A World on Edge: The End of the Great War and the Dawn of a New Age

by Daniel Schönpflug

Es noviembre de 1918 y el mundo es un lugar asolado que debe reconstruirse: la guerra ha terminado y todo debe empezar de nuevo. Muchos proyectos ilusionantes surgen en el mundo occidental. Virginia Woolf intenta publicar en su pequeña editorial, Moina Michael reparte sus míticas remembrance poppies, la Bauhaus de Walter Gropius empieza a fraguarse y Harry Truman monta una tienda de camisas para hombre en Kansas. La democracia, la ilusión artística y las ganas de emprender de nuevo la vida despuntaban, y Europa comenzaba a limpiar sus paisajes en ruinas. Lo que nadie sabía es que a ese final de la Gran Guerra lo acabaríamos llamando periodo de entreguerras, que este repunte de ilusión se vería truncado por otra contienda inimaginable para los habitantes del Occidente de 1918.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, World War I, Historical, Politics, Germany, German Literature

368 pages, Hardcover

First published October 16, 2018

Reviews

[Diane S ☔ · Rating 4 out of 5]

November 11, 1918, the war they call the great war, WWI has ended. Now a new world order must be pieced together. For many it is a time of joy, a new beginning, for others it is an ending yet to be thoroughly defined. Many empires have toppled, The Ottoman empire, Germany, Russia and The Austrian- Hungarian. Such a wide spread war this was.

In this well researched book the author uses a wide array of real people and their reactions during this year. There is an extensive bibliography included, from many types of source material. Notables and their reactions include Harry Truman, Louise Weiss, the woman who gave the poppy themeaning it holds today, Alma Mahler. Artists such as Virginia Woolf, and Paul Klee. In narrative fashion he takes the reader back and forth through these and other characters, how did they fare during this year, what were their thoughts, their feelings. Incredibly interesting.

Peace and what it should look like, the terms of peace varied so widely be different nations, so it is to be expected that so many found this a confusing time. How to plan a future, when the future looked so different. I also appreciate that the author included an epilogue of how each of these characters went on to live their lives, or in a few cases didn't. Where they ended up, found their places in history.

[Antônio Xerxenesky · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Na esteira do centenário do armistício, a editora Todavia publica 'A Era do Cometa: o Fim da Primeira Guerra e o Limiar de um Novo Mundo', do historiador alemão Daniel Schönpflug. À primeira vista, trata-se de mais um livro de história popular que concentra sua ação em um só ano a ser analisado. Entre os exemplos mais conhecidos no Brasil estão os livros de Laurentino Gomes. A proposta estética de Schönpflug, no entanto, radicaliza esta estrutura. As personagens principais do livro não são (necessariamente) generais, presidentes, reis, mesclando, ao invés disso, soldados rasos, coadjuvantes políticos, artistas experimentais, escritores etc."
RESENHA COMPLETA EM: https://alias.estadao.com.br/noticias...

[Jonas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lees de volledige recensie op Vreemder dan Fictie.

De ondertekening van de wapenstilstand In 1918 lijkt een eenduidig en helder historisch moment; een soort collectieve cesuur in de wereldgeschiedenis. Daniel Schönpflug, docent geschiedenis aan de Vrije Universiteit Berlijn, haalt dit plaatje vakkundig onderuit in zijn boek "1918: het jaar van de dageraad". Met grote zwier toont hij hoe het einde van de Grote Oorlog op sterk uiteenlopende manieren werd ervaren. Sommigen trokken toekomstdronken en feestend door de straten, terwijl anderen vooral onzekerheid voelden, of gewoon geen flauw benul hadden van wat er zich net had voltrokken in een treinwagon die stilstond op een open plek in het bos van Compiègne.

De geschiedenis zoals we die kennen uit schoolboeken, documentaires of Wikipedia, is altijd een soort samenvatting: jaartallen, hoofdrolspelers en sleutelmomenten vormen samen de hoofdlijnen van een reconstructie waar de meerderheid het al dan niet over eens is. Deze aanpak van het verleden laat Schönpflug varen in zijn boek over het bijzondere jaar 1918.

“De geschiedenis valt uiteen in talloze individuele en asynchrone verhalen”, schrijft hij. Schönpflug koos er dan ook voor om dit unieke moment in de geschiedenis te schetsen aan de hand van – niet noodzakelijk objectieve – egodocumenten zoals dagboeken, brieven en memoires van rechtstreekse ooggetuigen.

Het resultaat is een weefsel van gestileerde verhalen die samen moeten illustreren hoe de wereld in 1918 heen en weer slingerde tussen hoop en vrees. Nooit eerder leken er zo veel mogelijkheden open te liggen, maar tegelijk sluimerde de geest van revolutie al en raakten nieuwe, extreme ideeën op ramkoers.

