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The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) was founded during a period of seventeen months between Mitterrand's first initiative in October 1989 and the Bank's inauguration in London in April 1991. There are numerous books and articles on the negotiations, the legal complications and political opposition from various countries, big and small, relating to the foundation of the EBRD. A large majority of these texts appeared in the early 1990s and they saw the reasons for the fiasco accompanying EBRD activities until 1994 in the conflicts that occurred during the founding process. The public perception in the West since then of the EBRD has been that it is an institution devouring taxpayers' money for what are mostly failed projects and for high salaries for the staff working in a marble palace in central London. The East and NGOs for a long time believed that the EBRD did and understood far too little and when it did do something it was either taking part in environmentally questionable projects or projects involving privatisation tycoons.Neither of these has been true for quite some time. The EBRD has since at least 1999 been a financially profitable institution with a strictly controlled budget and a series of successfully completed projects. In practical terms, the institution basically understands all the nuances of the problems involved in transition and in the reform of individual countries in transition and does exactly what is necessary, no more no less.

It seems that this sense of a slight underestimation of the EBRD suits everybody within and around it. In fact, it is a part of its corporate communication strategy. Although the official EBRD publications are full of numbers, facts and neo-soc-realist pictures speaking about assistance to projects implemented from the River Oder to Vladivostok, they know that this "propaganda" is taken seriously by only a few. ... Read more

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As the Second World War drew to a close, European borders were being redrawn. The regions of Istria, Dalmatia, and Venezia Giulia, nominally Italian but at various times also belonging to Austria and Germany, fell under the rule of Yugoslavia and its dictator Marshal Tito. The ensuing removal and genocide of Italians from these regions had been little explored or even discussed until 1999, when the esteemed Italian journalist Arrigo Petacco wrote L'esodo: La tragedia negata degli italiani d'Istria, Dalmazia e Venezia Giulia. Now this story is available in English as A Tragedy Revealed.

Petacco explains the history of the regions and how they were shifted between empires for centuries. The greater part of the story however details the genocidal program of the Yugoslav Communist government toward the native Italians in the regions. Based on previously unavailable archival documents and oral accounts from people who were there, Petacco reveals the events and exposes the Italian government?s mishandling ? and then official silence on ? the situation. This is a riveting work on a little-known, tragic event written by one of Italy?s most highly regarded journalists.

Customer Reviews (1)

A Tragedy Revealed
This book did an excellent job of exposing one of the great atrocities of our time. It gave voice to the suffering of a people who were rejected and denied by their own country. Those who survived are validated by the historical and personal accounts presented in this book. You cannot read it without being profoundly touched or changed in some way. ... Read more

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Based on extensive interviews with authors, editors, and publishers in four countries, this book examines the economic, social, and literary effect of the end of communist domination and accompanying cultural subsidies in Slovenia, Slovakia, Hungary, and Romania. The end of the communist regime has made the position of writer less lucrative as well as less prestigious within these four countries. Likewise, the countries' respective publishing markets are struggling to adjust to a new economy in which books are more expensive, Western competition is ever-increasing, and distribution systems must be rebuilt. The author addresses each of these concerns as they affect the individual nations and Central Europe as a whole and includes extensive bibliographical citations for primary and secondary works referenced in each chapter. ... Read more

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Uropean Urbanity provides an overview about young architectural strategies on contemporary urban development, showing all prize-winning and selected Europan projects from the competitions Europan 7+8 in Austria and Slovenia.

In parallel with these projects, a collection of texts by writers, critics, theorists, architects and artists examines the effects of political, economical, and social forces onto urban environments, as well as they reflect spatial and urbanist practices, always in relation to current transformations of urban spaces.

This publication addresses specialist readers from the disciplines architecture, urban planning, sociology, and cultural theory as well as an audience interested in development of contemporary cities and in experimental architecture work.

