Balkan Ghosts: A Journey Through History (Paperback)

~ (Author) "The past in Zagreb was underfoot: a soft, thick carpet of leaves, soggy from rain, that my feet sank in and out of, confusing with..." (more)
Key Phrases: crowd symbol, painted monasteries, grey falcon, Athenee Palace, Dame Rebecca, Eastern Europe (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

From the assassination that triggered World War I to the ethnic warfare now sweeping Serbia, Bosnia, and Croatia, the Balkans have been the crucible of the twentieth century, the place where terrorism and genocide first became tools of policy.

This enthralling and often chilling political travelogue fully deciphers the Balkans' ancient passions and intractable hatreds for outsiders. For as Kaplan travels among the vibrantly-adorned churches and soul-destroying slums of the former Yugoslavia, Albania, Romania, Bulgaria, and Greece, he allows us to see the region's history as a time warp in which Slobodan Milosevic becomes the reincarnation of a fourteenth-century Serbian martyr; Nicolae Ceaucescu is called "Drac," or "the Devil"; and the one-time Soviet Union turns out to be a continuation of the Ottoman Empire.

From Publishers Weekly

Journalist Kaplan's vivid, impressionistic travelogue illuminates the Balkan nations' ethnic clashes and near-anarchic politics.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 368 pages
• Publisher: Vintage (March 15, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679749810
• ISBN-13: 978-0679749813
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.4 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (124 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #740,015 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

63 of 71 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Not to be taken seriously, February 29, 2000

By	Edward Bosnar (Zagreb, Croatia) - See all my reviews

Kaplan's book is very is extremely well-written, and easy to read. It's also easy to get drawn into the author's narrative and take everything he says as given. However, Kaplan is not as well-informed on his subject (basically the entire Balkan peninsula) as he thinks he is. With the exception of Greece, where he spent a lot of time, and perhaps Bulgaria, he doesn't know a whole lot about the region and fills in the gaps in his knowledge with stereotypes drawn from other authors or by transposing the opinions a few people he talked to onto entire populations--often giving distorted impressions of e.g. the Serbs, Croats or Romanians. Nothing is more indicative of Kaplan's essentially unscholarly approach to such a complex topic than the reading materials he says he used to prepare himself for his journeys: for Yugoslavia he depends on Rebecca West's pre-World War II travelogue "Black Lamb and the Grey Falcon," a biased book itself, and based on her rather short (3-4 week) sojourn in Yugoslavia; even more troubling is his use of Bram Stoker's "Dracula" as a guide for Romania. Stoker was never in Romania (or rather Transylvania) nor did he ever intend his book to be taken as an accurate view of southeastern Europe; he was simply trying to provide some atmosphere for his novel, and his portrayal of Transylvania draws heavily on Victorian-era prejudices about the Balkans as an eerie and savage place. Yet Kaplan repeatedly cites Stoker as though he is a legitimate authority on Romania. This is, to say the least, irresponsible. As other reviewers on this page noted, the most disturbing thing is that this book's popularity ensured that it helped formulate opinions among broad sections of the public, including policy-makers.

46 of 52 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Idiosyncratic, Shocking, Compelling!, March 30, 2002

By	S. Miska (Germany) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Kaplan weaves a masterful mix of travelogue, history and sociopolitical insight into a book about his journey through the Balkans, before Kosovo became headlines. He traveled throughout the region during the 80's and wrote stories of his adventures along the way. He uses the word idiosyncratic to describe his writing, given that his style mirrors past journalists/travelers who sought to understand the root causes of social and political behavior through the lens of history. Thus, expect a solid accounting of historical narrative for each country, coupled with a mix of contemporary thought largely begotten through his conversations with local politicians, journalists, and travelers.

Criticisms:
1) His approach is fairly egotistical since he believes that few Western reporters actually capture the complexity of the region, and none, except a rare few (of which he is one), ever understand the people or their real motivations. Although his assessment of Western reporters may have elements of truth, he seems to make the point numerous times throughout the book as if to create his own air of superiority.
2) Kaplan's assessment of Greece seems to carry the most weight since he lived there for seven years, whereas he sometimes only spends days in other regions. Nevertheless, he feels obliged to draw the same broad generalizations from those areas where he spoke to relatively few people, as he does from places where he met many people and spent much time. His underlying assumption throughout the book is that only a thorough understanding of history can engender a comprehension for the present state of affairs. Thus, in the countries he frequented little, he feels a fair amount of research in history allows him to make the same prognostications as he makes in areas where he has gotten to know many people.

