Rosa BalfourDirector of Carnegie Europe
Fiction
Having delved into Ukrainian literature during the winter, I recommend reading Life and Fate, a masterpiece by Vasiliy Grossman. An epic journey into Second World War fighting, mostly on Ukrainian territory, that brilliantly reveals the horrors of war, the brutal, paranoid, fearful realities of dictatorship, and how humankind retains the capacity for joy and love. A must-read.
Non-fiction
In Tainted Democracy, Zsuzsanna Szelényi takes the reader on a mind-reading journey of Prime Minister Viktor Orbàn and his subversion of Hungary’s democracy. The story, made even more compelling because of Zsuzsanna’s personal experience, also provides a blueprint for how democracies can be dismantled.
Podcast, film, or music
Europe Inside Out, of course! Timely analyses from Carnegie scholars with a long shelf life. Unmissable.
Matti MaasikasEU Ambassador to Ukraine
Fiction
The Czar’s Madman by Jaan Kross. A brilliant Estonian novel on lies, truths, czars and wars, suited for our times as well.
Politics
The Russo-Ukrainian War: The Return of History by Serhii Plokhy. If you want to understand Ukraine, start with the Harvard professor’s works.
Podcast, film, music, or art
The Futuromarennia exhibition in Kumu Art Museum in Tallinn, Estonia.
Ukrainian avant-garde art from the 1910s and 1920s, deeply European. And yes, Kazimir Malevich was Ukrainian, too.
Guilty pleasure
Days in the Caucasus by Banine. A witty and clear-eyed coming-of-age memoir in the oil baron’s family in Baku during the Russian revolution, through the lens of an educated French woman that the author became.
Oana LungescuNATO Spokesperson
Fiction
The Travelling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa and The Cat Who Saved Books by Sosuke Natsukawa, which combine my love of cats and fascination with Japan. I also want to revisit Ryunosuke Akutagawa’s brilliant short stories, especially In a Grove and Rashomon.
Politics
Putin’s People by Catherine Belton forensically details the rise of Putin and his KGB cronies, and lays bare their long-standing obsession with Ukraine, imperial ambition and resentment of the West.
Podcast, film, or music
Looking forward to watching The Diplomat on Netflix, not least for a fact-checking opportunity. Diplomacy can be fun, but it’s not as glamorous as it’s made out to be…
Guilty pleasure
I’ll probably have more guilty pleasures once I leave NATO at the end of August, but right now it’s the beautifully illustrated Leonard Cohen Everybody Knows - Inside His Archive.
Steven ErlangerChief Diplomatic Correspondent in Europe for the New York Times
Fiction
We Others, by Steven Millhauser, collected stories and novellas. One of the great underrated American writers, who bends the world, like Donald Barthelme and George Saunders, into thoughtful, compelling shapes. Also, All the King’s Men, by Robert Penn Warren, a novel of an early American demagogue, Huey Long.
Politics
Black Wind, White Snow: The Rise of Russia’s New Nationalism by Charles Clover. A prescient look at the roots of Russian fascism, which feels pretty relevant today.
Podcast, film, or music
Drops of God, an engaging and well-acted series on Apple TV about wine, France, Japan, and fathers, in French, Japanese, and English. It began as manga.
Guilty pleasure
Besides sleep? Two spy-ish series, Slow Horses, about a washed-up agent played deliciously by Gary Oldman, on Apple TV, from Mick Herron novels; and Treason on Netflix, a more traditional tale of skullduggery at MI6 but very enjoyable.
Félix KrawatzekSenior researcher at the Centre for East European and International Studies (ZOiS)
Fiction
Alice Zeniter’s L’Art de perdre (The Art of Losing) is a gripping novel by a French-Algerian author who traces her family history back to Algeria spanning three generations. She illuminates the colonial violence that Algeria endured during the 1960s and the contradictions that are part of the decisions people take during war—a war that was for long only know as “the event.” The novel also speaks to the long shadows of these critical junctures in an impressive way.
Politics
Recently I finished Anthony Pagden’s The Pursuit of Europe: A History and would claim that this is probably one of the richest and most enlightening histories of the idea of Europe. At a moment when Europe’s political integration finds itself in a permanent crisis mode, Pagden’s historical depth from Kant and Napoleon’s French vision on the European project to the present are important for understanding the numerous historical roots of European integration as it unfolder after 1945.