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Forty years after surviving his fourteen-month imprisonment in concentration camps, Boris Pahor, a Slovene from Trieste, visits a former camp in the Vosges mountains that has been preserved as a historical monument and suffers acute memories of the horror. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Glittering phantasmagorical memoir of the horrors of the concentration camps
Natzweiler/ KLNa to the Nazis, one of the least discussed of the concentration camps, with its population of almost entirely non-Jewish inmates, and Jewish resistors not identified as Jewish, makes an important case study of revolt. For 25 years I have studied this camp and created a website as a guide to the resources that will open up a rich avenue of scholarship. In particular, the memoirs of Natzweiler-Struthof provide primary material for a serious exploration of the history of repression and resistance in the second World War.
All the writers known to have written about Natzweiler belonged to a category which deserves to be studied far more extensively than it has been in the U.S.: they were resistors condemned under the NN -- "Nacht und Nebel" decree. From 1942 on, the KLNa was mostly dedicated to the incarceration and death of resistors. By 1943, Himmler decided to group all those arrested under this decree at Natzweiler.

The phenomenon of opposition to the Nazis under many forms and guises is represented in these memoirs of Jews and non-Jews who actively participated in the destruction of the Third Reich, for the enduring honor of mankind. Boris Pahor, a non-Jew,has written the most "literary" of the existing more than two-dozen memoirs of NAtzweiler/Struthof /KLNA. Pahor, the author of some 15 books,deals with the guilt of the survivor, also a theme in his 1958 book, recently translated from the Slovene into French as Printemps Difficile (Difficult Spring)." He told an interviewer recently:
"I only know how to describe the dying and the dead...After our return, thousands committed suicide....It was difficult to return. With the guilt of knowing that, if they are still living, it is because they ate dead men's bread....I write as if I was in the morgue." (Le Monde)

This self-assessment undervalues the glittering attraction of his writing as he shifts the reader's attention between the living tourists and the dead victims (both the "Shadows" of the title), whom he sees and reaches out to during his days' and night's return to Natzweiler. Boris Pahor, born in Trieste, fought for national Slovene liberation in 1943 and was arrested and sent to Natzweiler as anti-German, anti-fascist. Pahor begins Pilgrim Among the Shadows, his account of his return to Natzweiler in 1966, by sharing his conflicted emotions. He at first resents the motorized procession of tourists "distorting the dreamlike images that have lived in the shadows of my mind ever since the war."
"Their eyes will never see the abyss of desolation that was our punishment for believing in man's dignity and freedom." "At the same time I feel an unbidden and gently persistent satisfaction that this mountain in the Vosges is no longer the site of a distant, self-consuming fury of destruction; that it has become, instead, the destination of endless crowds which, naïve and guileless though they may be, are sincere in their wish to experience just a hint of the inconceivable fate of their lost brothers. Maybe in the ascent here there is something of the fervor of religious pilgrimages ... They come to tread on holy ground, to pay homage to the ashes of fellow creatures who by their mute presence have raised, in our hearts, an immovable landmark of human history."

Pahor is the most introspective, personal and candid of the memorists, and also the only one who questions and dissects all of his motives and efforts to make sense of the memories. This affects not only what he chooses to record but also how it is done. He says that he speaks to us from the privacy of the page more candidly that he would ever address a fellow survivor. "I myself would never speak to a fellow visitor, even one who had been with me in the place of crematoria. I would be afraid of slipping into cliché at every word. It's impossible, anyway, to talk about death, or love, with anyone but yourself. Death and love allow no witnesses."
His description of the midnight inspection for lice, each naked man standing on a stool so that "a man holding a caged light can examine his crotch," is unique in its literary allusions and psychological analysis of a nightly event which is mentioned in some, and left out of other of the memoirs.
`There is no pubic hair- the barber's razor has seen to that- but on the ends of the emerging new hairs there might be a few nits. It's a though each penis is illuminated for some new rite of adoration...But in this pathetic illumination of crotches there is nothing of the reverence that once chiseled fertility symbols over the doors of Pompeii. It is simply a ritual by which those in power confront their fear of lice and typhus. So the light overtakes the sparrow in its nest, dead from starvation before it could fledge, dangling lifelessly in the inspectors hand."
Like several of the memorists, Pahor sees the mass rituals of camp life in terms of visual spectacle. Held in all the Nazi camps, similar spectacular beatings, hangings and other public humiliation, torture and execution sessions are part of the memory of all the survivors of Natzweiler too.

