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Tag Archives: Balkan Ghosts
Recommended Books: Non-Fiction
I have been meaning to do a Part 2 to my Recommended Books: Fiction list – put together years ago. I wanted to recommend non-fiction, from history books to biographies to essays to whatever. Here is the Non-Fiction list. I’ve … Continue reading
Posted in Books, Founding Fathers, Theatre
Tagged Abraham Lincoln, Afghanistan, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Alexander Hamilton, Austria, Balkan Ghosts, Balkans, baseball, Belfast, Black Lamb and Grey Falcon, Catherine Drinker-Bowen, Central Asia, China, Crowds and Power, Dava Sobel, David McCullough, Edmund Burke, Edvard Radzinsky, Elias Canetti, Elvis Presley, England, Federalist Papers, Founding Brothers, France, Germany, Group Theatre, Gulag Archipelago, Hitler, Hunter S. Thompson, Imperium, Ireland, Iris Chang, Isaac Newton, James Madison, Janet Malcolm, Japan, Joseph Ellis, Michael Schmidt, Miracle at Philadelphia, nonfiction, Olivia Laing, Philip Gourevitch, poetry, Primo Levi, Rasputin, Rebecca West, Red Sox, Robert Conquest, Robert Kaplan, Roman empire, Russia, Rwanda, Ryszard Kapuściński, science, Serbia, Shakespeare, Stalin, The Great Terror, The Soccer War, Tom Wolfe, true crime, Ukraine, Vincent Bugliosi, WWI, WWII, Yugoslavia
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Focus on Croatia
Zagreb Rebecca West’s classic travelogue of Yugoslavia, Black Lamb and Grey Falcon, begins at the railway station in Zagreb, Croatia, 1937. Robert Kaplan, following her trail in 1989, begins his book Balkan Ghosts at the same railway station. In 1918, … Continue reading
Posted in Miscellania
Tagged Balkan Ghosts, Balkans, Black Lamb and Grey Falcon, Rebecca West, Robert Kaplan
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Focus on Croatia
Religion The best way to describe the split in the Croatian Catholic Church is to talk about Bishop Josip Strossmayer and Cardinal Alojzije Stepinac. (I am stealing this device blatantly from Robert Kaplan). But first: A bit of theology. During … Continue reading
Focus on Hungary
Culture There is a huge blank in my knowledge, as far as Hungary is concerned. My notes start in the 800 ADs, and then they skip to World War I. So my apologies for that. One of the many cool … Continue reading
Posted in Miscellania
Tagged Balkan Ghosts, Balkans, Hungary, politics, Robert Kaplan
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Macedonia, Again
Competing claims I have two passages on Macedonia (and the wider world of the Balkans) to share from Roberrt Kaplan’s influential book Balkan Ghosts. As I said yesterday, my understanding of the Macedonian situation is tenuous, at best, and I … Continue reading
Posted in Miscellania
Tagged Balkan Ghosts, Balkans, Macedonia, politics, Robert Kaplan, war, Yugoslavia
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