© Columbia University Press
The Columbia Guide to the Literatures of Eastern Europe Since 1945
April, 2003
Cloth, 512 pages, None
ISBN: 978-0-231-11404-2
$113.00
/ £78.00
"A great new research tool . . . Segel lays out the striking complexity of the region's intellectual life and the lives and work of its writers. In his brilliant introduction, he contributes a magnificently comprehensive, 34-page review article on the region's intellectual life since the war and its history, politics, peoples, and cultures, as well as its literatures. . . . Highly recommended." — Library Journal (*Starred Review)
"Assembled by an eminently qualified expert on the literatures of Eastern Europe, this prodigious compilation . . . provides historical, political, and literary context for the period . . . [N]o single work in English is nearly so comprehensive." — Choice
"No such handy, erudite guide to the postwar literary traditions of these thirteen nations was available until now . . .This is an excellent, much-needed reference work, which should be found within reach of every scholar of Eastern European literature . . . Surely, higher praise for a book cannot be conceived than this, that its only 'flaw' is that it leaves the reader yearning for more of the same?" — Halina Stephan, Polish Review
"A timely resource that provides a wide range of information on almost 700 authors from Albania, the former East Germany, Serbia, Slovenia and others, filling what would seem to be a considerable gap." — Booklist
"This superb guide to authors and their works fills a much-needed gap in reference works on literature." — Terri Tickle Miller, American Reference Books Annual
"It is, of course, thrilling when a senior scholar of Harold Segel's distinction undertakes such tasks. It means that the priorities and emphases in all parts of the book will cohere...Segal has wisely resolved that key to putting a new area on the inner map of American readers is to provide a face, a life, and further reading." — Caryl Emerson, Comparative LiteraturePrinceton University
"Undoubtedly, Segal'sThe Columbia Guide to the Literatures of Eastern Europe Since 1945 is an invaluable reference." — Eileen Krajewski, Text and Presentation
"The Columbia Guide conveys this encyclopedic breadth in distilled, ready reference form... serves scholars, teachers, students and librarians alike. " — Michael Biggins, American Reference Books Annual
"This magnificent volume contains a superb introduction, several useful gazetteers, information on orthography and transliteration, a fine bibliography, and, most importantly, the extraordinarily rich and often exciting biographies of modern Eastern Europe's intellectual greats and not-so-greats. No one should undertake to write on any aspect of the subject without having Harold Segel's book at hand." — István Deák, Columbia University
"This book is a work of astonishing erudition and an indispensable resource for both literary critics and intellectual historians of the twentieth century. Harold Segel permits us to appreciate, perhaps for the first time, the dazzling complexity of postwar intellectual life in Eastern Europe. All the conventional narratives of European literary and intellectual history, with their biases toward Western Europe, are revealed as incomplete by half at least, and Segel's exploration of the writers of Eastern Europe suggests the contours of a more comprehensive and integrated history. At the same time, this work is invaluable for considering the tragic and twisted encounter between communism and European culture in the twentieth century." — Larry Wolff, author of Inventing Eastern Europe
"A major achievement, this uniquely valuable reference work gathers together in one place many years'worth of research that covers all of geopolitical Eastern Europe. Anyone interested in the region, regardless of whether that interest is academic, policy-oriented, based on heritage, or just curiosity, will find interesting and useful information here as well as the inspiration to read further." — Victor A. Friedman, Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities and Chair, Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Chicago