But only Pahorspeculates how camera angles might be used: "A movie camera could capture such sequences faithfully- dwelling on the long electric cord, moving down it toward the lightbulb and the shriveled crotch, catching along the way the shaved heads of men jostling for position so they canbe first to run off to their chilly crypt for the night. Maybe it's just as well there was no camera; for who knows what people today might think..."( 11)Pahor shifts back and forth between his sense of feeling "superior" in the world of the living, "satisfied with the special privilege that comes from my former status as an outcast,"and his feelings towards the dead whom he sees everywhere, but cannot rouse or touch- the shadows that come out during his solitary, nocturnal visit to the deserted camp. Between the two worlds, he tries to find meaning, much as, at the time he was in camp, he found it in the cycle of the daily routines: "For while our clockwork comings and goings were only the languid shifting of a dead sea, their rythmic motion gave some dim sense of purpose." How did Pahor survive? How did anyone survive? He was an infirmary aide. Pahor was befriended and taught French by Jean Larebeyrette, a doctor who bandaged his wound at first, then took him in.
"The Slovene talent for learning foreign languages also helped me.I can't say whether that ability of ours is a sign of psychological wealth, of an active and multifaceted mind, or whether it simply is an elasticity that we've acquired over the centuries through incessant bowing, scraping and accomodating. In this respect we ressemble the Jews and Gypsies."
Pahor gives no importance to the system ofhierarchiesin the camp. "In these neropolises it did not matter what department you worked in. Barbers shaved death, quartermasters dressed it, medics undressed it, registrars entered the dates of death after the serial numbers, and in the end, they all, each of them, were sucked up the huge chimney."

However, he also acknowledges how being in the infirmary, writing case histories and diagnoses for the prison head physician "meant escape from chaos into peace and order. At Leif's side I could help people and be useful." (135)"We weren't constantly, unremittingly hungry any more....Like the tiles on the floor, we had been installed in the system."Not working outdoors at the camp was one way to have a better chance at outliving the war. Pahor worked at the weberei(weaving workshop) as did Scheinmann and Linet when they finally acceded to this inside function which was forbiddent to the French NN until late into their stay. All the French authors remark on the upward mobility they experienced at Natzweiler as their national and political group achieved seniority.
It was probably helpful to Pahor that his red triangle badge carried "I" for Italian on it instead of being identified as a Slav.
Although Pahor was thrown a lifeline by the inmate doctors he worked with, he sees with clarity the nature of Doctor Leif Poulson (spelled different ways in different memoirs) who was a benefactor to some of the prisoners needing medical care and who shut out others.
"He was always indifferent when he wasn't dealing with his fellow Norwegians. Had it been a different patient [than Ivo], perhaps Leif would have found some sulfa somewhere. ...if Leif had wanted to, he could have found some sulfa. I should have pleaded with him then, stepped forth on Ivo's behalf. But sulfa was the last thing on my mind at the time, and Leif wasn't even sure what was wrong with Ivo. When Leif finally mentioned nephritis, Ivo was going. Sulfa might not have made any difference. It might have been a tubercular infection. I was too insignificant a player in camp politics for Leif to discuss this with me."
Beyond the physical conditions, there were psychological factors which probably assisted or prevented prisoners from staying alive. Here the reader notices discrepancies among this author's own perceived strategies and between strategies adopted by the different authors. For example, Pahor writes that "the first condition for even the slightest chance of survival is to eliminate from your mind any image that does not belong to the kingdom of evil. The result is that even those whom death ultimately pardons feel themselves so saturated with death that despite their new freedoms they are inextricably bound to it."
Outside the haven of the infirmary, Pahor writes about his emotional disassociation from both his co-sufferers and the torturers. He doesn't even seem to remember the names of "the corporals". "Corporals whose nastiness derives from stupidity or an inferiority complex." " Fear deadened me, but also protected me from the greater evil of accommodating myself to that reality. And so it never occurred to me to take an interest in the names of our superiors, or to join the circles of the influential, or to participate in camp politics. I learned about this only later, when I read the testimonies of others. Even as an interpreter, and later as a medic, I remained one of the herd, another cell in the body of mass fear." In recent correspondence, Pahor has written that he was too involved with his inner life to notice as much of the power struggles; in Pilgrim he acknowledges the other memoirs, which name the perpetrators by name, place and date.
"For a long time I've been aware that my own experiences were modest compared to what others described in their memoirs. Blaha, Levi, Rousset, Bruck, Ragot, Pappalettera. And that I wasn't observant enough. I was trapped in my dark world, a hollow world populated by shadows. I saw with my eyes, yes, but did not allow those images to reach my heart."

