Russia?

Don’t be discouraged about reviewing books before you’re finished reading — strike while the iron is hot! Also, you can follow-up with later posts. It’s not as if the issue of AFOE is printed and your initial review has to be the very last word.

Martin, I’m not yet seeing the “attitude towards socialism and left wing politics”, but again, I haven’t hit 1968 yet. And I’d disagree that he focuses too much on Germany, France and the UK — those are the three biggest countries in Europe, after all. He spends plenty of time on Italy too, and manages to at least touch on Austria and Scandinavia. If he’s neglecting anyone in western Europe (so far) it’s the Swiss and the Dutch.

He does treat the two halves of Europe as very separate, but for the period in question (roughly the 20 years after WWII so far) I don’t think that’s unreasonable. For most of this period there was very little coming and going; the Iron Curtain started to loosen in the south after 1962, when Yugoslavia started admitting Western tourists in large numbers, but before then you had 15 years where almost nobody from one side of Europe was able to visit the other. If he’s still maintaining this division into the 1980s, then I’ll be more critical. (Teach me to review a book I haven’t finished, I suppose.)

Doug M.

He has a clear political viewpoint on some things, which isn’t surprising because he is a Brit. He is very dismissive of nationalist movements in Europe, like the Basques, Catalonians, or even Northern Ireland. He views nationalism as inherently destructive, and this comes through strongly in certain sections. His sections on Ireland and Britain’s influence there seemed like weasel words.

Personally I found this interesting but disappointing, as he focused too much on Germany, France and the UK and seemed to treat Eastern Europe too much like a monolithic block of countries at times, with much of the rest of Europe given short shift. I was expecting either something more comprehensive, or more generalising.