Dromen, verlangens, onrust en angsten kleurden de periode rond 1918 die Schönpflug de ‘kometenjaren’ noemt. Hij geeft ze weer vanuit uiteenlopende perspectieven. Als lezer kijk je bijvoorbeeld mee door de ogen van Matthias Erzberger, een van de leden van de Duitse vredesdelegatie, of Harry S. Truman, de 33ste president van de Verenigde Staten die in 1918 als onbekende artillerieofficier in de Vogezen hunkerende brieven schreef naar zijn liefje op het thuisfront.

Talloze andere bekende en minder bekende personages bieden elk hun unieke kijk op het tijdvak. Passeren onder meer de revue: oorlogsheld Alvin C. York, publiciste Louise Weiss, Bauhaus-architect Walter Gropius, femme fatale Alma Mahler-Werfel, schrijfster Virginia Woolf, kunstenares Käthe Kollwitz, verzetsleider Mahatma Gandhi en keukenhulp Nguyễn Tất Thành – die later bekendheid zou verwerven als de Vietnamese communistische leider Hồ Chí Minh.

Deze figuren zijn niet toevallig gekozen. Hun verhalen geven telkens treffend weer hoe de ambivalente tijdsgeest van rond 1918 wereldwijd nagalmde – en concrete gevolgen had. In 1918 vind je niet enkel de kiemen van de tweede wereldoorlog en de holocaust, maar ook die van onder meer de emancipatie van zwarte Amerikanen, het vrijheidsstreven van Ieren, Indiërs en Vietnamezen, de veranderende ideeën over de vrije liefde en de toenemende gelijkwaardigheid van man en vrouw.

Door verschillende verhalen te verweven tot een caleidoscopisch geheel, schrijft Schönpflug een heel aparte vorm van historische non-fictie. Hij kiest fascinerende personages en ontvouwt stapsgewijs, met kleine cliffhangers, hun plotlijn en rol in het grotere plaatje.

Het opvallendste kenmerk is echter wat de auteur zelf zijn “scenische manier van schrijven” noemt. In het dankwoord meldt Schönpflug dat hij dat vooral te danken heeft aan zijn jarenlange samenwerking met filmproducent Gunnar Dedio. Al vanaf de eerste pagina’s is duidelijk wat deze manier van schrijven inhoudt.

Het is een schrijfwijze die ook de historische non-fictie van schrijvers als Geert Mak en Philipp Blom kenmerkt, maar Schönpflug gaat toch nog een stap verder in zijn stilering van het verleden. Hij behoudt bijvoorbeeld de opsmuk en subjectiviteit van sommige egodocumenten en voegt met eigen stijlelementen nog extra dramatiek toe.

Wellicht huiveren sommige historici bij zoveel literaire losbandigheid, maar het resultaat is wel een pakkend, spannend en meeslepend boek dat je echt laat proeven van de tijdsgeest. Schönpflug is zich er zelf goed van bewust dat zijn aanpak wenkbrauwen zal doen fronsen.

Schönpflug wil je als lezer niet uitleggen wat er allemaal gebeurd is in 1918. Hij wil je de beroering, de opinies, de angsten en de toekomstvisioenen van ‘de kometenjaren’ laten ervaren, om zo de historische feiten in een menselijke context te plaatsen en beter te begrijpen. Wat mij betreft, is hij daar meesterlijk in geslaagd.

[Stan Prager · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review of: A World on Edge: The End of the Great War and the Dawn of a New Age,
by Daniel Schönpflug
by Stan Prager (1-31-21)


