Homelands

A Personal History of Europe

By: Timothy Garton Ash

Narrated by: John Sackville

Drawing on half a century of firsthand experience and exemplary scholarship, Timothy Garton Ash tells the story of postwar Europe's triumphs and tragedies

Timothy Garton Ash, Europe's "historian of the present," has been "breathing Europe" for the last half century. In Homelands he embarks on a journey in time and space around the postwar continent, drawing on his own notes from many great events, giving vivid firsthand accounts of its leading actors, revisiting the places where its history was made, and recalling its triumphs and tragedies through their imprint on the present.

Garton Ash offers an account of events as seen from the ground—history illustrated by memoir. He describes how Europe emerged from wartime devastation to rebuild, to triumph with the fall of the Berlin Wall, to democratize and unite. And then to falter. It is a singular history of a period of unprecedented progress along with a clear-eyed account of how so much went wrong, from the financial crisis of 2008 to the war in Ukraine. From the pen of someone who, in spite of Brexit, emphatically describes himself as an English European, this is both a tour d'horizon and a tour de force.

©2023 Timothy Garton Ash (P)2023 Tantor

Europe

Insightful and balanced review of Europe postwar. Well argued and fair minded. Highly recommended. Looking forward to reading more by this authors.

A magisterial review and a personal journey of the European project.

A sweeping review of Europe‘s postwar history and the changing concepts of Europe from 1945 until today, profoundly presented and well written by a true expert, with first hand accounts and personal vignettes by the author. TGA has been an active and sympathetic observer at the center of much of the transition in Central and Eastern Europe before and after the fall of the Berlin wall. Since the European project of an open liberal order without borders has come under attack in recent years with Brexit and the rise of authoritarian regimes, and the book ends with the depressing situation of the war in Ukraine, I hope he is writing a new book that can provide some of the elements for a revival of the dream of a Europe whole and free.

The presentation is well done and a pleasure to listen to (except for the pronunciation of German, French or other non-English terms)