Eastern Europe

Softcover. NY, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, reprint, 1986, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 192 pages. Roman Vishniac's A Vanished World is an extraordinary record of the lives of German and Eastern European Jews in the years immediately preceding the Holocaust. Vishniac, a Russian Jew, began to take photographs of village life during World War I, when Russian Jews who lived near the front were accused of being German spies and were deported to Siberia. He later moved to Germany, where he witnessed the horrible events of Kristallnacht and the anti-Jewish legislation that allowed Hitler to declare his enemies stateless and therefore unworthy of international protection. As we study Vishniac's photographs--a surviving fraction of the more than 16,000 he took--we are aware that we are seeing the faces of those soon to die, witnessing a world that has all but perished. Yet that world, of shops and schools, of busy streets and quiet farms, remains with us if only as a ghostly memory, thanks in part to Vishniac's compassionate eye.

Hardcover. New York, Norton, 1st, 2005, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, A monograph focusing for the first time exclusively on Kertesz's early Hungarian prints; selected from more than 1,000 contact prints in the artist's estate and reproduced actual size. Photographs by Andre Kertesz; introduction by Bruce Silverstein; essay by Robert Gurbo. 160 pages; 66 duo-toned b&w plates + 11 text illustrations; 5.25 x 5.25 inches.

Softcover. NY, Aperture Foundation, 1998, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 80 pages. A large, beautifully designed photography publication with many full page photographs in black and white and color. Glossy wraps. A new generation of Czech and Slovak photographers--heirs to the legacy of such modern masters as Josef Sudek and Frantisek Driktol--will be the subject of the August 1998 issue of Aperture, featuring images never before published in the West. In the Aperture tradition of investigating the contemporary photography of individual nations, Crossing Borders probes the cultural, social, and emotional climate of the post-Communist era as experienced by twenty-three photographers.

Softcover. Aperture, 1st, 1998, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 79 pages, b&w and color photographs throughout. Very good.

Hardcover. London, Macmillan & Co., reprint, 1942, Book: Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcovers, two-volume set, green cloth with gilt lettering on spine. Rebecca West, 1892-1983, wrote Black Lamb & Grey Falcon after spending 6 weeks in Yugoslavia. Publication occurred at the same time as the Nazi invasion of the state. West pays tribute in the book's epigram to the thousands of civilians who lost their lives in the horrific events that followed; "To my friends in Yugoslavia, who are now all dead or enslaved." 32 black and white photographic plates, map endpapers to both volumes. Clean, tight bindings. Tattered dust jackets laid in. No markings. DUE TO WEIGHT, DOMESTIC SHIPPING ONLY.

Hardcover. NY, Russell Sage Foundation, 1st, 1994, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 400 pages, b&w illustrations. Little over a century ago, New York and Budapest were both flourishing cities engaging in spectacular modernization. By 1930, New York had emerged as an innovating cosmopolitan metropolis, while Budapest languished under the conditions that would foster fascism. Budapest and New York explores the increasingly divergent trajectories of these once-similar cities through the perspectives of both Hungarian and American experts in the fields of political, cultural, social and art history. Their original essays illuminate key aspects of urban life that most reveal the turn-of-the-century evolution of New York and Budapest: democratic participation, use of public space, neighborhood ethnicity, and culture high and low. What comes across most strikingly in these essays is New York's cultivation of social and political pluralism, a trend not found in Budapest. Nationalist ideology exerted tremendous pressure on Budapest's ethnic groups to assimilate to a single Hungarian language and culture. In contrast, New York's ethnic diversity was transmitted through a mass culture that celebrated ethnicity while muting distinct ethnic traditions, making them accessible to a national audience. Mild fade to spine of dust jacket, otherwise clean.

Hardcover. New Haven CT, Yale University Press, 1st, 1998, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 436 pages, b&w illustrations. The humiliation of Russia by separatist rebels in the Chechen War marked a key moment in Russian - and perhaps world - history. In this new analysis Anatol Lieven offers a riveting account of the war as a means to explore the painful fate of the post-Soviet state. Lieven looks into the long, troubled history of Russian-Chechen relations, noting that each side despised the other for largely cultural reasons (the Chechens have long been involved in organized crime in major Russian cities, whereas Russians have long tried to strip Chechnya of its resources). He notes that Chechen society has historically been militarized (one Armenian said to Lieven, "The men are always fighting and the women are cooking for them, nursing their wounds, and bringing up their children"), making the mountain people a formidable foe. In the meanwhile, writes Lieven, the Russian military suffered from low morale and from corruption of various kinds: Russian field soldiers sold their guns to Chechen guerrillas for vodka and currency, while Russian officers stole their soldiers' pay and Russian politicians skimmed off the top. This is an extraordinary look at a little-known conflict. Clean copy.