A familiar construct for students of European history is what is known as “The Long Nineteenth Century,” a period bookended by the French Revolution and the start of the Great War. The Great War. That is what it used to be called, before it was diminished by its rechristening as World War I, to distinguish it from the even more horrific conflict that was to follow just two decades hence. It is the latter that in retrospect tends to overshadow the former. Some are even tempted to characterize one as simply a continuation of the other, but that is an oversimplification. There was in fact far more than semantics to that designation of “Great War,” and historians are correct to flag it as a definitive turning point, for by the time it was over Europe’s cherished notions of civilization—for better and for worse—lay in ruins, and her soil hosted not only the scars of vast, abandoned trenches, but the bones of millions who once held the myths those notions turned out to be dear in their heads and their hearts.
The war ended with a stopwatch of sorts. The Armistice that went into effect on November 11, 1918 at 11AM Paris time marked the end of hostilities, a synchronized moment of collective European consciousness it is said all who experienced would recall for as long as they lived. Of course, something like 22 million souls—military and civilian—could not share that moment: they were the dead. Nearly three thousand died that very morning, as fighting continued right up to the final moments when the clock ran out.
What happened next? There is a tendency to fast forward because we know how it ends: the imperfect Peace of Versailles, the impotent League of Nations, economic depression, the rise of fascism and Nazism, American isolationism, Hitler invades Poland. In the process, so much is lost. Instead, Daniel Schönpflug artfully slows the pace with his well-written, highly original strain of microhistory, A World on Edge: The End of the Great War and the Dawn of a New Age. The author, an internationally recognized scholar and adjunct professor of history at the Free University of Berlin, blends the careful analytical skills of a historian with a talented pen to turn out one of the finest works in this genre to date.
First, he presses the pause button. That pause—the Armistice—is just a fragment of time, albeit one of great significance. But it is what follows that most concerns Schönpflug, who has a great drama to convey and does so through the voices of an eclectic array of characters from various walks of life across multiple geographies. When the action resumes, alternating and occasionally overlapping vignettes chronicle the postwar years from the unique, often unexpected vantage points of just over two dozen individuals—some very well known, others less so—who were to leave an imprint of larger or smaller consequence upon the changed world they walked upon.
There is Harry S Truman, who regrets that the military glory he aspired to as a boy has eluded him, yet is confident he has acquitted himself well, and cannot wait to return home to marry his sweetheart Bess and—ironically—vows he will never fire another shot as long as he lives. Former pacifist and deeply religious Medal of Honor winner Sergeant Alvin York receives a hero’s welcome Truman could only dream of, but eschews offers of money and fame to return to his backwoods home in Tennessee, where he finds purpose by leveraging his celebrity to bring roads and schools to his community. Another heroic figure is Sergeant Henry Johnson, of the famed 369th Infantry known as the “Harlem Hellfighters,” who incurred no less than twenty-one combat injuries fending off the enemy while keeping a fellow soldier from capture, but because of his skin color returns to an America where he remains a second-class citizen who does not receive Medal of Honor he deserves until its posthumous award by President Barack Obama nearly a century later. James Reese Europe, the regimental band leader of the “Harlem Hellfighters,” who has been credited with introducing jazz to Europe, also returns home to an ugly twist of fate.
And there’s Käthe Kollwitz, an artist who lost a son in the war and finds herself in the uncertain environment of a defeated Germany engulfed in street battles between Reds and reactionaries, both flanks squeezing the center of a nascent democracy struggling to assert itself in the wake of the Kaiser’s abdication. One of the key members of that tenuous center is Matthias Erzberger, perhaps the most hated man in the country, who had the ill luck to be chosen as the official who formally accedes to Germany’s humiliating terms for Armistice, and as a result wears a target on his back for the rest of his life. At the same time, the former Kaiser’s son, Crown Prince Wilhelm von Preussen, is largely a forgotten figure who waits in exile for a call to destiny that never comes. Meanwhile in Paris, Marshal Ferdinand Foch lobbies for Germany to pay an even harsher price, as journalist Louise Weiss charts a new course for women in publishing and longs to be reunited with her lover, Milan Štefánik, an advocate for Czechoslovak sovereignty.
Others championing independence elsewhere include Nguyễn Tất Thành (later Hồ Chí Minh), polishing plates and politics while working as a dishwasher in Paris; Mohandas Gandhi, who barely survives the Spanish flu and now struggles to hold his followers to a regimen of nonviolent resistance in the face of increasingly violent British repression; T.E. Lawrence, increasingly disillusioned by the failure of the victorious allies to live up to promises of Arab self-determination; and, Terence MacSwiney, who is willing to starve himself to death in the cause of Irish nationhood. No such lofty goals motivate assassin Soghomon Tehlirian, a survivor of the Armenian genocide, who only seeks revenge on the Turks; nor future Auschwitz commandant Rudolf Höss, who emerges from the war an eager and merciless recruit for right-wing paramilitary forces.
There are many more voices, including several from the realms of art, literature, and music such as George Grosz, Virginia Woolf, and Arnold Schönberg. The importance of the postwar evolution of the arts is underscored in quotations and illustrations that head up each chapter. Perhaps the most haunting is Paul Nash’s 1918 oil-on-canvas of a scarred landscape entitled—with a hint of either optimism or sarcasm—We Are Making a New World. All the stories the voices convey are derived from their respective letters, diaries, and memoirs; only in the “Epilogue” does the reader learn that some of those accounts are clearly fabricated.
Many of my favorite characters in A World on Edge are ones that I had never heard of before, such as Moina Michael, who was so inspired by the sacrifice of those who perished in the Great War that she singlehandedly led a campaign to memorialize the dead with the poppy as her chosen emblem for the fallen, an enduring symbol to this very day. But I found no story more gripping than that of Marina Yurlova, a fourteen year old Cossack girl who became a child soldier in the Russian army, was so badly wounded she was hospitalized for a year, then entered combat once more during the ensuing civil war and was wounded again, this time by the Bolsheviks. Upon recovery, Yurlova embarked upon a precarious journey on foot through Siberia that lasted a month before she was able to flee Russia for Japan and eventually settle in the United States, where despite her injuries she became a dancer of some distinction.
I am a little embarrassed to admit that I received an advance reader’s edition (ARC) of A World on Edge as part of an early reviewer’s program way back in November 2018, but then let it linger in my to-be-read (TBR) pile until I finally got around to it near the end of June 2020. I loved the book but did not take any notes for later reference. So, by the time I sat down to review it in January 2021, given the size of the cast and the complexity of their stories, I felt there was no way I could do justice to the author and his work without re-reading it—so I did, over just a couple of days! And that is the true beauty of this book: for all its many characters, competing storylines, and what turns out to be multilevel, deeply profound messaging, for something of the grand saga that it is it remains a fast-paced, exciting read. Schönpflug’s technique of employing bit players to recount an epic tale succeeds so masterfully that the reader is hardly aware of what has been happening until the final pages are being turned. This is history, of course, this is indeed nonfiction, but yet the result invites a favorable comparison to great literature, to a collection of short stories by Ernest Hemingway, or to a novel by André Brink. If European history is an interest, A World on Edge is not only a recommended read, but a required one.