Despite this retreat to interiority, Pahor is constantly turning over in this book, as possibly he even did at the camp, the elements of his past as a Slovene under Italian domination, as an interpreter for Yugoslav prisoners for two years on Lake Garda, of film, children's literature, and other devices which helped him and could help others understand each other and communicate with others. His restless mind only comes to rest, ever so lovingly and regretfully, on the friends and companions he lost: Tolya, Gabriele, Franc, Lief, André, Tomas, Ivo. No last names are mentioned in his book, except of people on outside Natzweiler. By literally placing the reader on a first-name basis to both the good and evil he describes, he draws the reader closer to both.
In addition to the introspection and the lyricism of both his despair and his affection, Pahor's work is distinguished by stylistic consistency and other devices which make his memoir outstandingly literary in comparison to the other authors' more workmanlike uses of language. Beside the allusions noted earlier, he uses metaphors or parts of the body to represent the dislocation of minds and bodies:
"The bewildered herd hastily undresses...the light bulb shows a multitude of bare skulls and ladderlike ribs, while all hands are busy twisting rags into bundles. Emaciated limbs shiver, shift back and forth, and hop to fend off the winds....On this harp of a human chest the wind's cold finger's play a quiet requiem....The body loves the countless warm tongues that lick it....and we forget that beneath the shower room is an oven, and that night and day a stoker heaves human logs into it. Even if the bodies think they may soon be used to heat the water, the pleasure offered by this wet warmth is not lessened..."
Objects and body parts finally commingle and become confused in Dachau, where all 4,000 Natzweiler prisoners still alive were relocated in September 1944:
"...the Dachau parade grounds are an enormous garbage dump, with countless shovels heaving paper, wet rags, broken clogs, and filthy striped bundles onto it out of washroom windows. Among the mattresses that cover the large field are unwrapped paper bandages, worn wooden spoons, and a knife fashioned in prehistoric times. Mattresses with wet stains, empty, lacking the forms that made the indentations in them. Mattresses with naked bodies. Bodies with wounds. Female genitalia with hard, swollen labia. Decomposing labia eight inches wide. More rubbish. More clogs. More heaps of wet, filthy zebra skins laid low by typhus. Next to them, bodies still functioning, undressing on the mattresses. Abandage unraveling like the thread of the insatiable Fates. A bony hand refusing to let go of its wooden spoon..."
As Pahor puts the modern atrocities into a continuuum with the past, the subtext is clearly that of their continuum into the future. "Man is capable of anything. He has drunk wine from the skulls of the vanquished, he has shrunk heads. Twentieth-century Europeans used such heads as desk decorations, heads with grinning teeth. Flayed human skins hung in Dachau, Dr. Blaha writes, like laundry set out to dry...."
To conclude the analyzing and return to the departed, "The shadows of the dead are far away. But maybe they approach when darkness covers the mountain and the terraces are buried under snow, for there are no tourists then. When the shadows come, they do as they used to; they lay the dying down on their snowy biers, then stand in formation, not waiting for a man in boots to count them. In total silence they assess and weigh the messages that drift toward them from the noisy world of the living." ( Pilgrim Among the Shadows, by Boris Pahor, 41)

Hard to Read, Hard to Put Down
This is a unique Holocaust memoir -- a highly literary, poetic, deeply emotional look back at this Slovene medic's experiences in Natweiler and later Dachau, with stops at the tunnels where the V-1 and V-2s were built, and numerous other horrifying anecdotes along the way.

The language of this novel is very personal, and as a medic it is true Mr. Pahor was treated mildly better than some of the patients, and yet, because his view was often as an observer, he suffered greatly by what he saw and did, and by the horrific deaths of those he sought to help and comfort.

An unforgettable memoir that is hard to read, and yet hard to stop reading.

Awfully hard to read
I am reading "Pilgrim Among the Shadows" by Boris Pahor (Orlando, FL, 1995, Harcourt Brace & Co.), a translation by Michael Biggins from the Slovenian of "Nekropola." It appears to be the only work by Pahor to have been translated into English.

