Fetch Balkan Ghosts: A Journey Through History By Robert D. Kaplan Presented As Copy

rather dark overview of the Balkans, but once the book of choice for those venturing into Europe's heart of darkness in the's, the former republic of Yugoslavia, and trying to get a basic grasp of the peoples and issues on the plane ride in.
I read it sitelinkon the road to Kosovo, during the war there between the KLA and the Yugoslav Army, There are better books, if you're willing to spend quality time reading them, but if you're just trying to establish a base line to draw from, this will do nicely.
A bit torn. I eagerly devoured the history between these pages, but at the same time, his writing lacked both balance and technical panache, His view of the Orient was alarmingly onesided and laughably outofdate, I did feel, however, that certain essays in here that's all it really is, a collection of travel essays and opeds are worth the price of admission, I liked most of those on Romania and Bulgaria, . . his views on Greece and Albania and especially Kosovo just rubbed me the wrong way, Very mixed bag. From the assassination that triggered WW I to the ethnic warfare in Serbia, Bosnia amp Croatia, the Balkans have been the crucible of theth century, the place where terrorism amp genocidest became tools of policy.
Chosen as one of the Best Books of the Year by The NY Times, amp greeted with critical acclaim as "the most insightful amp timely work on

the Balkans to date" by The Boston Globe, Kaplan's prescient, enthralling amp often chilling political travelogue is already a modern classic.
Flat lands are invitations to invade, Mountains are fortresses to defend, Conquest beckons the powerful but brings resentment in the conquered,

Central Europe, flat, has been a historic pathway for invasion, with horrors of conquest over the centuries culminating in the invasion of the USSR by Germany and then the invasion of Germany by the USSR in WW.
The book to read on this is Bloodlands,

Balkan Ghosts takes a look at the lands to the south, the Balkans, with the author touring the mountainous regions that often but not always provided refuge from the invasion of one country or people by another.
These relatively small countries, Romania, Bulgaria, Greece, and the lands that made up the former Yugoslavia Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Montenegro, Serbia and Macedonia packed closely together Slavs and Serbs, Greeks and Turks, Eastern Orthodox and Catholic Christians and Muslims in a mix ready to combust.


As Robert Kaplan puts it so well, each group, each nation, has considers the time when it ruled over the most territory as the golden age and longs for that time to return.
Unlike the United States and Britain, countries that have enjoyed empire without being overrun by invasion of the homeland, the Balkan states have all been invaded, repeatedly, with hatred planted and nourished by every episode.


As the author travels around interviewing people, he often hears that "you Americans cannot understand our situation" and that cannot be denied, yet in each case the person speaking clearly cannot understand any but his/her own situation.
Kaplan visited over a period of years fromthrough the end of Soviet control in, making his home in Greece at the time, finding a litany of resentment and righteous indignation concerning events from ancient history right up to the time he visited.


With each country he delves into the history of conflict that characterize each, the period of Ottoman rule standing out strongly for oppression though it ended over a century ago.
Each nation has a story to tell of slaughter and of alignment with or against now this, now that invading power, The holocaust of the Jews in the's was of course as much a part of Balkan history as it was of central and eastern Europe to the north.


Dictators such as Yugoslavia's Tito, Serbia's Milosovic, and Romania's Ceausescu are covered in full along with the most remarkable character of all, Andreas Papandreou of Greece, a man who went from being a PhD at Harvard to become the chairman of the department of economics at UC Berkeley and then the prime minister of Greece, along the way turning a blind eye to terrorism, enjoying the support of Libya's Ghaddafi and needling the United States at every opportunity.


From the descriptions Kaplan provides fromBalkan life was very bleak, poverty was common and the general lack of joy in life that characterized USSR style communism still smothered all of the countries with the exception of Greece, a democracy open as it is to the West through the Mediterranean.
The author doesn't hesitate to analyze cultural issues, relating the great increase in tourism to Greece from America prompted by the movies Never on Sunday and Zorba the Greek.
He makes a point of Americans seeing the mystical, exotic, irrational east as an exciting and enticing place of escape from the rational, coinciding with the sexual revolution in the's.


Things have improved for the people of the Balkans since this book was written, though Serbia under Milosovic went on a rampage in the's bringing the military intervention of NATO.


