eastern

Hardcover. NY, Thames & Hudson, 1st, 2006, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 249 pages. Marking the fiftieth anniversary of the October 1956 Hungarian revolt against Soviet domination after World War II, this imposing volume contains powerful black-and-white photographs taken during the years preceding as well as the outbreak and crushing of the uprising by a German member of the international photojournalist cooperative Magnum. Introduced by Lessing's recollections and Hungarian French historian Francois Fejto's precis of the momentous events, the pictures appear in three chapters, "Communist Hungary," "The Revolution," and "The Failure." Hungarian novelist George Konrad's intense impressions of the time, during which he carried a rifle as a revolutionary young intellectual, follow the first chapter, and French political scientist Nicolas Bauquet's assessment of the revolt's impact on Western Europe's Communist parties, the USSR, and subsequent European history follows the third. Views of the cemetery in which the uprising's martyrs are now buried conclude the book elegiacally, and brief last words by Lessing and the director of Hungary's Institute 56 indicate who may forget what happened and why the rest of us should always remember. An extraordinary document.

Softcover. Lanham, MD, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 1st, 1998, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 245 pages. Crisp, clean, illustrated wraps. From the back cover: "An astute observer of the soviet Union, Robert Daniels collects here his observations of political change in the USSR over a twenty-five-year period." Tight binding, clean & unmarked pages throughout.

Hardcover. NY, Aperture, 1st, 1998, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 168 pages. A native of Kazakhstan, Ljalja Kuznetsova traversed the expanses of the Central Asian steppe to photograph the gypsies, or Roma people, whose mysterious comings and goings have fascinated her since she was a child. Shaking the Dust of Ages: Gypsies and Wanderers of the Central Asian Steppe is the first book devoted to these pictures, for which Kuznetsova won the Mother Jones Leica Medal of Excellence and the Paris Grand Prix for Photography.Kuznetsova's photographs present rare, intimate portraits of gypsies-- whose freedom from the ties of civilization is reflected in the wild winds and unlimited vistas of the steppe landscape. As Kuznetsova traveled through Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and the Ukraine, the gypsies continually inspired her. She found in them a people without frontiers, living independent of politics, religious dispute, or social class. Though their presence on the steppe is becoming a thing of the past, Kuznetsova's cast of characters and their world seem timeless in these images.

Softcover. Princeton NJ, Princeton University Press, 1st, 1995, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 443 pages. In the first political analysis of unemployment in a socialist country, Susan Woodward argues that the bloody conflicts that are destroying Yugoslavia stem not so much from ancient ethnic hatreds as from the political and social divisions created by a failed socialist program to prevent capitalist joblessness. Under Communism the concept of socialist unemployment was considered an oxymoron; when it appeared in postwar Yugoslavia, it was dismissed as illusory or as a transitory consequence of Yugoslavia's unorthodox experiments with worker-managed firms. In Woodward's view, however, it was only a matter of time before countries in the former Soviet bloc caught up with Yugoslavia, confronting the same unintended consequences of economic reforms required to bring socialist states into the world economy. Clean copy.

Hardcover. Bloomington IN, Indiana University Press, 1st, 1987, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, green cloth stamped with gilt lettering and design. artfully explains the initial spirit and modern understanding of Tamil bhakti poetry. His fluent translations make the poems -- songs of the experience of God -- live for us as they did for their first audience nearly fifteen centuries ago. Clean, bright copy.

Softcover. University of Washington Press, 1st pbk., 1977, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 365 pages. Provides an over-all picture of the least studied and most obscured part of Balkan history, the Ottoman period. The book begins with the early history of the Ottomans and with their establishment in Europe, describing the basic Muslim and Turkish features of the Ottoman state. The author goes on in subsequent sections to show how these features influenced every aspect of life in the European lands administered directly by the Ottomans (the "core" provinces) and left a permanent mark on states that were vassals of or paid tribute to the empire. Clean copy.

Softcover. New York, Aperture, 1st, 2001, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover. In original shrink wrap, spotless and tight. Poet, scholar, philosopher, and master of Vajrayana (Tibetan) Buddhism, Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche led a life of profound dedication to spiritual enlightenment and teaching. During the final fourteen years of his life his personal assistant was Matthieu Ricard. Together they traveled throughout Tibet, Bhutan, India, and Nepal, returning to the places of Khyentse Rinpoche's youth: his birthplace in Eastern Tibet; the monastery of Shechen which he had entered at the age of eleven; and the retreats where he spent years in meditation and study. At every stop on his journey, Khyentse Rinpoche was welcomed with elaborate ceremonies and outpourings of devotion. Ricard's deeply personal photographs of this journey are enhanced by a biographical narrative that is interspersed with extensive passages from the writings and teachings of Khyentse Rinpoche. Together, these images and texts form an inspiring portrait of one of the great spiritual leaders and teachers of our time. Many masters of Tibetan Buddhism studied with Khyentse Rinpoche, including His Holiness the Dalai Lama, who regarded him as his principal instructor in the Nyingma tradition of Tibetan Buddhism.

Hardcover. Prague, SNDK, 1st, 1958, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, SIGNED BY WENIG. Czech language. Black & white pen-line drawings in color by Mikolase Alse. Red cloth with gilt decoration.

Softcover. Sanbornton, Sant Bani Press, First Edition, 1984, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 333 pages. Softcover. Full page, full color illustrations and a few in bw. Interviews & reflections with Kirpal Singh, Baba Sawan & Sant Ajaib. Light wear to spine edges, light sunfading to lower spine. Discolored smudge to top edge. Previous owner's signature to preliminary pages. Otherwise, clean & unmarked copy.