Pahor's experience was in Natzweiler -- and later in Dachau. He tells the
grisly tale of how Italy persecuted the speakers of Slovenian and
Serbo-Croatian in the areas it annaxed after World War I and expanded into after the outbreak of World War II. For Pahor, a Triestino Jew barred from speaking his own language and whose main memories are of gravestones on which the names were italianized and of the main Slovenian library in Trieste being burned to the ground by blackshirted fascists, Natzweiler (he does not explain why he ended in that camp high in the Vosges mountains of France) proved that the ties among "Yugoslavs" were strong despite the signs of breakup after the death of Tito.

This is a literary memoir -- awfully hard to read with constant flashbacks
from present to past and back again -- that does flesh out some horrors.
For example, the hot water in the showers at Natzweiler came from boilers placed above the crematorium ovens (something I did not find in
Buchenwald).

Peculiarly, Pahor hardly mentions his own Jewishness. ... Read more

Product Description
NSK is considered by many to be the last true avant-garde of the twentieth century and the most consistently challenging artistic force in Eastern Europe today. The acronym refers to Neue Slowenische Kunst, a Slovene collective that emerged in the wake of Tito's death and was shaped by the breakup of Yugoslavia. Its complex and disturbing work—in fields including experimental music and theater, painting, philosophy, writing, performance, and design—has an international following but a powerful and specific cultural context. Within the NSK organization are a number of divisions, the best-known of which is Laibach, an alternative music group known for its blending of popular culture with subversive politics, high art with underground provocation—reflecting the political and cultural chaos of its time.

In Interrogation Machine, Alexei Monroe offers the first critical appraisal of the entire NSK phenomenon, from its elaborate organizational structure and its internal logics to its controversial public actions. The result is a fascinating portrait not only of NSK but of the complex political and cultural context within which it operates. Monroe analyzes the paradoxes, perplexities, and traumas of NSK's work at its deepest levels. His investigation of the relationships between conceptual content, stylistic method, and ideological subtext demonstrates the relevance of NSK in general and Laibach in particular to current debates about culture, power, war, politics, globalization, the marketplace, and life itself. As Slavoj Zizek writes in his foreword, "Today, the lesson of Laibach is more pertinent than ever."

Monroe uses a variety of theoretical and historical approaches, as is appropriate to the shifting and elusive nature of his subject. The use of theory reflects NSK's own theoretical engagement; it is also a valuable way to read the issues raised by the work. Neither oversimplifying nor uncritically mystifying, Monroe leaves intact the "gaps, contradictions, and shadows" inherent in his subject, demonstrating that "it should still be possible to appreciate the work as art that moves, confuses, agitates, or fascinates." ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Feh.
The author seems a fan who covered the band as a dissertation topic, not first and foremost research. a recurring theme in Laibach's/NSKs work and is unrelenting references to European parahistory; references to freemasonry, esoterism, etc. None of this is covered in the book. Here are only a few examples; "How The West Was Won" from "Opus Dei" is verbatim "The Entered Apprentice's Song"; the lyrics can be searched online to read them. "Opus Dei" is riddled with masonic references and allusions to conspiracy theories - the title itself for one (a conservative Catholic religious order), the song "Fiat" includes a recitation of "fortitude, prudence, temperance, justice", a frequent formulation in Masonic Entered Apprentice Degree Work. The references in the recording sleeve for "Nova Akropola" are almost lifted entirely from the last page of "The Occult and the Third Reich" by Jean-Michel Angebert, and the cover is a manipulation of Anselm Keiffer painting of The Reichstag. Again, none of this appears in the book (painting might have been noted, I don't think so though). It was nice someone made coverage of laibach and NSK - but it didn't seem to include actually researching the content - just discussing initial impressions in Postmodern manner.

Difficult, but generally on target
OK Laibach fans, I broke down and bought the book knowing that it would probably be very academic in style.Well, it is.Somewhat surprisingly, the author admits as much in the Preface.He flat out states that there are some chapters that people may want to skip and that that's just fine.

Here's some comments in a fairly random order:

-This book is interesting in that it provides a lot of the Slovenian context for Laibach's work.As an American, I have always found Laibach's use of totalitarian imagery as challenging.But, I always saw it as an aesthetic statement, often intended with humor behind it.Which I still believe it is.However, in the Slovenian context, it's more than that.The specific images chosen and in some cases the exact music and lyrics/quotes sampled were very provocative to Slovenes.I believe that the author is correct in describing that both reactions were intended.Laibach was trying to make a very Slovene statement AND were trying to make an international statement.Most Laibach art is intended to have multiple interpretations, leaving the audience to either figure it out or be faced with other audience members right in front of them having the opposite reaction.The authors description of Laibach audiences including both right wing skinheads and left wingers touches on this.The bigger idea is that Slovenia became part of the world by becoming itself.

