The Magic Lantern: The Revolution of '89 Witnessed in Warsaw, Budapest, Berlin, and Prague

ISBN: 0679740481

Condition: New

Product DescriptionThe Magic Lantern is one of those rare books that define a historic moment, written by a brilliant witness who was also a participant in epochal events. Whether covering Polands first free parliamentary elections-in which Solidarity found itself in the position of trying to limit the scope of its victory-or sitting in at the meetings of an unlikely coalition of bohemian intellectuals and Catholic clerics orchestrating the liberation of Czechoslovakia, Garton Ash writes with enormous sympathy and power.This book is a stunningly evocative portrait of the revolutions that swept Communism from Eastern Europe in 1989 and whose aftereffects are still being felt today. As Garton Ash writes in an incisive new afterword, from the perspective of three decades later: Freedoms battle is never finally won. It must be fought anew in every generation.Review"[Garton Ash's] own involvement in these events, intellectual and emotional, is of such intensity that he can speak...from the inside as well as from the outside. Yet the sense of historic dimension...is never lost. And the quality of the writing places it clearly in the category of good literature." -- George Kennan"Along with the historian's long view, Gatton Ash has an eye and an ear for the telling detail." -- Washington Past Book WorldFrom the Publisher"A wonderful combination of first-class reporting, brilliant political analysis and reflection."--The New York Times Book ReviewFrom the Back CoverThe Magic Lantern is one of those rare books that define a history moment, written by a brilliant witness who was also a participant in epochal events. Whether covering Poland's first free parliamentary elections--in which Solidarity found itself in the position of trying to limit the scope of its victory--or sitting in at the meetings of an unlikely coalition of bohemian intellectuals and Catholic clerics orchestrating the liberation of Czechoslovakia, Garton Ash writes with sympathy and power.About the AuthorTimothy Garton Ash is the author of ten books of history of the present which have explored many facets of Europe over the last half-century. He is Professor of European Studies, University of Oxford, Isaiah Berlin Professorial Fellow at St Antonys College, Oxford and a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He also writes a column on international affairs in the Guardian, which is widely syndicated, and is a regular contributor to The New York Review of Books, amongst other journals. His books include The File: A Personal History, In Europes Name: Germany and the Divided Continent and, most recently, Free Speech: Ten Principles for a Connected World. Awards he has received for his writing include the International Charlemagne Prize and the George Orwell Prize. The Magic Lantern, originally published in 1990, has been translated into twenty languages.