1947: Where Now Begins

"Elisabeth Åsbrink, a Swedish journalist, takes readers month by month through this epochal year and tells us what in the world was going on. The coverage isn’t limited to the political realm (which saw, among much else, the opening of the Nuremberg trials and HUAC’s arrival in Hollywood) but also includes such events as Nelson Algren and Simone de Beauvoir’s love affair, the fight to have genocide recognized by the U.N. as an international crime, the appearance of flying saucers over the Cascades in Oregon and much more. In Fiona Graham’s smooth translation, parallels between 1947 and 2018 are frighteningly obvious. Even though I have a history degree and already knew at least a little about many of the events Åsbrink details, I found so much that was eye-opening in every month’s account."