Derek Sayer

Postcards from Absurdistan is a cultural and political history of Prague from 1938, when the Nazis destroyed Czechoslovakia's artistically vibrant liberal democracy, to 1989, when the country's socialist regime collapsed after more than four decades of communist dictatorship. Derek Sayer shows that Prague's twentieth century, far from being a story of inexorable progress toward some 'end of history', whether fascist,...

Postcards from Absurdistan is a cultural and political history of Prague from 1938, when the Nazis destroyed Czechoslovakia's artistically vibrant liberal democracy, to 1989, when the country's socialist regime collapsed after more than four decades of communist dictatorship. Derek Sayer shows that Prague's twentieth century, far from being a story of inexorable progress toward some 'end of history', whether fascist,...

Thirty years ago, Prague was a closed book to most Westerners. Today it is the continent's fifth most-visited city, surpassed only by London, Paris, Istanbul, and Rome. With a stunning natural location on the Vltava River and a spectacular potpourri of Romanesque rotundas, Gothic towers, Renaissance palaces, Baroque churches, Art Nouveau cafes, Cubist apartment buildings, Modernist villas, and postmodern architectural...