Hardcover. Canada, Deutscher Kunstverlag, 1st, 2012, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 159 pages. Like new in publisher's shrink-wrap. The material that was saved from Warsaw in 1939 included more than ten color slides. These slides are the only color photo documents showing that historic moment from the perspective of city residents. The slides were found only in recent years by the photographer's son, Sam Bryan. In addition to color slides this album also includes photographs recorded by Julien Bryan on black-and-white film at that time and iater subjected to a complicated process of colorizing. The colorizing took piace after Bryan's return to the United States in 1939.

Hardcover. Vilnius, Baltos Lankos, 1st, 1995, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 69 duotone plates, images taken by the Lithuanian photographer Jozef Chechowicz (1819-1888). Mostly landscapes of the city and it's buildings, some with people. Beautifully produced volume, limited to 2000 copies. Light edgewear to dust jacket.

Hardcover. Montreal, Drawn & Quarterly, 1st, 2003, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 140 pages. Hardcover NO dust jacket. Black and white comic. Clean, unmarked copy with minor wear to boards. Award-winning comix-journalist Joe Sacco goes behind the scene of war correspondence to reveal the anatomy of the big scoop. He begins by returning us to the dying days of Balkan conflict and introduces us to his own fixer; a man looking to squeeze the last bit of profit from Bosnia before the reconstruction begins. Thanks to a complex relationship with the fixer Joe discovers the crimes of opportunistic warlords and gangsters who run the countryside in times of war. But the west is interested in a different spin on the stories coming out of Bosnia. Almost ten years later, Joe meets up with his fixer and sees how the new Bosnian government has "dealt" with these criminals and Joe ponders who is holding the reins of power these days...

Hardcover. London, Hamish Hamilton, 1st, 2008, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 496 pages. SIGNED BY THEROUX on title page. In 1975 a young and ambitious writer named Paul Theroux made his literary mark by taking the 28,000-mile intercontinental journey via rail from London to Tokyo and back home again. Thirty years later, an older and wiser Theroux decided to retrace his steps. The result is Ghost Train to the Eastern Star, a fascinating account of the places you vaguely knew existed, yet definitely should know something about. Get on board Theroux's fast-moving travelogue, which features some of the most astute commentary on our distorted notions of time, space, and each other in the age of jet speed, broadband connections, and cultural extinction. A railway journey through Eastern Europe, India, and Asia. Clean copy

Hardcover. Scarsdale, NY, Bradbury Press, 1st, 1981, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Good, Non-paginated. Hardcover with dust jacket. Clean, tight copy.A Hungarian folktale translated by Severo. Color illustrations by Diane Goode. Dust jacket with light edgewear

Hardcover. Hanover NH, Smith and Kraus, 1st, 2004, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 561 pages, b&w illustrations. 12 year old Bertel, living in Hindenburg, Germany in 1938, was forced by the Nazis to leave Germany for Poland. Disguising herself as a young Polish woman, this is the story of Bertel's survival. INSCRIBED TWICE BY LAUER on the front fly leaf. Clean copy.

Nafziger Collection , reprint, 2007, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 214 pages. Large size 28cm x 21cm in soft card covers. Clean and sound. History of the Polish Revolution of 1830 by Joseph Hordynski - Major of the Late Tenth Regiment of Lithuanian Lancers (Originally pub. in 1833) .

Hardcover. NY, Philosophical Library, 1st US, 1948, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, green cloth covers, 265 pages. B&w frontis. portrait. Previous owner's long inscription on front fly-leaf, otherwise clean.

Hardcover. NY, Paragon House, 1st, 1991, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket. 274 pages. Black cloth spine over brown boards. First published in 1925.

