William T. Vollmann
Paperback | Pages: 811 pages Rating: 3.92 | 2356 Users | 297 Reviews
Identify Based On Books Europe Central
| Title | : | Europe Central |
| Author | : | William T. Vollmann |
| Book Format | : | Paperback |
| Book Edition | : | US / Canada |
| Pages | : | Pages: 811 pages |
| Published | : | December 1st 2005 by Penguin (first published 2005) |
| Categories | : | Fiction. Historical. Historical Fiction. Novels. Literature. American. War. Cultural. Russia |
Interpretation Concering Books Europe Central
In this magnificent work of fiction, William T. Vollmann turns his trenchant eye to the authoritarian cultures of Germany and the USSR in the twentieth century. Assembling a composite portrait of these two warring leviathans and the terrible age they defined, the narrative intertwines experiences both real and fictional—a young German who joins the SS to expose its crimes, two generals who collaborate with the enemy for different reasons, the Soviet composer Dmitri Shostakovich laboring under Stalinist oppression. Through these and other lives, Vollmann offers a daring and mesmerizing perspective on human actions during wartime.Declare Books To Europe Central
| Original Title: | Europe Central |
| ISBN: | 0143036599 (ISBN13: 9780143036593) |
| Edition Language: | English URL http://www.penguin.com/book/europe-central-by-william-t-vollmann/9780143036593 |
| Characters: | Friedrich Paulus, Käthe Kollwitz, Andrey Vlasov, Dmitri Shostakovich, Kurt Gerstein, Nadezhda Krupskaya, Fanya Kaplan, Roman Karmen, Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, Hilde Benjamin |
| Setting: | Berlin(Germany) Dresden(Germany) Moscow(Russian Federation) …more Stalingrad, USSR Leningrado(Russian Federation) …less |
| Literary Awards: | National Book Award for Fiction (2005), California Book Award for Fiction (Gold) (2005), National Book Critics Circle Award Nominee for Fiction (2005), Preis der Leipziger Buchmesse for Übersetzung (2014), Βραβείο Λογοτεχνικής Μετάφρασης Αγγλόφωνης Λογοτεχνίας ΕΙΛΜ (2012) |
Rating Based On Books Europe Central
Ratings: 3.92 From 2356 Users | 297 ReviewsCriticism Based On Books Europe Central
(Thank You, Bill, for Another) God Almighty Tome[An Interpolation Upon an Enquiry by Steven Moore]Now its for sale,Dont be deterred.This thousand-page, Half-million-word War effort hadTo be contrivedIn breath-taking,Large scale detail,So it could beDesired asA maximal Unholy grail. We college gradsAnd desk-bound malesNow type awayInside the whale,So that we canAll adulateThe moral scope Of Vollmann's tale.Hence, we honourIts mighty length,And shower itWith lavish praise. A Novel Calculus"EuropeAll magic spells fail without belief. We enforced belief.~~Europe Central is another monstrous book from Vollmann; monstrous in size, content, language, implications, critique of humanity, world-historical analysis. Lets get something out of the way at the outset: This book is a masterpiece (horrifying, painfully beautiful, profound); if youre a writer you wish you could have written this; and no one could have written this book in these early years of the 21st century except Vollmann. In many
Most Americans know about the American contribution to the Allied defeat of Nazi Germany, but by the accounts of most Europeans, it was the victory of Russia that determined the fate of the Third Reich. In comparison to the 4oo thousand American deaths, Russia lost twenty-three million. The cities and endless expanses of Central Europe were littered with bodies when these two gigantic armies slugged it out. This book paints a fantastic portrait of that struggle and its aftermath, studded with
Never trust anyone. Never say anythingexcept musically, of course. Music is safe because nobody understands it. In other words, only in music is everything clear. As the world burns, they create their art. Käthe Kollwit paints the nightmarish portraits of her dead child, and the Soviet Union proclaims her metaphorology ripe with Communist intent, but . . . (In the end, her art got supplanted in both zones. A grief-stricken mother holding her dead child is all very well, but perhaps a trifle too
Wow. How many of these dense 800+ page novels can I get through without hitting my head against a wall? Not sure, but here is another. Vollmann reigns supreme among living writers. I can't think of a single American writer more prolific than Vollmann, going all the way back to the country's founding.An historic novel set in early 20th century central Europe, it sets out to depict the mindset of many famous people put in moralistic binds during warfare; a modern War and Peace, essentially.His
4.5/5If you have no interest at all in learning massive amounts about World War II, this book is not for you. As a matter of fact, if you are not in the mood for facts and quotations and references galore packaged in a semi short story fashion, refer to the previous statement. However, if you are alright with that sort of thing, you are in for a treat.I will admit, I panicked a little bit once I realized how jam packed this book is with historical trivia. As if that wasn't intimidating enough,
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