At the end of WWII, the Soviet Union, to its surprise and delight, found itself in control of a huge swath of territory in Central Europe. It set out to convert a dozen radically different countries to a completely new political and moral system, Communism. Iron Curtain describes how the communist regimes of Eastern Europe were created, and what daily life was like once they were complete. Applebaum draws on newly opened European archives and personal accounts translated for the first time to portray in devestating detail millions of individuals trying to adjust to a way of life that challenged their every belief, rendered worthless their every qualification, and took everything away they had accumulated. Today the Soviet Block is a lost civilization, once whose cruelty, paranoia, bizarre morality and strange aethestics Applebaum captures in the electrifying pages of this book.

A New York Times Notable Book * Winner of the National Jewish Book Award * Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award * A Los Angeles Times Book Prize Finalist "A gripping detective story, a stirring epic, a tale of ghosts and dark marvels, a thrilling display of scholarship, a meditation on the unfathomable mystery of good and evil, a testimony to the enduring power of the ancient archetypes that haunt one Jewish family and the greater human family, The Lost is as complex and rich with meaning and story as the past it seeks to illuminate. A beautiful book, beautifully written."--Michael Chabon In this rich and riveting narrative, a writer's search for the truth behind his family's tragic past in World War II becomes a remarkably original epic--part memoir, part reportage, part mystery, and part scholarly detective work--that brilliantly explores the nature of time and memory, family and history. The Lost begins as the story of a boy who grew up in a family haunted by the disappearance of six relatives during the Holocaust--an unmentionable subject that gripped his imagination from earliest childhood. Decades later, spurred by the discovery of a cache of desperate letters written to his grandfather in 1939 and tantalized by fragmentary tales of a terrible betrayal, Daniel Mendelsohn sets out to find the remaining eyewitnesses to his relatives' fates. That quest eventually takes him to a dozen countries on four continents and forces him to confront the wrenching discrepancies between the histories we live and the stories we tell. And it leads him, finally, back to the small Ukrainian town where his family's story began, and where the solution to a decades-old mystery awaits him. Deftly moving between past and present, interweaving a world-wandering odyssey with childhood memories of a now-lost generation of immigrant Jews and provocative ruminations on biblical texts and Jewish history, The Lost transforms the story of one family into a profound, morally searching meditation on our fragile hold on the past. Deeply personal, grippingly suspenseful, and beautifully written, this literary tour de force illuminates all that is lost, and found, in the passage of time.

From a gifted young writer, the story of his quest to reclaim his family's apartment building in Poland--and of the astonishing entanglement with Nazi treasure hunters that follows Menachem Kaiser's brilliantly told story, woven from improbable events and profound revelations, is set in motion when the author takes up his Holocaust-survivor grandfather's former battle to reclaim the family's apartment building in Sosnowiec, Poland. Soon, he is on a circuitous path to encounters with the long-time residents of the building, and with a Polish lawyer known as "The Killer." A surprise discovery--that his grandfather's cousin not only survived the war, but wrote a secret memoir while a slave laborer in a vast, secret Nazi tunnel complex--leads to Kaiser being adopted as a virtual celebrity by a band of Silesian treasure seekers who revere the memoir as the indispensable guidebook to Nazi plunder. Propelled by rich original research, Kaiser immerses readers in profound questions that reach far beyond his personal quest. What does it mean to seize your own legacy? Can reclaimed property repair rifts among the living? Plunder is both a deeply immersive adventure story and an irreverent, daring interrogation of inheritance--material, spiritual, familial, and emotional.

Though allied to Nazi Germany during World War II, Italy opposed German efforts to exterminate the Jews. In areas they occupied, the Italians turned them into safety zones for the Jews.This book describes this little-known but important conflict between the two Axis powers.

