Pravda Ha Ha: True Travels to the End of Europe - Hardcover

MacLean, Rory

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1408896524 ISBN 13: 9781408896525

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2020

Synopsis

'A gem of a book, informative, companionable, sometimes funny, and wholly original. MacLean must surely be the outstanding, and most indefatigable, traveller-writer of our time' John le Carré

In 1989 the Berlin Wall fell. In that euphoric year Rory MacLean travelled from Berlin to Moscow, exploring lands that were – for most Brits and Americans – part of the forgotten half of Europe. Thirty years on, MacLean traces his original journey backwards, across countries confronting old ghosts and new fears: from revanchist Russia, through Ukraine's bloodlands, into illiberal Hungary, and then Poland, Germany and the UK. Along the way he shoulders an AK-47 to go hunting with Moscow's chicken Tsar, plays video games in St Petersburg with a cyber-hacker who cracked the US election, drops by the Che Guevara High School of Political Leadership in a non-existent nowhereland and meets the Warsaw doctor who tried to stop a march of 70,000 nationalists. Finally, on the shores of Lake Geneva, he waits patiently to chat with Mikhail Gorbachev.

As Europe sleepwalks into a perilous new age, MacLean explores how opportunists – both within and outside of Russia, from Putin to Home Counties populists – have made a joke of truth, exploiting refugees and the dispossessed, and examines the veracity of historical narrative from reportage to fiction and fake news. He asks what happened to the optimism of 1989 and, in the shadow of Brexit, chronicles the collapse of the European dream.

About this title

About the Author

Rory MacLean is one of Britain's most expressive and adventurous travel writers. His books – which have been translated into a dozen languages – include the Sunday Times bestseller Stalin's Nose, Under the Dragon and Berlin: Imagine a City, which was named a Book of the Year by the Washington Post.

Review

“[A] gripping book, part-travelogue, part contemporary history of Europe ... MacLean is an accomplished writer; his immersive prose crackles with wit and wry humour, and captures scenes and personalities with aplomb” ―Guardian

“This is a timely book. It addresses the challenges of a fractious and fractured Europe ... MacLean is a compassionate writer, and he balances his stories of men and women of power ... with those of the dispossessed” ―Spectator

“[An] eye-opening travelogue ... Sometimes darkly funny, often surprising and always compelling” ―Wanderlust

“MacLean combines vivid reportage with unabashed soapboxing. The result is an engrossing travelogue that's both trenchantly observant and deeply felt” ―Publishers Weekly

“A triumph ... MacLean paints a convincing portrait of a Europe in turmoil” ―Herald

“MacLean sheds some bleak light on the manoeuvers of post-Soviet Russia and populist, post-truth Europe in the decades since the Wall came down ... By turns fascinating and chilling” ―Geographical

“MacLean excels at sketches. He uses them to tell deeper stories ... Every few pages, you light on a gem of observation” ―Tablet

Edition details

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
• Publication date: 2020
• ISBN 10: 1408896524
• ISBN 13: 9781408896525
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 368