Podcast, film, or music
Over the last months I have built up a huge backlog of episodes for my favorite podcast, Freakonomics, and I am looking forward to catching up. This is a great scientific podcast that explores all imaginable everyday themes using scientific methods, data, and theory, with amazing guests on the show.
Guilty pleasure
Completely disconnecting from the digital world for a part of the summer is my immense pleasure—whether it is guilty or not is open for interpretation.
Sophie PedderParis bureau chief for The Economist
Fiction
Watch Us Dance by Leïla Slimani is now out in English, and is as entrancing as it was in the original French. Slimani continues the tale of Amine and Mathilde Belhaj, whose story featured in her previous novel, The Country of Others. From citrus groves to leather maxi boots, it is an unfolding family drama set against the rebellion and repression of France and postcolonial Morocco in the late 1960s. I think it’s Slimani’s most ambitious novel yet.
Politics
France on Trial: The Case of Marshal Pétain by Julian T. Jackson is another work of painstaking archival research by the British historian. After his biography of Charles de Gaulle, Jackson here turns to an altogether more controversial French figure, Philippe Pétain. In the dock is both a leader and a country, for which the trial in 1945 was its first reckoning with one of the darkest periods of its history.
Podcast, film, or music
The Rest is Politics, hosted by Alastair Campbell and Rory Stewart, because it is an engaging and balanced way to keep in touch with UK politics from abroad, but also because the hosts make a real effort to take European politics seriously. Recent interviewees include Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama and former French president François Hollande.
Guilty pleasure
Succession season 4, because it’s a dramatic masterpiece. I can’t resist mentioning episode 5 in particular, which, of all things, features a conversation about an article in the Economist on France.
Marc PieriniSenior fellow at Carnegie Europe
Fiction
Stefan Zweig’s Conqueror of the Seas – The Story of Magellan, which I read in French (Magellan, L'homme et son exploit)—partly fiction, partly history.
Politics
Gönül Tol’s Erdogan’s Wars, A Strongman's Struggle at Home and in Syria.
Podcast, film, or music:
Mozart’s Piano Concerto N°23, K. 488—old habit, same enjoyment.
Guilty pleasure
The movie Top Gun: Maverick (the sequel, thirty-six years later).
Peter KellnerNonresident scholar at Carnegie Europe
Fiction
The Armour of Light by Ken Follett. His latest novel is an historical page-turner, with progressive values infused in his drama of protest, love, and war set in the times of Pitt, Wellington, and Napoleon.
Politics
And Then What? by Catherine Ashton. Stories from her time as the EU’s High Representative—Serbia-Kosovo agreement, Iran nuclear negotiations, and much more. Only cynics and Brexiters will make mischief with the fact that Cathy is my wife.
Podcast, film, or music
The Rest is Politics—a weekly podcast in which Alastair Campbell, Tony Blair’s former Communications director, and Rory Stewart, former Conservative cabinet minister, show that it is possible to disagree with respect and intelligence.
Paul HaenleMaurice R. Greenberg Director’s Chair at Carnegie China
Fiction: I highly recommend Edward Rutherfurd’s China: The Novel. Rutherfurd’s intriguing story traces the last seventy years of the Qing Dynasty in China, beginning in 1839 in the early days of the Opium War, through the Taiping and the Boxer rebellions, concluding with the ascension to the throne of China’s last emperor Pu Yi.
Politics
Longtime China expert Bates Gill has a terrific new book out called Daring to Struggle: China’s Global Ambitions Under Xi Jinping, which takes stock of the fundamental drivers of China’s more dynamic, assertive, and risk-taking approach to the world under its current leader, Xi Jinping.
Podcast, film, or music
Chinese filmmaker Wang Bing’s new documentary film Youth (Spring) premiered in competition in May 2023 at the Cannes Film Festival. Profiling young factory workers in a collection of children’s clothes factories in a town in China’s Zhejiang province, the film offers a riveting, touching overview of their exuberant lives despite their poor working conditions and seemingly bleak existence.
Guilty pleasure
I highly recommend the 2022 movie Argentina: 1985. It recreates, in an extremely compelling way, the Trial of the Juntas—the prosecution of Jorge Videla’s dictatorship and the disappearances and deaths of more than 30,000 Argentine citizens from 1976 to 1981. The closing argument by the prosecutor Julio Strassera is absolutely riveting and includes, of course, his famous real-life powerful quote: “I wish to use a phrase that is not my own because it already belongs to all the Argentine people. Your Honors: Never again!”
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