This magnificent book by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author Anne Applebaum took six years to research and write and it quickly becomes clear why this should be so. The breadth of research into many different country and language archives is quite astonishing and Applebaum acknowledges the extensive research help she received.
The book is not a chronological narrative of the Communist overthrow and suppression of the Eastern Block after 1945 but rather it deals, in separate chapters, with different aspects of the Communist subversion of the democratic institutions and the supervision of all aspects of everyday life. The book confines itself to the period largely under the control of Stalin and does not deal with events running up to the collapse of 1989. Thus, the first half of the book includes chapters, amongst others, devoted to the establishment of the secret police, the role of violence, ethnic cleansing and the capture of the radio. The second half, which is aptly titled, `High Stalinism' deals with the systematic identification and elimination of supposed enemies of the state, the control of the arts and architecture and how the ordinary rank and file accommodated to these changes. Finally the German and Hungarian revolutions of 1953 and 1956 are briefly described. Applebaum chooses to deal principally with East Germany, Poland and Hungary although some references are made to the other European Communist states such as Czechoslovakia, Romania and Yugoslavia. The informed reader will be familiar with the general sweep of history contained in this book as much has already been published on this subject, but the fascination and interest of this work derives from its attention to detail and the painstaking way in which the author describes the varied aspects of the all-enveloping, suffocating, spread of Communist control into virtually every part of life in Eastern Europe. Applebaum also gives excellent character sketches of the detestable leading figures in these countries. My only quibble with the historical content is that the author describes the expulsion of ethnic Germans, and those supposed to be ethnic Germans, from Poland and Czechoslovakia as better organised, more humane, and less chaotic than the facts would suggest. Applebaum is unduly generous to the 1945 Polish government and the downright nasty interim government of Edvard Benes in Czechoslovakia. A reading of `Orderly and Humane' by R. M. Douglas, Yale, 2012, provides a good corrective to the somewhat orderly picture painted by Applebaum. I was disappointed that the book did not spend more time dealing with the privileged enclaves the leaders of these Communist regimes provided for themselves, particularly in the DDR, but perhaps that is a subject for a different book.
This excellent book is very well written in a clear, lucid, style and I do not think I had to re-read a single sentence. Whilst rather weighty, it is very accessible and should appeal to all interested in this aspect of modern history.
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