The Eitingons: A Twentieth-Century Story - Brossura

Wilmers, Mary-kay

Brossura

ISBN 10: 1844679004 ISBN 13: 9781844679003

Casa editrice: Verso Books, 2012

Riassunto

Mary-Kay Wilmers began looking into aspects of her remarkable family twenty years ago. The result is a book of astonishing scope and originality that throws light into some of the darkest corners of the last century. At the center of the story stands the author herself— ironic, precise, searching, and stylish—wondering not only about where she is from, but about what she is entitled to know.

Su questo libro

Recensione:

“Unlike the hordes of amateur historians who have mobbed the world’s libraries over the past decade on the theory that reconstructing lineage equates to personal discovery, Wilmers is up to something that commands general attention.”
—Christopher Glazek, New Yorker

“Wilmers’ adventures in digging through [the Eitingons’] lost world makes Mary-Kay one of the book’s most intriguing characters.”
—Harper’s

“Like characters in some Russian Jewish Stalinist Freudian capitalist 20th-century fairy tale, the Eitingons are larger than life, their fates bitter and all too human.”
—New York Times

“A superbly written book, The Eitingons is much more than a family history, for the author has a deep knowledge of the cultural and political context, whether of twentieth-century America or the Soviet Union, in which they lived. It stands as an intimate portrait of a world that seems far removed from our own.”
—The Observer

“The Eitingons is a riveting history of the twentieth century. It deals with war, displacement, murder, espionage, the Jewish diaspora and psychoanalysis. It explains Trotsky’s assassination, the growth of Freud’s teachings, the importance of the fur trade, the uses of money and the lure of the past. There is a lightness and a truthfulness in the narrative that makes you turn every page with pure fascination.”
—Colm Tóibín

“Wilmers pieces together what she can of the shadowy life of Leonid Eitingon, a high-level KGB killer ... and looks for clues that her grandfather’s cousin Max, a protégé of Freud in Berlin, and Motty, a New York fur trader, were also working for Stalin. What emerges is a fascinating story of family secrets and silences.”
—New Statesman

“Well researched, bold, and revealing, Wilmers’s book transforms a series of dark family secrets into an illuminating experience for anybody brave enough to delve into the enigma of family history.”
—Publishers Weekly

“Compelling ... [Wilmers] has produced a deeply-researched family chronicle, which bears only a trace resemblance to the memoirs that dominate the book industry.”
—Barnes and Noble Review

L'autore:

Mary-Kay Wilmers is the editor of the London Review of Books, the largest- selling literary publication in Europe. She has written for the Listener, TLS and The New Yorker.

Su questa edizione

• Editore: Verso Books
• Data di pubblicazione: 2012
• ISBN 10: 1844679004
• ISBN 13: 9781844679003
• Rilegatura: Copertina flessibile
• Numero di pagine: 476