https://regarp.com/2021/01/31/review-...

[Alec · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rather than reading a couple of books about World War I as planned, I ended up reading a couple of books which looked at Europe as it worked its way into WWI (The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went to War in 1914) and a book about the world just after WWI (this book here). Despite my plan to learn more about the Great War, I ended up learning more about how the war began and how it affected the world than the war itself (in fact, the only shots fired in either book were essentially the shots of assassins, not really of any army).

Mr. Schönpflug's book was a fascinating look at the world as it emerged from WWI through the eyes of a variety of individuals from different backgrounds. As the book progressed, Mr. Schönpflug kept the focus on the same group of individuals. Each person he focused on came from a different background, an Austrian Jew, a couple of soldiers from Black Army units, an American war hero and a future President, and many more. It was a very interesting way to show how the war impacted life and how the world tried to adjust to the new realities.

In much the same way I felt when I finished the book which lead up to the start of the War, I was left feeling frustrated. Frustrated that the "winners" of the war behaved the way they did beforehand and exacted such a price afterwards. Frustrated that some of the seeds which bore such terrible fruit over the course of the 20th century, had seeds sewn during this period. Frustrated that so much progress was made on certain issues, that the world was so close to solving things only to regress and then have to fight for decades to get back to the same point.

However, I really liked this book mainly because it was such a fresh approach to history. It would have been easy to make the same points in a traditional historical narrative, but I really appreciated Mr. Schönpflug's approach. I would recommend it to those interested in a unique approach to history and those interested in the world between WWI and WWII.

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

A World on Edge – Such a Fantastic Book.

Sometimes, historians stop what they are doing and investigate something that people have overlooked, or not taken in to account. The brilliant German historian Daniel Schönpflug has written an excellent history, looking directly at 1918, as the end of war and the dawning of a new age. Personally, I think this book needs a wider audience, to a historian this book is just as important as AJP Taylor’s ‘Origins of the Second World War’.

This takes a more European view of 1918, than the usual British and American War view, as war over, peace began, we were the victors. This book looks at Europe that had been devasted by war, large swathes of Belgium and France had been destroyed. The Kaiser had gone into exile and Germany had to find a new non-military government.

Even outlining what future President Harry Truman was doing, the exciting job of running a shop out in Kansas City, Ho Chi Minh was a pot washer in Paris, and Adolf Hitler was a failed corporal in the Reich Army, along with being a failed artist.

The book is brilliantly written and researched, which takes you on a journey of intrigue and learning. One of my favourite chapters, A Deceptive Peace, which takes from what has been described as the ‘dreamland of the armistice’, through the dark hatred and the growing violence across especially in Eastern Europe, Poles were fighting Ukrainians, and the Germans were fighting each other, Russia had killed the Tsar, the middle and upper classes and the workers were in control. All part of the build up to an age of extremes, and to what would finally crush the world, hatred.

This really is a fantastic book that uses many sources that many English historians do not have available unless they have language skills or a researcher that does. It is the right time, with a century has passed that we look at the events from 1918 with a broader view. This book is the beginning, and people need to read it to understand what followed from 1933.

[Pieter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Daniel Schönpflug beschrijft de laatste oorlogsdagen en de daaropvolgende periode van onzekerheid en chaos vanuit een multiperspectief. We lezen over de oorlog en zijn brede consequenties, over het Ierse, Indische, Arabische en Vietnamese onafhankelijkheidsstreven, over de strijd voor seksuele vrijheid. Schönpflugs bespiegelingen capteren meer dan de oorlogssfeer vooral op meesterlijke wijze een tijdsgeest. Komen voorbij in dit caleidoscopische titanenwerk: de onvermoeibare journaliste Louise Weiss en haar langzaam tanende geloof in een Europe Nouvelle, de tragiek van de Ierse onafhankelijksstrijder Terence MacSwiney, de moedige pogingen van de vermoorde Matthias Erzberger om de Duitse democratie in het zadel te hijsen, Nguyen Ai Quoc die ijvert voor de Vietnamese zaak en dat onafhankelijke Vietnam later als Ho Chi Minh zal verdedigen tegen de Amerikanen.

