkly beautifulblack-and-white photographs capture the essence of Slovak village life in amountainous region of Central Europe at the moment of encounter between theold ways and the new day of European development, when centuries oftradition were about to give way to the modern age. This is a strikingsurvey, a powerful visual tool documenting what was about to be alteredforever by the technologies and ideologies of the second half of thetwentieth century. An informative text by Martin Slivka places the imagesinto a sound cultural context and enhanced Images Gone With Time as asignificant and invaluable overview of a people and a way-of-life now but abit of European history, a yesteryear culture that will never come again. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Ethnology    2. Europe - Austria & Hungary    3. Foreign Language - Dictionaries / Phrase Books    4. General    5. History    6. History: World    7. Pictorial works    8. Slovakia    9. Ethnic studies    10. European history (ie other than Britain & Ireland)    11. Photographs: collections   

Subjects:  1. Biography / Autobiography    2. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    3. Historical - Holocaust    4. Letters   

Subjects:  1. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    2. Eastern Europe - General    3. History    4. History - General History    5. History: World    6. Modern - 20th Century    7. Modern - 20th Century/Nuclear Age   

Reviews (1)

SLOVAK AMERICAN HISTORY
A woefully neglected group, Slovak-Americans finally have something of a history of their experience in America from the time of the Great Immigration (1880-1920) through World War II.Interesting perspectives--including the Slovak fraternal efforts' contribution to founding Social Security--too bad it ends with World War II.But a good book that gives plenty of information about a neglected topic. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. East European Americans    2. Ethnic Studies - General    3. Ethnic identity    4. General    5. History    6. History - U.S.    7. History: American    8. Politics and government    9. Slovak Americans    10. United States    11. United States - General    12. Ethnic studies    13. Slovakia    14. USA   

Reviews (1)

Understanding post-communist transition
If you are a politics student, a businessman or a journalist interested inthe Czech and Slovak Republics, read this book. In under 200 pages, RobinShepherd has successfully drawn out almost all the key themes of the lastdecade of post-communist transition. The book is divided into eightself-standing chapters each dealing with a different theme, but the valueof the whole is greater than the sum of its parts in that it provides acoherent and comprehensive analytical framework for understanding therecent history of the two countries. Straight-forward histories of thepost-revolution period too often fail to provide a broader context, therebyleaving many a journalist or analyst surprised or alarmed by subsequentevents. How many predicted that Czechs and Slovaks would part ways in 1993or that the Czech economy would sink into recession in the late 1990s forexample. Shepherd, by eschewing chronology for analysis has produced aclassic political textbook of the period, that is readable, rigorous andbristling with ideas.Read more

Subjects:  1. 1993-    2. Central Europe - History    3. Czech Republic    4. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    5. Economic conditions    6. Europe - Former Soviet Republics    7. History    8. History - General History    9. History: World    10. Political History    11. Political Ideologies - Communism & Socialism    12. Politics and government    13. Politics/International Relations    14. Slovakia    15. Central Europe    16. Former Soviet Union, USSR (Europe)    17. History of specific subjects    18. POLITICS & GOVERNMENT    19. Political Science / Communism & Socialism   

Subjects:  1. 1968-1989    2. 1989-1992    3. Czech Republic    4. Czechoslovakia    5. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    6. General    7. History - General History    8. Philosophy    9. Politics and government    10. Post-communism    11. Slovakia    12. Social Science    13. Sociology    14. European history: from c 1900 -    15. Former Czechoslovakia    16. Social theory   

Subjects:  1. 1993-    2. Czech Republic    3. Eastern Europe - Czech Republic & Slovakia    4. Europe - General    5. History & Theory - General    6. History - General History    7. International Relations - General    8. Political Science    9. Politics and government    10. Politics/International Relations    11. European history: postwar, from c 1945 -    12. Germany    13. Political Science / General    14. Political structure & processes