To Hell and Back, Ian Kershaw
To Hell and Back, Ian Kershaw
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To Hell and Back
Europe 1914-1949

Author: Ian Kershaw

Narrator: John Curless

Unabridged: 26 hr 43 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Recorded Books

Published: 11/17/2015


Synopsis

The European catastrophe, the long continuous period from 1914 to 1949, was unprecedented in human history—an extraordinarily dramatic, often traumatic, and endlessly fascinating period of upheaval and transformation. This new volume in the Penguin History of Europe series offers comprehensive coverage of this tumultuous era. Beginning with the outbreak of World War I through the rise of Hitler and the aftermath of the Second World War, award-winning British historian Ian Kershaw combines his characteristic original scholarship and gripping prose as he profiles the key decision makers and the violent shocks of war as they affected the entire European continent and radically altered the course of European history. Kershaw identifies four major causes for this catastrophe: an explosion of ethnic-racist nationalism, bitter and irreconcilable demands for territorial revisionism, acute class conflict given concrete focus through the Bolshevik Revolution, and a protracted crisis of capitalism.

Incisive, brilliantly written, and filled with penetrating insights, To Hell and Back offers an indispensable study of a period in European history whose effects are still being felt today.

“Chilling … To Hell and Back should be required reading in every chancellery, every editorial cockpit and every place where peevish Euroskeptics do their thinking. … Kershaw documents each and every ‘ism’ of his analysis with extraordinary detail and passionate humanism.”—The New York Times Book Review

About Ian Kershaw

Ian Kershaw, author of The End, Fateful Choices, and Making Friends with Hitler, is a British historian of twentieth-century Germany noted for his monumental biographies of Adolf Hitler. In 2002 he received his knighthood for Services to History. He is a Fellow of the British Academy, of the Royal Historical Society, of the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin, and of the Alexander von Humboldt-Stiftung in Bonn.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Melina on December 14, 2020

''Οι πόλεμοι των λαών θα είναι τρομερότεροι από τους πολέμους των βασιλέων.'' Γουίνστον Τσώρτσιλ (1901) Σπουδαίο βιβλίο στο οποίο ο Kershaw περιγράφει αδρά αλλά με αφηγηματική δεινότητα τριάντα πέντε χρόνια ιστορίας (1914 -1949). Από την "Μπελ Εποκ" και την Ευρώπη του τσάρλεστον, της τέχνης, του πολι......more

Goodreads review by Lawyer on November 23, 2015

To Hell and Back: Europe 1914-1949: Kershaw's Analytical History My thanks to Random House/Viking/Penguin for the opportunity to read To Hell and Back: Europe 1914-1949 by Ian Kershaw and the opportunity to state my opinion of this work. This is the first of a planned two volume history of Europe duri......more

Goodreads review by Lewis on February 08, 2017

I will be dipping into this overview from time to time over the next few months. The sections I have read so far are simply outstanding, reflecting both Kershaw's brilliant historical perspectives and his clean controlled writing style. UPDATE 12/16/15 ... I have just read the section on the Spanish......more

Goodreads review by Mircea on January 28, 2022

Autorul nu se limiteaza la prezentarea evenimentelor. Le si analizeaza, intr-un mod usor de inteles. De ce s-au instalat regimuri totalitare in Germania, Italia si Rusia? Care sunt diferentele dintre totalitarism si autoritarismul conventional? Ce impact a avut Marea Criza in fiecare tara europeana?......more

Goodreads review by Brendan on April 29, 2019

"Hell" seems a good word to describe Europe from 1914 to 1949. The hell of Dante is the most suitable "hell" for comparison to Europe during this period, as there were clearly varying degrees of "hell" Europeans were in based on their ethnicity and location. If you're a white protestant in Sweden, f......more