European Notebooks: New Societies and Old Politics, 1954-1985

Description

A generation of outstanding European thinkers emerged out of the rubble of World War II. It was a group unparalleled in their probing of an age that had produced totalitarianism as a political norm, and the Holocaust as its supreme nightmarish achievement. Figures ranging from George Lichtheim, Ignazio Silone, Raymond Aron, Andrei Amalrik, among many others, found a home in Encounter. None stood taller or saw further than François Bondy of Zurich.In a moving tribute to his friend, Melvin J. Lasky, long- time editor of Encounter, writes, "Bondy was a breathtaking spectacle. I had known him to read and walk, to think and talk, all at once--and still make mental notes for his next article.... Early or late, seated or standing, awake or asleep, his incomparable spiritedness would always be darting from point to point, paying attention and idly wandering at once. Taken all in all, he still continues to represent for me perhaps a Henry Jamesian New Man."Bondy's essays themselves represent a broad sweep of major figures and events in the second half of the twentieth century. His spatial outreach went from Budapest to Tokyo and Paris. His political essays extended from George Kennan to Benito Mussolini. And his prime mÚtier, the cultural figures of Europe, covered Sartre, Kafka, Heidegger and Milosz. The analysis was uniformly fair minded but unstinting in its insights. Taken together, the variegated themes he raised in his work as a Zurich journalist, a Paris editor, and a European homme de letres sketch guidelines for an entrancing portrait of the intellectual as cosmopolitan.European Notebooks contains most of the articles that Bondy (1915-2003) wrote for Encounter under the stewardship of Stephen Spender, Irving Kristol, and then for the thirty years that Melvin Lasky served as editor. Bondy was that rare unattached intellectual, "free of every totalitarian temptation" and, as Lasky notes, unfailing in his devotion to the liberties and civilities of a humane social order. European Notebooks offers a window into a civilization that came to maturity during the period in which these essays were written. Cover Half Title Title Page Copyright Page Contents Introduction The 1950s A Moment in Budapest “Asia”: Does It Exist? Paris on the Psychoanalyst’s Couch Young Spain and the Old Regime The Sick Man of Europe is...Europe: Thoughts after Kennan The 1960s Letter from Jerusalem: On Misunderstanding Eichmann Letter from Berlin: The Pilloried Pope Letter from Paris: The New Puritans The Struggle for Kafka and Joyce: A Conversation between Hans Mayer and Françis Bondy Notes on a Lady Mandarin Letter from Prague: The Empty Pedestal Letter from Paris: The Forty Immortal Chairs Letter from Paris: Decline of the French Left The 1970s Letter from Paris: The Idiot, or Sartre’s Flaubert D’Annunzio and Mussolini: New Letters Letter from France: New Society, Old Politics Letter from Rome: Italy’s “Cultural Crisis” Frantz Fanon: “Black Orpheus” of the Homeless Left Letter from Paris: As Sartre Grows Old Letter from Zurich: “What Thinketh Solzhenitsyn?” The Quest for Serendip “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?”—The New Left Today Ignazio Silone at 75 European Notebook: What’s Left European Notebook: Arguing about Fascism European Notebook: Giants on the French Left: Thorez and Aragon European Notebook: Porno-O; A New Prince?; Régis Debray’s Novel European Notebook: On the Death of Pasolini European Notebook: Le Monde,; Italian Censorship; Solzhenitsyn and Spain European Notebook: Telos European Notebook: Heidegger; Amalrik European Notebook: Doris Kearns and Lyndon Johnson; Polish Democracy; Andrey Amalrik European Notebook: Miracle in Milan European Notebook: Dictatorships and the EEC; Religion in America; French Elections European Notebook: Budapest’s October; The Two Cultures; Nathalie Sarraute European Notebook: Le Canard Enchaine; Murder in Rome European Notebook: Alain Peyrefitte; Death of Prince de Broglie European Notebook: Boris Souvarine; “Gambizzazzione”; “Execution” in Turin; On the French Left Prizewinners Between Frost and Thaw Terror Targets The 1980s European Diary: The Line of Non-Alignment European Diary: The Very Latest from Paris European Diary: The Veterans European Diary: How to Relax in the Cold War European Diary: The Comeback of Drieu La Rochelle European Diary: Of Passing Scandals European Diary: “Russian” (Good), “Soviet” (Bad)... Mauriac, between Province and Paris European Diary: Milosz, the Unknown J-J S-S Rides Again European Diary: Incident in Vitry; ‘Terza Pagina”; Exit This Way European Diary: French Ideology European Diary: Sartre, a Year Later European Diary: A Dividend for Marchais; Italian Miracle European Diary: On the Death of a Friend: Romain Gary A Man and His Double European Diary: Where is Prussia?; In the Vienna Woods European Diary: Ceremonial Farewell; The Lowenthal Paper Thinking about Flaubert European Diary: Mosques in the Factory; “1983”; News of the Day; Wajda’s Danton European Diary: Boomerangs?; The Trial Begins; Germans Among Themselves; Latin Learners European Diary: More Sartriana; Kisielewski and Warsaw; Genet’s Comeback; Bettino Craxi Manès Sperber European Diary: Words, Phrases, Conceits; Of the Once and Future Leader; German Illusions: Remembering Wroclaw Sherlock Holmes and Socialist Realism Kulturds Achievement The Crown Jurist: The Death of Carl Schmitt Raymond Aron Index