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After Yugoslavia (Lonely Planet Journeys)
 
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After Yugoslavia (Lonely Planet Journeys) (Paperback)

by Zoe Bran (Author)
4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)

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Product details

  • Paperback: 292 pages
  • Publisher: Lonely Planet Publications Ltd (26 Jan 2001)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 1864500301
  • ISBN-13: 978-1864500301
  • Product Dimensions: 19.6 x 12.4 x 2 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 833,557 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in these categories:

    #35 in  Books > Travel & Holiday > Countries & Regions > Europe > Slovenia
    #74 in  Books > Travel & Holiday > Countries & Regions > Europe > Croatia

Product Description

Amazon.co.uk Review

The Lonely Planet Journeys are a series noted for their vivid creation of atmosphere and locale--but most notably for their often tough, unsettling evocations of the world's most troubled countries. Zoë Brân's After Yugoslavia may be concise, but the reader is taken on a remarkable epic journey in which one of the most turbulent periods in human history is powerfully conjured. The author visited Yugoslavia in the 70s as a tourist looking for a good time. And when she returns 21 years later, she finds a massively changed land. Sarajevo, Mostar and Dubrovnik (names carved into the consciousness of all of us who watched the deeply affecting news broadcasts of the early 90s) are the cities Brân finds herself in once again, struggling to make sense of the catastrophe that has befallen them. But as well as the destruction wrought by conflict, she finds a people filled with resilience and spirit--and her tale is as much one of the indomitable qualities in human nature as it is a study of war. From progressive Slovenia through war-torn Croatia (whose stunning beauty is in stark contrast to its image as an icon of human division) and into the country most deeply affected by the conflicts, Bosnia-Hercegovina, we are taken on an eye-opening journey that evokes both the nobility and horror involved in the war. And again and again, a word appears that is crucial to the genesis of the divisions: tradition--and the author becomes convinced that this is as crucial a factor in the hatred as religion is in Northern Ireland. But Brân is interested in far more than the dead hand of a tradition (often barely remembered) that has cost so many lives, and her book, while often unsettling, remains as much an affirmation of the human spirit as it is an astringent and compelling evocation of a divided land. --Barry Forshaw


Synopsis

Dubrovnik, Mostar, Sarajevo: these are names now etched into the world's psyche. In this book, the author retraces her steps through these cities, finding that although the war may be over, the recriminations and hatreds are not. Yet the people she meets on her travels are looking to the future.

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Customer Reviews

4 Reviews
5 star:
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4 star:
 (1)
3 star:
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Average Customer Review
4.2 out of 5 stars (4 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Revisiting what was once Yugoslavia, 24 Feb 2001
By A Customer
Retracing a journey made to what was Yugoslavia in the late 70s the author Zoe Bran finds a transformed land. Still physically beautiful but fractured into 5 states peopled by fractured people. Ms Bran reports the stories told to her wwithout flinching but also with compassion. The reality of war is so much more complex than reports in newspapers or on television can convey. An elderly Serb told her that all that blood was not shed for land, for conquest, but ' for tradition...for traditions we hardly remember the beginnings of any more'. In Bosnia Hercegovina she talks to people working for the International Criminal tribunal for Yugoslavia - counting, trying to give names to the dead, identify those responsible. Could life move on without this grim reckoning ? Probably not - ghosts would keep emanating from this bitter history to threaten the uncertain future. Don't get the idea all is gloom and doom - Ms Bran met many brave, kind and clever people dedicated to rebuilding their communities. You are left desperately hoping they succeed.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars There's better info elsewhere, 22 Jan 2004
I found this a bit disappointing after first reading "The Impossible country" by Brian Hall, which was written just before the disintegration of Yugoslavia. Zoe Bran's book seems to me a little stodgy and is nowhere near as full of originality. At times, she falls into the trap of being condescending towards some of the people she meets and there is also some reliance on well-known stereotypes of Yugo/ ex-Yugo character.

If you can't get "The Impossible Country", this book will do, I suppose.

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4.0 out of 5 stars The personal behind the political, 2 Nov 2009
A much more illuminating read than the several solidly historical/political books I'd ploughed through 15 years ago or so when the war was still going on.

The illumination comes less from feeling that now I can confidently disentangle the racial/ethnic/religious issues, than in the way the author so clearly and honestly describes the impossible complexity of the situation, and how not only she but almost all the outside agents she met seem to have admitted to it too. But more illuminating than the earlier books I read because there are so many individual stories, running both with and against the grain of what their respective religious/national/ethnic groupings are "supposed" to show.

The book takes the time not only to listen to what people are saying but to conjecture what they seem to be thinking, and to flesh out the people behind their words, and so shows us that their politics and histories are only ever a part, usually not the most important one, of who they are.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars An thoughtful and incisive look at the Former Yugoslavia
I really enjoyed reading this book which moves easily between history and culture, real-life people and strange meetings. Read more
Published on 2 May 2002

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