Ukraine: A Nation on the Borderland

(Hardback)

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The Euromaidan uprising in Kiev, followed by radical regime change, the annexation of the Crimea and the war in Eastern Ukraine, have shattered European security. The Western response to Russian aggression has been uncertain and hesitant in handling the unfamiliar yet large nation of Ukraine, a country with a complicated past, and one whose history is little known in the rest of Europe.

In Ukraine: A Nation on the Borderland, Karl Schloegel presents a picture of a country which lies on Europe's borderland and in Russia's shadow. In recent years, Ukraine has been faced, along with Western Europe, with the political conundrum resulting from Russia's actions and the ongoing Information War. As well as exploring this present-day confrontation, Schloegel provides detailed, fascinating historical portraits of a panoply of Ukraine's major cities: Lviv, Odessa, Czernowitz, Kiev, Kharkov, Donetsk, Dnepropetrovsk and Yalta - cities whose often troubled and war-torn histories are as varied as the nationalities and cultures which have made them what they are today, survivors with very particular identities and aspirations. Schloegel feels the pulse of life in these cities, experiencing their more recent pasts and their challenges for the future.

Reviews

"In response to these events, this book is an effort to make amends: to educate the broader public about Ukraine, Europe's terra incognita. It presents not only a fascinating, oftentimes poetic investigation of Ukraine's highly diverse urban landscapes, but also records the inner struggles of a German historian trying to make sense of Putin's undeclared war against Ukraine. . . . This book is a path-breaking study of the urban archaeology of post-Soviet Ukraine, haunted by the demographic catastrophes of the twentieth century."-- "Europe-Asia Studies"
"The deftly translated Ukraine: A Nation on the Borderland is a powerful and erudite assertion of Ukraine's legitimacy as a nation-state, its rich cultural heritage, and the underlying sources of Russia's campaign against it. In the book, Schlgel, a renowned scholar and lifelong admirer of Russia, takes his readers on a tantalizing historical and intellectual tour of Ukraine's major cities. . . . What's best about Schlgel's Ukraine is the affectionate, inspiring journey on which he takes the reader through the nation's ages, empires, and metropolises, coloring in the blank swathes with history, purpose, and significance. . . . He populates each vignette with its literary . . . luminaries and other figures of history who lived at least part of their lives in Ukraine."--Paul Hockenos "International Politics and Society"

Author Bio

Karl Schloegel is a historian and essayist and Professor Emeritus of the European University Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder), Germany. His many books include histories of Moscow, Berlin and St Petersburg, and he won the European Charles Veillon essay prize in 1990 and the prize of the Historisches Kolleg Munich in 2016.