Softcover. Bloomington IN, iUniverse, 1st, 2007, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 155 pages including epilogue. This is the story of Checiny, the author's hometown in southern Poland, and of the people who lived there between the two world wars of the 20th Century. Clean copy.

Hardcover. New Haven CONNECTICUT, Yale University Press, 1st, 1978, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 317 pages, b&w illustrations, red cloth with gilt lettering on spine. Bright dust jacket with price-clip.

Hardcover. London, Ruskin House, George Allen and Unwin, 1st, 1959, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Good, Hardcover in a worn dust jacket, 194 pages. This study traces the origin of Buddhism in Brahmanism, and fixes its relationship to Hinduism, describing and stressing the basic importance of Buddhist contemplation. No markings.

Softcover. Ithaca NY, Snow Lion Publications, 1st, 1990, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 151 pages. SIGNED ON HALF TITLE PAGE BY THE 14TH DALAI LAMA IN OCTOBER OF 2012 AT MIDDLEBURY COLLEGE. Light wear. Clean, tight copy.

Hardcover. New Haven CT, Yale University Press, 1st, 1996, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 346 page with index. This unique book weaves linguistic, cultural, and historical themes together to form a concise and accessible account of the development of the Slavic languages. Alexander Schenker demonstrates that inquiry into early Slavic culture requires an understanding of history, language, and texts and that an understanding of early Slavic writing is incomplete outside the context of medieval culture. Clean copy.

Hardcover. London, William Collins, 1st, 2020, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 342 pages, color photos. In 1976 James Crowden left his career in the British army and travelled to Ladakh in the Northern Himalaya, one of the most remote parts of the world. The Frozen River is his extraordinary account of the time he spent there, living alongside the Zangskari people, before the arrival of roads and mass tourism. James immerses himself in the Zangskari way of life, where meditation and week-long mountain festivals go hand in hand, and silence and solitude are the hallmarks of existence. When butter traders invite James on their journey down the frozen river Leh, he soon realises that this way of living, unchanged for centuries, comes with a very human cost. In lyrical prose, James captures a crucial moment in time for this Himalayan community. A moment in which their Buddhist practices and traditions are in flux, and the economic pull of a world beyond their valley is increasingly difficult to ignore.

Hardcover. London, Andre Deutsch, 1st, 1957, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, black cloth, 192 pages, b&w photos. No dust jacket. Light tanning to edges, else a clean, tight copy.

Softcover. Bloomington IN, Indiana University Press, reprint., 1987, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 300 pages. Illustrated with maps. Contents: Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Romania, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. Bibliographical Essay, Index. Clean copy.

Softcover. Jerusalem, Gefen Publishing House, reprint, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover. Masha Greenbaum delivered an excellent history of the Jews of Lithuania, from the earliest years, beginning in the 9th Century through WWII. The author discusses the many kings, their courts, the Church, the various social strata and their relationships with the Jews throughout the centuries. Politics, religion, areas of livelihood and social standing are detailed in each time period. Clean, like new.

Hardcover. NY/Oxford UK, Berghahn Books, 1st, 2003, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, 232 pages, pictorial boards. Milena Jesenska, born in Prague in 1896, is most famous as one of Franz Kafka's great loves. Although their relationship lasted only a short time, it won the attention of the literary world with the 1952 publication of Kafka's letters to Milena. Her own letters did not survive. Later biographies showed her as a fascinating personality in her own right. In the Czech Republic, she is remembered as one of the most prominent journalists of the interwar period and as a brave one: in 1939 she was arrested for her work in the resistance after the German occupation of Bohemia and Moravia, and died in Ravensbruck concentration camp in 1944. It is estimated that Jesenska wrote well over 1,000 articles but only a handful have been translated into English. In this book her own writings provide a new perspective on her personality, as well as the changes in Central Europe between the two world wars as these were perceived by a woman of letters. The articles in this volume cover a wide range of topics, including her perceptions of Kafka, her understanding of social and cultural changes during this period, the threat of Nazism, and the plight of the Jews in the 1930s. Clean copy.

Hardcover. London, Reaktion Books, 1st, 2011, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 208 pages. In The Modern Balkans, historian Richard C. Hall gives a complete account of the historical events that have shaped the Balkan region of Southeastern Europe. Originally separated from the rest of Europe by culture, politics, and economics, the Balkans have slowly been integrating into Western Europe since the nineteenth century. But this process of economic and political development, following the Western European model, has been far from smooth in the Balkans. As Hall explains, it has often been marked by violence and destruction, the result of many wars and rebellions. Though Soviet power imposed a nearly fifty-year peace in the region, the collapse of the Soviet Union renewed conflict that continued through the end of the twentieth century. Hall concentrates here on the significant political and economic events that have had the greatest impact on the role of the Balkans in Europe; in particular, he examines the development of national states in the nineteenth century, the influence of the two world wars, and the collapse of Yugoslavia. Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, Praeger Publishers, 1st US, 1971, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, hardcover in a dust jacket with light fading. 240 pages, b&w illustrations. 75 photos, 48 line drawings, 15 maps, 1 table. Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, Riverhead, 1st, 2004, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 349 pages. A heartwarming memoir describes growing up in Czechoslovakia during the 1970s as the child of dissidents involved with the failed Prague Spring uprising in a loving family--her mother, the disowned daughter of two Party elite parents; her inventor and cab driver father; her beautiful teenage sister; and her dog, a famed Czech TV star. Clean copy.

Hardcover. New York , Penguin Putnam Inc, 1st, 1993, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 158 pages, illustrated throughout with photos in b&w. Clean, unmarked copy with only minor wear to dust jacket. Elie Wiesel provides the preface to a master photographer's record of eastern Europe's Jewish communities in the years just before World War II with 160 photographs that capture the ordinary lives of Jews before the Holocaust.