The Bloodiest, Most Stomach-Turning Book You’ve Ever Read
“All of European literature springs from a fight,” says a Classics professor in Philip Roth’s The Human Stain. He’s talking about Homer’s The Iliad, and what a nasty little story it is. A few lines from Book 4, during the first major battle scene between the Trojans and the Achians, offers a sanguine taste: Then fate fell upon … Continue reading
Humanity in the Bloodlands
Each of the living bore a name. So writes Timothy Snyder in the conclusion of Bloodlands, a systematic and unblinking account of the utter Hell experienced between Berlin and Moscow from 1930 to 1947, wherein fourteen million people were killed. Snyder’s thesis is that, as history, World War II was not just about D-Day or … Continue reading
Hitch and the Holocaust
The new book on my bedside table is not on the Master List, but still one I have wanted to read ever since it came out: Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin by Timothy Snyder. I expect to write another post specifically about the book itself, but its subject of World War II atrocities has me … Continue reading
Letters Republic 