Maar net zo goed leren we over het wedervaren van de Amerikaanse professor Moina Michael, die ervoor zorgt dat de Remembrance Poppy vandaag genoegzaam bekend is als symbool voor de oorlogsslachtoffers. Of WOI-soldaat Harry S. Truman, de kledijverkoper die na 1918 zweert nooit meer een schot te lossen, en later als president van de VS zijn go geeft voor de atoombommen op Hiroshima en Nagasaki. En Rudolf Hess, de stokebrand wiens daden een voorafspiegeling zijn van de gruwel die hij als kampmeester van Auschwitz oogluikend laat plaatsvinden. Schönpflug herinnert aan het verdrag van Versailles, dat een van de aandrijvers zal blijken van een mechanisme dat eindigt in de bloederige waanzin van WOII.

"In het 'medelijden' dat Louise Weiss voelt, wordt de ambivalentie van het vredesverdrag weerspiegeld; de schok van de verliezers die op zijn laatst nu moeten inzien dat de nederlaag fatale gevolgen voor hen zal hebben; de onvervulde hoop van alle naties die geloofd hebben in Wilsons 'recht op zelfbeschikking'. Waren zo gezien ook niet de overwinnaars van de oorlog in zekere zin verliezers, zelfs zij die een schadeloosstelling kregen en hun positie als wereldmacht konden uitbreiden? Ze hadden hoe dan ook een kans gemist om na het einde van de krijgshandelingen in een nieuwe, constructieve geest van een akkoord naar elkaar toe te bewegen. De droom van een rechtvaardigere en vreedzamere wereldorde was geofferd op het altaar van de staatsraison. Na het verdrag van Versailles waren er geen krachtige mechanismen om de vrede te bewaren, maar wel smeulende conflicten waaruit ooit de vlammen van een nieuwe oorlog zouden oplaaien."

[Richard Marney · Rating 4 out of 5]

A worthwhile read! The author explores the immediate aftermath of World War I, a period filled with both radical hope and profound uncertainty. Through the personal stories of diverse figures—like a young Ho Chi Minh in Paris and future President Harry Truman running a haberdashery—it paints a vivid, ground-level portrait of a world grappling to rebuild. The book ultimately reveals how this brief window of opportunity for a new world order quickly gave way to disillusionment, setting the stage for the turbulent decades to follow.

[Kostia Konyaev · Rating 4 out of 5]

Понравится тем, кто интересуется историей и культурой начала ХХ века.

[Sebastian Uribe Díaz · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

Interesante coro de historias post I GM para comentar pronto.

[Jan Heeren · Rating 3 out of 5]

Een caleidoscoop van biografische elementen uit de periode 1918-1922. Even vroeg ik mij af of dit kon boeien maar als je er eenmaal in zit zijn de afwisselende stukjes fascinerend. Van vrijkorpsleden tot rode matrozen, van Ho Chi Min tot Harry Trumann. En ik was geschokt dat er in de in mijn ogen moderne en progressieve Bauhaus beweging antisemitisme bestond.

[Colin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a great little book. Easy to read in small bits. The cast of characters is well-known, but the stories told are not. I really enjoyed this book.

[Silvia · Rating 2 out of 5]

Il libro parte a raccontare dal novembre 1918, in un momento in cui Grande Guerra ha ridotto il Vecchio continente a un cumulo di macerie e raramente il destino degli uomini è sembrato così incerto. L’11 novembre di quell’anno accade un rarissmo momento di sincronismo mondiale del quale milioni di persone si ricorderanno per il resto della vita. È la fine della Prima guerra mondiale e l’inizio di un nuovo futuro…

Daniel divide il libro in capitolo e ogni capitolo è spezzato da frammenti di più vite diverse, di persone che saranno fondamentali per la storia: La cosacca Marina Jurlova che si oppone alla rivoluzione in Siberia, Käthe Kollwitz che trasforma il suo dolore in arte, Rudolf Höß che marcia con i Freikorps mentre gli Imperi centrali sono travolti da inimmaginabili sconvolgimenti e le casate regnanti sono destinate a un futuro di anonimato; Virginia Woolf che rivoluziona il romanzo, Walter Gropius che esplora lo stretto legame tra società e architettura. In quel mondo prendono forma anche le rivendicazioni che porteranno alla nascita di nuove nazioni e le aspirazioni dei domini coloniali alla libertà con Gandhi e Nguyen Ai Quoc. E ancora Louise Weiss, Thomas E. Lawrence, George Grosz, Harry S. Truman, Woodrow Wilson, Franz Werfel, Marcel Duchamp, Arnold Schönberg e molti altri.

