Chris’s Reviews > The Age of Extremes: The Short Twentieth Century, 1914-1991 > Status Update

"On the wilder shores of the American 1960s, where rock fans and student radicals met, the line between getting stoned and building barricades often seemed hazy." Well played, professor.

I could tell from the Daily Mail review that Geoffry Levy hadn't actually read Hobsbawm's work. At this point, though l, it's completely obvious that he (and everyone else) took the loss of 15-20 million people (not "murder", as RWNJ would tell you) out of context. That quote refers to WWII, not Stalinist purges. Was it worth it? Was the world better because of those sacrifices? It's an important question.

"For the Second World War was, for those on the winning side, not merely a struggle for military victory, but - even in Britain and the USA - for a better society." Dubious for the leaders, but certainly for those who fought. There's the context for Hobsbawm's remarks about what people were willing to lose (not "murder" as the intellectually lazy and/or dishonest would have it).

I've seen right-wing readers call Hobsbawm's history "Stalinist." Pretty sure they have no idea what that word means.