Barring the above critiques, I enjoyed the book and found myself coming back to it until complete. He complements a firm grip of historical facts with a wonderful ability to depict people and places through metaphor and descriptive writing. Here is an example, "Greeks are married to the East. The West is our mistress only. Like any mistress, the West excites and fascinates us, but our relationship with it is episodic and superficial." His ability to characterize relationships, people and places with words is refreshing. I will definitely read more Kaplan.

138 of 165 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Read It, But With a Grain of Salt, December 27, 1999

By	Kelli - See all my reviews

Robert Kaplan's "Balkan Ghosts" is a flawed book, but certainly worth reading in order to understand, if nothing else, the prevailing Western attitudes towards the Balkan region of Europe.

The books clear strength lies in the author's lucid, fluid and descriptive writing style - it truly makes the book, from the literary point of view, a joy to read. The reader is given a vivid picture of the Balkan lands Kaplan visits in a sort of `travelogue from hell' or `anti-travelogue' regarding places that most readers will not yet have visited. Added to this is a good deal of insight and reportage, interviews with locals, and so forth, that lend the book much readability and depth.

Unfortunately, however, the book is marred by the author's own Western prejudices and biases. What we have here is a critique, in many ways, of the `backwards East' and a not-so-subtle head-shaking that the region is not more `Western' in outlook.

The problems surface on two levels: First, Kaplan's descriptions of the local cultural life are off the mark, due in many cases to his lack of understanding of Orthodox Christianity. Many ignorant comments are notable regarding Orthodox religious art, piety, liturgical life, church organization, etc. Kaplan is right that the Orthodox tradition has had a profound influence on the region, but his conclusions as to the nature of this impact are nothing more than a perpetuation of the common and long-held Western stereotypes about the Eastern Orthodox part of Europe - in particular, the myth that Eastern Orthodox Christianity is a dangerous brew of mysticism, austerity and nationalism. Not only is this an incorrect summary, but the impressionistic conclusion is false -- the reality of the impact of the Orthodox Church on these countries in the twentieth century is much more complex and nuanced than Mr. Kaplan leads the reader to believe. Kaplan would have been better served to study more about Orthodox Christianity before repeating so many tired stereotypes about it in this book. But, alas, many Western readers are not in a position to correct Mr. Kaplan, and will accept what he writes as true, thereby experiencing a convenient confirmation of their existing stereotypes.

Second, Kaplan's `program' for the region is unabashedly biased towards the 'enlightened' Western approach. According to Kaplan, the post-Enlightenment West is the paradigm that the world (or at least this part of it) must follow, and he accords much of the problems of these countries to their non-Western, Byzantine, Slavic, Eastern Orthodox Christian background - in a vast, vast overstatement and oversimplification of the real situation in the Balkans and in Europe in general. The fact that the Enlightenment itself led to the drastic decline of ethical life in the `West', and the development of the political ideologies that are the real cause of the tragedies of the Twentieth Century seems lost on Kaplan, who would solve the problems of the Balkan region by imposing the full-blown developments of Western Enlightenment ideology on these Southeastern Europeans.

The story of the Balkans is simple enough - it is a region that has been `put upon' by outsiders for centuries, each with their own designs for the region - the Venetians, the Byzantines, the Ottomans, the Austrians, the Nazis, etc. In the act of being downtrodden, rivalries developed and these have in some cases developed into ethnic hatreds. These hatreds are easily manipulable by local political powers to engage the population in one or another act of internal or external agression (read: scapegoating). The influence of outsiders on the region has been profoundly negative historically, and in my opinion, Kaplan is mistaken to assume that yet another `design' for the region would meet with any greater success than the previous ones have.

Read `Balkan Ghosts' for a great travelogue and an excellent portrayal of the present Western stereotypical view of the Balkans. But don't take his strereotypes to heart - the truth is much more complex and nuanced, and the region needs to be understood from the `inside out' rather than the view from the `outside in' that Kaplan presents here.