Consiglio questo saggio? Sì e no, dipende quanto si è informati in materia e quanto si è appassionati di storia. Ammetto di essermi fatta attrarre dalla presenza di nomi come Virginia Woolf e Walter Gropius: speravo di trovare in questo libro un qualcosa di diverso. È una scrittura evocativa, molto romanzata, bella da leggere, ma che l'80% delle volte il lettore – almeno, nel caso mio – non viene coinvolto. Perché? Perché molte delle persone raccontate qui non le avevo mai sentite nominare e il libro non mi ha dato il tempo di apprezzarle, capirle o non mi ha informato abbastanza. Sono frammenti distaccati, alcune volte mi sono sentita abbastanza persa.
È un saggio molto specifico e sicuramente pretende un certo livello di conoscenza che io non avevo quando l'ho iniziato (i saggi esistono anche per colmare le lacune e mi dispiace un po' uscire da questo tipo di letture con più domande che risposte, soprattutto perché tanto è stato dato per scontato). Per questo non posso dire che sia stato il saggio della vita.
Lo consiglio quindi a chi vuole scoprire di più sulla vita di tante figure storiche, perse tra le rivoluzioni del mondo in tutta Europa, in Siria, in India. O per chi si vuole informare sui movimenti rivoluzionari.

[Mairi · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was interesting and moving about a turbulent historical time - liked the different perspectives that were incredibly diverse a range of views

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

Closer to a work of literary nonfiction than a true historical account, Schönpflug's A World on Edge captures the frantic chaos of the world following the 1918 armistice and Paris peace agreement a year later. It explores the reality of the war's end through brief biographies of the noted and the noteworthy, including the likes of Käthe Kollwitz, Moina Michael, Nguyễn Sinh Cung better known as Ho Chi Minh), Wilhelm von Preussen Daniel Schönpflug, Harry Truman, Virginia Woolf, Alvin York, and others. The brevity of the account undermines the point scored in the book's tone. There are better works out there capturing either the overview of the early interwar period or the more detailed accounts of the individuals included in Schönpflug's narrative. A serviceable introduction to what came after the First World War with a noteworthy bibliography but little else.

[Mikhail · Rating 3 out of 5]

Don't get me wrong - this is a fine book, but the bar for this genre (patchwork-of-biographies-on-%yearname) is set too high by 1913 - Der Sommer des Jahrhunderts.
Additionally, I didn't really feel any interplay between the stories, and the amount of sources used by Schonpflug was rather scant.

[Deacon Tom (Feeling Better) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well Written Journal of Post WWI

Very enjoyable book about what happened to some of the heroes of world war one. Quite often when we find about battles and so on but never really what happened after the treaty of Paris. The author follows individuals to the rest of their lives and you could see the impact of both ideology and personal accomplishments or defeat

[Geoff Habiger · Rating 4 out of 5]

World War 1 has often been considered one of the fundamental turning points in the 20th Century, and a lot has been written about the war and the events that led to armies fighting across Europe. Not as many books though have been written about the aftermath of the war, or have taken such a broad look at how the aftereffects of the war resonated throughout the years, influencing people, politics, and policies many decades later. Daniel Schönpflug tackles this period, from 1918 to around 1920 in A World on Edge. He looks are a broad collection of people, from writers and artists, composers and soon-to-be politicians, ordinary people that had gone through extraordinary situations, and distills their experiences into a collection of vignettes and scenes to show us how the Great War and the "peace" that followed changed not only individual lives, but the course of the 20th Century.

Schönpflug starts out as World War 1 is ending, giving us a great perspective on the war and the effects that it has had on the world up until that point. We see the events that lead to the armistice on November 11, 1918, and how people reacted. We are introduced to men weary of war, who must do their duty to their country, but who dream of what peace may bring. Schönpflug then follows this collection of people in the years following the war and we see how they continued to change. And it is a diverse collection of people, from the ordinary to the famous (or infamous). From people who would set policy and politics in the future like Matthias Erzberger, Terence MacSwiney, T.E. Lawrence, and Harry S. Truman, to men who fought in the trenches like Henry Johnson and Alvin C. York. Also the artists like Virginia Woolf, George Grosz, and Walter Gropius, or the future revolutionaries like Mohandas Gandhi and Nguyen Tat Thanh (Ho Chi Minh). And the woman who worked to make the poppy the symbol for the horrors of the war, Moina Michael. This is just some of the very diverse group of people Schönpflug introduces us to and through whose eyes we see how the war and the following "peace" changed everything.

