Savage Continent
Europe in the Aftermath of World War II
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4.0 • 75 Ratings
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- $13.99
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
Winner of the PEN Hessell-Tiltman Prize
"A superb and immensely important book."—Jonathan Yardley, The Washington Post
The Second World War might have officially ended in May 1945, but in reality it rumbled on for another ten years...
The end of World War II in Europe is remembered as a time when cheering crowds filled the streets, but the reality was quite different. Across Europe, landscapes had been ravaged, entire cities razed, and more than thirty million people had been killed in the war. The institutions that we now take for granted—such as police, media, transport, and local and national government—were either entirely absent or compromised. Crime rates soared, economies collapsed, and whole populations hovered on the brink of starvation.
In Savage Continent, Keith Lowe describes a continent where individual Germans and collaborators were rounded up and summarily executed, where concentration camps were reopened, and violent anti-Semitism was reborn. In some of the monstrous acts of ethnic cleansing the world has ever seen, tens of millions were expelled from their ancestral homelands.
Savage Continent is the story of post–war Europe, from the close of the war right to the establishment of an uneasy stability at the end of the 1940s. Based principally on primary sources from a dozen countries, Savage Continent is the chronicle of a world gone mad, the standard history of post–World War II Europe for years to come.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Hitler's defeat did not end WWII, writes historian Lowe (Inferno: The Fiery Devastation of Hamburg, 1943) in this horrific account of years of violence and misery that immediately followed the war. Civil wars ignited by Nazi invasion raged for years in Greece, Yugoslavia, and Poland. Partisans in the Baltic states and Ukraine fought the Red Army until the 1950s. After WWII the victors moved people to suit borders moving ethnic minorities, often with good intentions, to prevent future hostilities, but with cruel results. Vengeful neighbors expelled 11 million Germans from Poland, but a dozen other acts of "ethnic cleansing" involved millions of Ukrainians, Hungarians, Poles, and other Slavs. Nor were Allied nations idle. Twenty-four thousand German POWs died in French camps. Americans kept millions of German soldiers in open fields with no shelter or sanitation and little food. Despite Lowe's thoughtful explanations for the actions he recounts, few readers will emerge unshaken from this meticulous history of unspeakable behavior by both governments and ordinary citizens. 16 pages of color photos, 12 maps.
Customer Reviews
Stunning New History
For me this book is a stunning new history about what Europe was like in the five years after World War II ended. I had no idea the carnage and savagery continued on, mostly in Eastern Europe, for so long. It seems like simmering bigotry is alway lurking behind the scene in Europe. For me, the book is a lesson in why we must forgive even though we must not forget. Otherwise, we are just monkeys pretending to be humans.
Where are the maps
Great
Savage Continent
This was one of the best history books I have read. It gave a whole new perspective on WW2 with all the side shows that were going on before, during and after the official time frames of this war.
It addressed many of the myths associated with this era, and demonstrated how brutal our species can be.
After reading it, you will truly appreciate the peace we enjoy today and be thankful that many of the grievances that existed for centuries are, at least for now, gone or alleviated.
May we learn the horrors of war and not repeat them