In this arresting, intimate narrative journey, award-winning Eva Hoffman returns to her Polish homeland and five other countries—Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, and the two nations of the former Czechoslovakia—historically transformed by the demise of Communism. The result is the penetrating personal odyssey across the “other Europe” and a vivid portrayal of a landscape in the midst of change. Hoffman combines the wise perspective of an outsider and the passionate concern of a native daughter to illuminate the forces informing the region’s complex politics as she captures the texture of everyday life in a world in flux. “Indispensable for anyone who wants to seriously come to grips with the experience of Eastern Europe.”— The Cleveland Plain Dealer “Complex and full of the unexpected . . . Hoffman earns our trust as an observer.”—Tina Rosenberg, New York Newsday “Written with incredible literary talent and intellectual soundness . . . An indispensable clue for anyone who is keen to understand how the new Europe is emerging from the debris of the Cold War period.”—Ryszard Kapuscinski

The Military History of the Soviet Union and The Military History of Tsarist Russia treat Russian military history from the rise of the Muscovite state to the present, even peeking briefly into the future. The two volumes will cover Russia's land forces extensively, but will also cover the development of the Russian Navy, and the creation and development of the Russian Air Force, parts of the Russian military machine which are frequently neglected in general writings. The historical analysis will address the development and function of the Russian military whether in peace or in war, as well as the impact of war and changes in the military upon Russian society and politics.

Evaluates and considers the Bolshevik Revolution as Lenin's creation and looks at the hybrid society which emerged in Lenin's wake.

The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising has become a symbol of heroism throughout the world. A short time before the uprising began, Pawel Frenkel addressed a meeting of the Jewish Military fighters: Of course we will fight with guns in our hands, and most of us will fall. But we will live on in the lives and hearts of future generations and in the pages of their history.... We will die before our time but we are not doomed. We will be alive for as long as Jewish history lives! On the eve of Passover, April 19, 1943, German forces entered the Warsaw ghetto equipped with tanks, flame throwers, and machine guns. Against them stood an army of a few hundred young Jewish men and women, armed with pistols and Molotov cocktails. Who were these Jewish fighters who dared oppose the armed might of the SS troops under the command of SS General Juergen Stroop? Who commanded them in battle? What were their goals? In this groundbreaking work, Israel s former Minister of Defense, Prof. Moshe Arens, recounts a true tale of daring, courage, and sacrifice that should be accurately told out of respect for and in homage to the fighters who rose against the German attempt to liquidate the Warsaw ghetto, and made a last-ditch fight for the honor of the Jewish people. The generally accepted account of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising is incomplete. The truth begins with the existence of not one, but two resistance organizations in the ghetto. Two young men, Mordechai Anielewicz of the Jewish Fighting Organization (ZOB), and Pawel Frenkel of the Jewish Military Organization (ZZW), rose to lead separate resistance organizations in the ghetto, which did not unite despite the desperate battle they were facing. Included is the complete text of The Stroop Report translated into English.

On the night the SS rounded up the Jews of his Ukrainian ghetto, eighteen-year-old Yosel Epelbaum crawled on his hands and knees to a nearby forest. There he joined a diverse band of pro-Soviet partisans, led by a kind of warlord in the wilderness, who created a "forest republic" behind enemy lines. With his courageous comrades, Epelbaum disrupted the German war effort for almost a year and a half and saved hundreds of civilans at the same time. After the liberation. the young survivor became caught up in Europe's roaring black market. With little money or formal education, an knowing no English, he immigrated to San Francisco in 1947 and within a year opened an ice cream shop in the city's outlying, foggy Sunset District. Only a decade later Joe Pell was well on his way to becoming one of the leading real estate developers in Northern California. Taking Risks, related in a taut and vivid style, is his story--one of loss and torment but also daring, ingenuity, and uncommon resilience.

A general introduction to the main currents and movements in modern philosophy.

Siberia has no history of independent political existence, no claim to a separate ethnic identity, and no clear borders. Yet, it could be said that the elusive country 'behind the Urals' is the most real and the most durable part of the Russian landscape. For centuries, Siberia has been represented as Russia's alter ego,as the heavenly or infernal antithesis to the perceived complexity or shallowness of Russian life. It has been both the frightening heart of darkness and a fabulous land of plenty; the 'House of the Dead' and the realm of utter freedom; a frozen wasteland and a colourful frontier; a dumping ground for Russia's rejects and the last refuge of its lost innocence. The contributors to Between Heaven and Hell examine the origin, nature, and implications of these images from historical, literary, geographical, anthropological, and linguistic perspectives. They create a striking, fascinating picture of this enormous and mysterious land.