A World on Edge may not appeal to some readers of history. By working with a large group of people Schönpflug is not able to dive too deep into any one person's struggles or experiences. We are given brief glimpses of each person's life, but not enough to really understand each person. These are not in depth biographies, but brief glimpses for each person. Schönpflug himself says in the afterword that he was wanting to create scenes for each of the people that would carry through the entire narrative. Personally, I liked this approach as I got a broad, very high level look at how the years after the war were shaped by the war itself, and the peace that followed. It gave a holistic approach that allows you to see how many different and widely spaced events - the post-war turmoil in Germany, the rise of the Republic of Ireland, and the future revolutions in places far removed from Europe (India and Vietnam), were all shaped by the aftermath of the Great War.

I recommend A World on Edge for anybody interested in history, especially the history of World War 1, and who don't mind a high-level, very holistic approach to these events. I learned a lot of information and was able to "fill in" my understanding of this period.

[Jim Razinha · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received an uncorrected proof review copy of this from the publisher through LibraryThing Originally published in German in 2017, the American English edition was published in October 2018.

The back cover says that this is the "story of the aftermath of World War I..." And "[w]ith novelistic virtuosity" Schönpflug describes that aftermath. This is a story. It reads often like some of the true crime genre...creative nonfiction...Schönpflug obviously has to embellish the narrative to create the flow, but the reader does not know how far he goes, because there are no notes! There is a bibliography of references of the panoply of characters (real life people, yes), but no citations anywhere in the text. And of the characters, Americans will recognizer some, but likely not many. Schönpflug pulls from many of those resources, not a few that were autobiographies and more than a few biographies, to create an interwoven but distinct accounting of perspectives. Schönpflug seems to have access to some rare sources - one example, Marina Yurlova's part two of her memoirs, Russia, Farewell, was never reprinted after 1936 and volumes are quite rare.

And those perspectives are told in third person present tense. This may be Schönpflug's standard, or it may be to create for the reader a presence in the moments. Either way, it's not a common form and some readers may not like it.

The aftermath that is the primary focus does not even begin to be explored until page 130 of 280, and really not until the latter third of the book. The first half considers events of the last days and hours of the war, and Schönpflug spends considerable time introducing all the players and their involvement. From Marina to Alvin York to Harry Truman, Virginia Woolf, Arnold Schönberg, Ferdinand Foch, and so many more, this is not a standard history of the end of a war that was the greatest devastating event to date. And though written by a German author, it looks at American, British, French, Russian, and more national perspectives.

Recommended for those interested in details of the first World War and what came from it - with the caveats of the third person present tense and that the focus in not entirely the aftermath.

[Terry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Publishers Weekly Review
[this review is OK but doesn't capture the vast range of characters covered]
In this engrossing account, German historian Schonpflug examines the last days and aftermath of WWI from a cultural and social perspective, primarily by following the lives and careers of military heroes, future world leaders, artists, and more. They all cope with postwar life in different ways. Harry Truman retired from the military to open a haberdashery whose eventual failure spurred him to the political career that landed him in the White House in 1945. Harlem-born soldier Henry Johnson, whose combat exploits earned him the nickname "The Black Death," enjoyed a period of fame and fortune as America's first black war hero, but his candor regarding his experiences quickly rendered him unmarketable, leading to a lonely, impoverished death in 1929. Schonpflug presents, almost lyrically, a complicated mixture of jubilation, exhaustion, anticipation, trauma, and recovery, giving an intimate, humanizing look at a world still reeling from war. In addition to inner experience, this history touches briefly on larger-scale matters: the fledgling Weimar Republic's growing pains, the development of new schools of music, art, and architecture (jazz, dada, Bauhaus), and the restructuring of the world in general. Schonpflug achieves his goal of portraying a world still traumatized and shell-shocked by war, optimistic about the future, and disturbed by the changes taking place, striking a good balance between a broad topic and in-depth exploration.

[Melkor von Moltke · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mr. Schonpflug has crafted a nice little work, mainly relying on primary sources, on the fallout of the First World War. The reader is introduced to a large cast of characters, from well known names like Harry Truman and Virginia Woolf, to minor figures like a German Sailor and a French Journalist. It is an intriguing array of hopes and nightmares that arose after the end of the war, and a wide variety of viewpoints.

The book only has a few issues, the biggest of which is its episodic nature. It jumps between narratives a bit too excessively, sometimes after just a paragraph or two, just to return to the narrative after another paragraph or two. This results in a broken narrative and disrupts the flow of the work. The book also seems to just abruptly end, with little fanfare or conclusion, just an epilogue with a short blurb about what happened to the various individuals.

All in all, this was an enjoyable work, in spite of being marred by a less than stellar structure. It offers some good points of view that are very interesting.

[Dylan · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting read on an oft underappreciated and hectic time-period in history, well, not the end of WW1 but what happens when the guns fall silent and outside of the halls of Versailles.

The author takes an interesting approach, relying basically the entire time on first hand accounts provided through letters, memoirs, autobiographies, and diaries to follow the cast of characters representing a fairly diverse group of people through the end of WW1 into 1920/21 timeframe. On the bright side, it is a wonderful look more into the cultural and personal of what experiencing this time of human existence is like.

