欧洲历史

Europe, viewed from across the Atlantic, is often looked on as a depressing place-not so much the old continent as the dark continent: economically stuck, politically and morally confused, militarily feeble and populated most visibly by pensioners, trade-unionists, anti-Semites and terrorists.
By looking at how much Europe has achieved over the past 50 years William Hitchcock is able to take a view of the continent that is fundamentally and appropriately optimistic. Starting his narrative with a compelling portrait of a wrecked and divided continent in 1945, he makes clear that the dominant themes of the next half century were the establishment of peace, remarkable economic recovery and an ultimately successful struggle against communism. The fact that this comprehensive and nuanced history should be the work of an American historian is also worth remembering in a time of transatlantic tension. It is important to be reminded that there is a deep fund of mutual knowledge and sympathy on both sides of the Atlantic. Long survey histories, covering 50 years and numerous countries, can be difficult books both to write and to read. For anyone unfamiliar with the period they risk turning into a blizzard of undifferentiated facts. There is a danger that they will simply be a rehearsal of well-known events, without adding anything really new. Mr Hitchcock is careful to avoid both pitfalls. He finds a convincing pattern in his material by imposing four themes on his chronology: the aftermath of war; economic boom in the 1950s and 1960s; rebellion in the 1960s and 1970s, covering everything from the Red Brigades in Italy to the democratic revolutions in Spain and Portugal; and unity for the last two decades of the century, covering the fall of communism and the deepening of European integration. As with most survey histories, it is possible to dip in and out of sections of Mr Hitchcock's book—to read the chapters on European integration, for example, but to skip those on decolonisation or the Soviet Union. But the reader who adopts this strategy would be missing something. It is part of the skill of the book that each section throws a light on the others. France's post-war embrace of Germany and European political integration, makes much more sense when understood against the backdrop of the debacle of decolonisation in Algeria and Indochina in the 1950s. The determination and energy with which the Germans set about creating their economic miracle is better understood against the background of the grim events on the other side of the iron curtain.