Postwar
by Tony Judt · 2005
Buy on AmazonThe first truly European history of contemporary Europe, from Lisbon to Leningrad, based on research in six languages, covering 34 countries across 60 years, using a great deal of material from newly available sources. The book integrates international relations, domestic politics, ideas, social change, economic development, and culture--high and low--into a single grand narrative. Every country has its chance to play the lead, and although the big themes are handled--including the cold war, the love/hate relationship with America, cultural and economic malaise and rebirth, and the myth and reality of unification--none of them is allowed to overshadow the rich pageant that is the whole.--From publisher description.
Recommended by
"Finalist"
Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction 2006 · pulitzer.org
"A book that deeply informs my journalist sense. Writers-particularly American writers-constantly feel the pull of soulutionism, the desire to assure their readers that there is a way out, even when there isn’t. Judt refused this. History, he understood, does not exist to comfort us."
Favorite books · radicalreads.com
"Tony Judt's 'Postwar,' which is, in its own way, about how the postwar international order was created, and why, for all its tremendous faults, it is worth preserving."
By the Book: Chris Hayes · nytimes.com