| Edition |
1st United States ed. |
| Description |
xxxvi, 566 p., [28] p. of plates : ill., maps ; 25 cm. |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references (p. [475]-541) and index. |
| Contents |
Pt. 1. False dawn : Zero hour ; Victors ; Communists ; Policemen ; Violence ; Ethnic cleansing ; Youth ; Radio ; Politics ; Economics -- Pt. 2. High Stalinism : Reactionary enemies ; Internal enemies ; Homo Sovieticus ; Socialist realism ; Ideal cities ; Reluctant collaborators ; Passive opponents ; Revolutions -- Epilogue. |
| Summary |
In the follow-up to her previous book "Gulag," the author, a journalist, delivers a history of how Communism took over Eastern Europe after World War II and transformed in frightening fashion the individuals who came under its sway. At the end of World War II, the Soviet Union, to its surprise and delight, found itself in control of a huge swath of territory in Eastern Europe. Josef Stalin and his secret police set out to convert a dozen radically different countries to Communism, a completely new political and moral system. In this book, the author describes how the Communist regimes of Eastern Europe were created and what daily life was like once they were complete. She draws on newly opened East European archives, interviews, and personal accounts translated for the first time to portray in detail the dilemmas faced by millions of individuals trying to adjust to a way of life that challenged their every belief and took away everything they had accumulated. Today the Soviet Bloc is a lost civilization, one whose cruelty, paranoia, bizarre morality, and strange aesthetics is captured in the pages of this book. |
| Subject |
Europe, Eastern -- Relations -- Soviet Union.
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Soviet Union -- Relations -- Europe, Eastern.
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Europe, Eastern -- Politics and government -- 1945-1989.
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Europe, Eastern -- Social conditions -- 20th century.
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Communist countries -- Politics and government.
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Communist countries -- Social conditions.
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Communism -- Europe, Eastern -- History -- 20th century.
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Communism -- Social aspects -- Europe, Eastern -- History -- 20th century.
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Political culture -- Europe, Eastern -- History -- 20th century.
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Political persecution -- Europe, Eastern -- History -- 20th century.
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| ISBN |
9780385515696 (hardcover) |
|
0385515693 (hardcover) |
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