For someone as ignorant of the region as I was, this book enthralled, The complexity of the ethnic and religious scene is impossible for me to convey, The USSR kept a tight lid on it all, Many years ago I would hear shortwave radio broadcasts from the Balkans Radio Sofia, Radio Bucharest, etc, uniform in the dreary presentation style of Radio Moscow, relating none of the colorful cultures of the countries,

Using the internet to look at street scenes in the Balkans today, it is clear that material life has greatly improved, I can only hope that this will continue as the suffering endured by those living in the Balkans, due to invasions from all sides is matched only by the European countries to the north.
The first/of the book is a delight as Mr, Kaplan recounts personal encounters through most of the Balkans in a prescient account before the strife of the early through lates, However, he stumbles when he gets to Greece, Perhaps for the selfstated reason that he spentyears there, he loses his storytelling ability and even his objectivity, For example, after talking about the ethnic homogenization of the region, he writes only TWO sentences on the population exchange between Greece and Turkey in the earlys, Shame on him this was the first systematic ethnic cleansing agreed to by world powers and used as precedent for years to come, leading to what we now refer to as ethnic cleansing.
Mr. Kaplan's final chapter on Greece is sadly lacking in the very objectivity that he accuses the philhellenes of lacking,

Wellwritten. Hardly objective. A must read for anyone who has the slightest interest in contemporary history: Kaplan has captured the fantastic complexity of the Balkan politics that have been the root cause of so much world tension and little things like World War I.
Each chapter of the book focuses on a key country: Kaplan blends his extensive personal experience there, recapping the threads of historical and cultural issues faced by that country, pointing to future outcomes.
Written in theth Century, many of Kaplan's predictions have come about since the book was published,

As a Greek American, I was particularly intrigued with his recap of contemporary Greek politics: his analysis of Andreas Papandreou is chilling and seemingly spot on, He nails the "Greek" question, I am swayed by Kaplan's premise, that the Balkans are still mired in the drama of Oriental despotism, that the Balkans have a long way to go to achieve a democratic society where ethnic minorities and the dominant majorities are able to be ruled by law rather than the whim of history and charismatic dictators.
Spellbinding: a modern classic.,/
Bałkańskie upiory literacko to ekstraklasa, Kaplan jest świetnym pisarzem eseistą, oddającym klimat miejsc i nastroje ludzi, których spotyka na swojej drodze, Reporter mistrzowsko wyczuwa napięcia i negatywne emocje przez lata nawarstwiające się na Bałkanach: Chorwacja, Serbia, Bośnia, Albania, Rumunia, Bułgaria czy Grecja, pod jego piórem jawią się słusznie jako etniczny tygiel, starający się wyjść z cienia Osmańskiego panowania, wymuszającego na każdej nacji podkreślenia swojej odrębności etnicznej eskalacja wisi w powietrzu.

Literacko super. Mam jednak wrażenie, że to bardziej zbiór impresji, niż rzetelne źródło wiedzy o Bałkanach tuż po upadku Tity, a w przededniu wojny, Kaplan owszem, przedstawia nam losy każdej nacji od czasów najdawniejszych pokrótce opisuje lata jej świetności, podstawy ewentualnych roszczeń i pretensji względem sąsiadów, pokazuje piętno, jakie na mieszkańcach wywarł komunizm i czytając byłem zachwycony, że wreszcie ktoś mi wytłumaczył czemu oni wszyscy tak się nienawidzą.

Potem przyszło do mnie kilka refleksji, Kaplan to reporter w stylu tych, co to biorą na plecy plecak, do plecaka wkładają książki mające być dla nich inspiracją, wsiadają do pociągu i jadą w nieznane.
Problem w tym, że większość szeroko cytowanych przez autora książek, właściwie wszystkie ważne, to pozycje również reportaże z lat, Rozumiem, że gdy autor pisał swoje reportaże na rynku nie było dostępnych zbyt wiele pozycji o Bałkanach boom przyszedł dopiero po wojnie, ale czerpać wiedzę o regionie z książek liczących sobie w najlepszym wypadkulat, to mimo wszystko trochę przegięcie, szczególnie jeśli za wszelką cenę stara się potwierdzić tezy wysnute przezzych kolegów po fachu i warto mieć to na uwadze sięgając po Upiory, które zdecydowanie warto przeczytać nie zapominając jednak o lekkim przymrużeniu oka przy niektórych fragmentach.
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