An illustrated travelogue that captures the beauty, culture, and history of Hungary. The book is packed with stunning photographs and vivid descriptions of Hungary's most iconic landmarks and landscapes, as well as its lesser-known treasures. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

"This is a work by a fighter, a thinker, and an idealist. Leo Labedz is a fighter who minces no words in his contempt for the apologists of totalitarianism. He never rests in his efforts to enlarge the scope of human freedom, and many have felt the sharp edge of his political scalpel. He is a thinker with a penetrating mind and en­cyclopedic knowledge. He is an idealist who believes in sacrificing for the just cause to which he has dedicated his life." With these words of extraordinary praise, Zbigniew Brzezinski opens this volume of critical and polemical essays by Leopold Labedz. His knowledge of Soviet affairs, as seen through the eyes of the crusaders and critics of the Modern Russian State, is peerless. Chapters, which include major studies of Alexandr Solzhenitsyn, George Orwell, Noam Chomsky, George Kennan, and Leszek Kolakowski among others, es­tablish Labedz as among the most incisive analysts of Soviet affairs as well as those who presume special expertise in this ar­cane field.Labedz's impassioned writing covers not only Sovietologists, but also the major fault lines with which totalitarian systems have been uniquely identified. His writings on the Holocaust, student revolt, European unity, and the meaning of detente, help provide a perspective with which to assess present moods and policies within the still ever-present Soviet bloc. The anthology was prepared and edited by Melvin J. Lasky, the editor of Encounter, in which many of these materials initially appeared.

The name "Tito" has become legendary in the annals of our common struggle against Hitlerism. Yet less is known about him today than most men of equal renown. Howard Fast, that distinguished American author of "Citizen Tom Paine" fame, made a careful study of the facts and wrote this incredible account of a man and a people who refused to understand the meaning of the word "defeat."

Carole Balin introduces us to dozens of Jewish women writers from late nineteenth- and early twentieth- century Tsarist Russia, focusing on five who were among the most prolific. Their extant literary remains include not only fiction, poetry, drama, translations, and essays, but also memoirs, autobiographies, diaries, and letters. Balin contextualizes the works of each within the culture in which she lived and wrote. Miriam Markel-Mosessohn (1839-1920) toiled to advance the goals of the Russian Haskalah (Enlightenment), translated German works into Hebrew, tried her hand at poetry, and became a foreign correspondent for a Hebrew newspaper at the age of 48. Hava Shapiro (1879-1943) published short stories and newspaper articles in Hebrew, earned a doctorate at the University of Berne, and was an active participant in the writing circle convened at the Warsaw home of Y. L. Peretz. Rashel Mironovna Khin (1861-1928) wrote numerous short stories and plays in Russian, two of which were staged at Moscow's Malyi Theater. Feiga Israilevna Kogan (1891-1974) composed books of Symbolist poetry in Russian while harboring a love of Hebrew, which she nurtured at the Society for Lovers of the Hebrew Language. Sofia Dubnova-Erlikh (1885-1986) was the daughter of historian Simon Dubnov, the wife of socialist Genrikh Erlikh, and an accomplished poet, essayist, biographer, and political activist in her own right. The life-like and touching portraits that emerge of these talented writers allow us a penetrating view of Jewish women within their Russian-Jewish milieu that is far more nuanced than the images of housewife and revolutionary currently held in collective Jewish memory. The lives and works of these women help to tell a larger story of Jewish cultural history in the Russian Empire.

This is a story of discovery. Like many kids in immigrant families, I avoided dealing with "old country" family history--and like many of us, I was later moved to go on a quest to discover my roots. This book, Searching for Butsnevits: A Shtetl Tale, is part autobiography, part social history, and part detective story--where the search is for a missing community rather than a missing person. The book is an encounter with the past, with the history of my family in Ukraine in the early 1900s, and includes information about Jewish life in the area and what's happened since to the place and the people, as well as a rare firsthand account of the flight of my family from Ukraine in 1920 in the wake of the pogroms that swept the country following the Russian Revolution.