Reviews for Cosmopolitan Europe

The average rating for Cosmopolitan Europe based on 2 reviews is 4.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2012-10-10 00:00:00 Eric Pomminville This was an excellent one volume history of Europe from 1914 to the early 21st century. If there were any weaknesses I would say this would be found in the author's treatment of the major dictators of the inter-war and war years ~ a little on the cliche side...no new observations which would help to flesh them out thereby offering a complexity that is generally missing. But on the whole is the best one volume history of 20th century Europe that I have read to date. Highly recommended. Some places are very readable and others drag a bit but taking the good with the bad this was an excellent read. It is long...almost 800 pages of text and over a hundred of endnotes, bibliography, index, etc...but if you have the time you should not be disappointed by the analysis.

Review # 2 was written on 2013-02-27 00:00:00 Jeff Wal Viewing the history of the world from 1914 through a little after 2004 shows many interesting different perspectives -- The chapters divide ages in new ways, like World War I, 1914-1916, and the age of revolutions, 1917 onward. After World War II we have different chronologies for Western Europe and Eastern Europe, including an important break in the East after the fall of Khrushchev after which the world realized that Soviet Russia could change rulers without killing the old one. Despite a nice, but short passage showing the Portuguese government trying to convince its people to fund the continuation of a cruel and pointless African war when the people can see that everyone in Europe has running water except them, there are issues where the separation of how people lived from the chapters on the decisions made by the leaders makes the book a little weaker in parts than it could have been. Nevertheless it covers a remarkable amount of material -- things I'd never heard of, things presented in different ways, and remains very readable.