Customer Reviews

Russia, Ukraine, and the Breakup of the Soviet Union

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

This is an uncommonly fine set of essays. Their subjects are some of the more important contemporary and historical connections and relationships in Eastern Europe, and the essays leave the reader's understanding of that part of the world much enriched. Among the connections and relationships Szporluk explores are: Ukraine-Russia; Poland-Ukraine; Russia-Poland; and Czarist Russia-the USSR. The essays, wirtten over the last 25 or 30 years, are marked by: an encyclopedic familiarity with all of the types of literature that have bearing on his subjects; a healthy respect for facts--particularly some that were long obscure to most observers--and where they lead (in the sense of not treating facts as mere fodder to be crammed into some favorite theoretical framework); and, a highly thoughtful and perceptive analysis that interrelates facts with facts, and facts with theory. If you're interested in Eastern Europe, a book not to be missed.

Perhaps the reason a scant handful of reviewers here do not appreciate this book, saying that it says nothing new, is because Mr. Szporluk himself is the founder of the way modern historians and political scientists view and analyze Eastern Europe. If this book reads familiar, it is because Mr. Szporluk's theories are the foundation upon which other work has been based. A brilliant readand a keystone in Eastern European history.

Mr. Szporluk's intelligent analysis of the final decades of the Soviet Union and the relationship of Russia and Ukraine is a must reading for any Eastern European history enthusiast. Cryptic innuendos can't diminish the importance of this book.

This is the worst book I have read in years. It is a disjointed, poorly written collection of useless, mind-numbing facts which have little or no current application or value. After reading about 60 pages, I started flipping through it, to see if there might be anything worth my time, and there isn't. The entire book reads like a giant footnote. It is grossly over-priced. Indeed, any price would be too much.

And what is new here? No one is surprised that Ukrainian history prior to 1917 deeply influenced developments of the twentieth century. Read the masters (Hrushevsky, Doroshenko, Krawchenko, among others) and leave this one behind. But for a metaphorical biography of this author, see "Isolato".

What is this book about? The writing is so poor, it's difficult to say. This author needs to go back and learn basic grammar and sentence structure before trying his hand at some very compex issues.