Hardcover. Cambridge MA, MIT Press, 1st, 1999, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 420 pages, illustrated with mostly b&w plates, 8 color pages. Small remainder stamp on bottom edge. "Tiege was at one and the same time both an agent provocateur and seismograph, at once provoking action and debate and yet simultaneously reacting with the utmost sensitivity to the shifting political spectrum of his time."--from the introduction by Kenneth FramptonKarel Teige (1900-1951), a leading figure of the avant-garde of the 1920s and 1930s, participated in every important argument and controversy of those turbulent years. He edited the most influential avant-garde journals on Czech and international cultural affairs and wrote profoundly original essays and books on the theory and criticism of art and architecture. He also produced paintings, collages, photomontages, film scripts, book covers, and typefaces and participated in theatrical performances.

Hardcover. Prague, SNDK, 1st, 1957, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Good, Hardcover in a lightly worn dust jacket, 140 pages. A collection of Czech/Yugoslavian fables illustrated in color by Vladimir Brehovzsky. Clean.

Softcover. Slovenia, FOTOFO , 1st, 2008, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, color photos.

Softcover. Buffalo NY, White Pine Press, 1st, 2003, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 181 pages. INSCRIBED BY AUTHOR on the title page. Immigrant writer Novakovich records his journeys to find his roots, some to his native Croatia, some no farther than Cleveland, where he searches for the grave of his grandmother, who refused to return to Croatia with the rest of her family. This moving collection reflects the joys and the difficulties in returning to a homeland left behind. Clean copy.

Softcover. Buffalo NY, Hungarian Cultural Foundation, 1st, 1973, Book: Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, First US translated printing (1973( of Jozsef's poems. Sun-fading to spine. 224 pages clean, unmarked. Several pages of b&w plates. There is a repaired paper slice to the first 3 pages, including cover. Otherwise very good.

Hardcover. Washington D.C., Smithsonian Institution Press , reprint, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 171 pages. Hardcover with dust jacket. Extensive b&w photographs throughout. Silver gilt titles on spine. Clean, unmarked copy with only minor wear to dust jacket. In September 1939, the German invasion of Poland propelled the world into war. By the spring of 1946, Poland was beginning to recover from five years of cataclysmic destruction. Liberated from the occupation of the Third Reich, the nation celebrated a peace already overshadowed by the emerging Cold War.John Vachon was in Poland to witness this transformation of almost mythic proportions. Assigned to cover United Nations relief efforts, this American photographer documented in images and letters a nation at the crossroads of the postwar East and West. Taken with a keen yet sympathetic eye, Vachon's photographs, most of them never before published, reveal the destitution and unfounded optimism of Poles, many of them returning in boxcars from German labor camps and Siberian exile, ready to reclaim their burned-out cities and farms left fallow by war.Vachon's letters home to his wife provide a rare context for the images. He writes of the luxuries enjoyed by the foreign corps amid Warsaw's rubble, the equal measures of hospitality and anti-Semitism among ordinary Poles, and of the anti-Soviet sentiment in the countryside, where "they love Russian songs, but always apologize when they sing one." In one account of a village fire, he conveys the often conflicting emotions of the photojournalist, documenting scenes of suffering he feels powerless to assuage.

Hardcover. Gottingen GR, Steidl, 1st, 2006, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Non-paginated. Black & white photographs by Rosalind Solomon. Minor wear. Clean, tight copy .Rosalind Solomon made her first pictures in Poland in 1988 during a time of political change, and returned there in 2003, a time of increasing violence and inhumanity in the world. All of the images are of individuals, their relationships and environments and are observations and commentaries on Poland itself, as well as on the rest of the world.

Softcover. US, Top Shelf Productions, 1st, 2007, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover. 285 pages, illustrated throughout in b&w. Clean, unmarked copy with only minor wear to wrappers. As the NATO bombs fell on his hometown of Pancevo in 1999, Serbian cartoonist Aleksandar Zograf used his diary comics and e-mail to reach out to the world and offer a glimpse at the effects of the attacks. Over the weeks and months of the war, Zograf documented not only how the bombings shattered the lives of his friends and neighbors, but also how the routine of daily life remained unchanged. The most recent attacks on Pancevo's oil refinery are contrasted with the latest local soccer matches -- and American propaganda flyers are as likely to fall from the sky as American comics are to arrive in the mail.