The obvious negative being that it sometimes lacks some context wrought by these unreliable narrators. But, overall, it's a readable and engaging look at a time I think is interesting and chaotic and would recommend to those looking for an introduction to the material.

[Daniela · Rating 4 out of 5]

Um livro de história diferente e muito bom. Conta, a partir de alguns indivíduos e eventos significativos, como foi viver este momento. Ele se centra e, 1918 mas começa um pouco antes e termina nos primeiros anos da proxima década. Da violência e destruição inéditas aos sonhos de um mundo melhor. Da decepção quando esses sonhos não são realizados (ou não são aquilo que era antecipado) às sementes da próxima guerra.

O livro parece ser contado numa narrativa fragmentada, pelo fio dos muitos personagens, mas no final o efeito é o contrário: percebemos como pessoas e eventos diversos estão ligados entre si, e como aquele momento é determinante para muito que aconteceu depois. Tudo e todos conectados pelo contesto.

[Auf_Naxos · Rating 3 out of 5]

Если Иллиес в своей книге «1913. Лето целого века» сосредоточен на событиях культурной жизни одного года в Берлине и особенно в Вене, то работа Шёнпфлуга пытается объять политические процессы во всем мире - от Сирии, Вьетнама и Индии до Ирландии, США и России в период 1918-1920 гг. Из-за величия замысла и объема материала повествование становится рваным и довольно поверхностным. По большому счету, это рассказ об истоках борьбы за самые разнообразные права, от национальной независимости до права быть евреем или негром. Книга в первую очередь посвящена политике и политическому противостоянию, поэтому если этот аспект вам неинтересен, то читать будет скучно.

[Ekaterina Okuneva · Rating 3 out of 5]

Определенно не 1913, меньше людей, больше истории, сюжетные линии разрозненные, герои не взаимосвязаны. Нет этой магии, когда у Рильке заболел живот в тот день, когда Пикассо начал "Женщину в сорочке", а Ленин не мог найти второй носок, поэтому вышел из дома на 10 минут позже и чуть не попал под лошадь.
И еще непонятно, почему героями стали Рихард Штумпф, Марина Юрлова, Махатма Ганди (где та Индия, из книги складывается впечатление, что всем вообще наплевать, хотя это, мягко говоря, не так) Альма Малер (про эту хоть интересно читать, потому что у нее была насыщенная личная жизнь), а не, скажем, Блок, Циолковский, Блюмкин и Соня Делоне.
Но это, конечно, все мои субъективные ожидания.

[Birgitte Bach · Rating 2 out of 5]

Den enkelte persons historie nåede aldrig at bide sig fast, fordi der blev sprunget så hurtigt rundt imellem dem. Jeg måtte flere gange læse det samme afsnit igen, for at kunne huske hvem personen nu var eller sågar bladre tilbage for at få genopfrisket, hvor historien nu var henne.

Det kan være, det ville give mere mening, hvis jeg havde set den planlagte tv-udsendelse? Men for mig var det et stort rod og der var intet der sad fast i hukommelsen. Måden historien er fortalt på fungerede heller ikke for mig. Jeg synes sproget var meget uelegant og der var intet flow i fortællingen.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

absorbing take on impact of WW One on arts/nations via the stories of individuals. Some I knew a lot about (Harry Truman) and some I had never heard of but should have (Louise Weiss). People as diverse as Virginia Wolff and Crown Prince Wilhelm of Prussia. I especially was grateful for the stories of the Henry Johnson and the Harlem Hellfighters, and the musician James Reese Europe (whose compositions I had recently been introduced to). I recommend this book to those interested in 20th century history, both political and cultural.

[Richard Falkenrath · Rating 5 out of 5]

Terrific, end of WW1 through the eyes of extraordinary people

A very readable translation from the original German

One hundred years after the end of the First World War, this book brings those epochal events to life through the eyes of about two dozen fascinating characters ... Sgt York, TE Lawrence, Gandhi, Virginia Woolf, and many many others.

Anyone interested in this period — strongly recommend this book.

[Sylvia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Recoge los testimonios de una variedad de personajes reales, desde Virginia Woolf a Rudolf Hoss o Harry Truman, sobre el final de la Gran Guerra. Un momento convulso, con la desaparición de los grandes imperios, el inicio de la descolonización, la revolución rusa... y el Tratado de Versalles, que impuso a Alemania mucho más que un castigo, una humillación que fue el caldo de cultivo de la siguiente guerra mundial. Me ha parecido apasionante.

[Maureen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting approach to telling the history of the end of WWI and its impacts. The stories from many counties and spheres of experience are well known - even famous, but it was fascinating to see how they evolved, juxtaposed against each other. Would have been better with more illustrations, and if the illustrations were in color.