-The author describes a number of times that Laibach was also interrogating western market economics in the 90s in the same way that it interrogated eastern totalitarianism.I get that this is partially true but to me the case is weaker."Market censorship" is self-chosen by the audiences and therefore is not the same as using force.It's much more of a situation like in the movie The Matrix where as long as people know they have a choice at some level, they are willing to go along.And, just as there was always an option for some number of people to opt out, that case exists in the West.It's even becoming more practical as the interconnections between people expands across the internet.

-There is some really interesting philosophy embedded here describing how the most threatening thing that can be done to power is to actually embrace its vision rather than be cynical about it.Anyone who has worked in a large corporation will get this because there is nothing that stops business productivity more than literally following a company's procedures to the letter.Laibach did this exact thing in Yugoslavia by be more totalitarian than the totalitarians.It's truly interesting to reflect on how power structures actually benefit from people not believing in them rather than believing.

-Ultimately, my interpretation of Laibach's and the NSK State's overall message is that we need to make our peace with tribalism in order to get past it.So, Laibach bring forward the instinctive human desires for power and purity within a group and turns it into an aesthetic experience.We can express it, enjoy it, and participate...then go home.By creating a state without borders, people can choose to be part of a defined group but without the need to fight over territory or force others to do believe differently.Rooting for sports teams, worshipping rock stars, these are all manifestations of this.Laibach's brilliance is that they allow you to see the inherent irony and humor in all of it.And, anything that can be laughed at ceases to be a real threat.

End Result:This is a philosophy book and not a music review.Although, it does have one chapter that talks about the first 4-5 records.If you naturally read philosophy and like Laibach, go for it.If you only like the music, then you may want to pass.If you don't like either the music or philosophy then I am really surprised you're reading this review. ... Read more

Product Description
For more than 1,300 years Slovenes had lived in Eastern Europe without having a separate Slovene state, but in December of 1990, they voted for independence, or, put more appropriately, for _disassociation_ from Yugoslavia. Unfortunately, Slovenia had to fight for its independence, which it did not fully achieve until 1995 after its bloody disintegration with Yugoslavia was over. Since independence, however, Slovenia has prospered; its economy is far ahead of other former communist states and in 2004 Slovenia acceded to both NATO and the European Union, the only republic of former Yugoslavia to do so.The A to Z of Slovenia covers the history of Slovenia and its struggle to gain independence from communism. This is done through a detailed chronology, an introduction, appendixes, a bibliography, and hundreds of cross-referenced dictionary entries on some of the more significant persons, places, and events; institutions and organizations; and political, economic, social, cultural, and religious facets. ... Read more

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High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Slovenian People's Liberation Council (SNOS) (Slovene: Slovenski Narodnoosvobodilni Svet) was formed as the highest governing organ of anti-fascist movement in Slovenia during World War II. The president of its presidium was Josip Vidmar. SNOS was formed on February 19, 1944 in ?rnomelj when the 120-member plenum of Liberation Front of the Slovenian People opted to change its name to SNOS and proclaim itself as the temporary Slovenian parliament. One of its most important decisions was that after the end of the war Slovenia would become a states within the Yugoslav federation. ... Read more

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High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The Slovenian Independence War sometimes called the Ten-Day War, was a brief military conflict between Slovenian TO (Slovenian Territorial Defence) and the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) in 1991 following Slovenia's declaration of independence. Following the death of Yugoslav president Josip Broz Tito in 1980, underlying political, ethnic, religious, and economic tensions within Yugoslavia surfaced. ... Read more

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High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Siegmund (Sigismund) Freiherr von Herberstein (or Baron Sigismund von Herberstein), (August 23, 1486 ? March 28, 1566) was an Carniolan diplomat, writer, historian and member of the Holy Roman Empire Imperial Council. He was most noted for his extensive writing on the geography, history and customs of Russia and contributed greatly to early Western European knowledge of that area. Herberstein was born in 1486 in Vipava (German Wippach) in the Duchy of Carniola (now Slovenia, then part of the Habsburg Monarchy) to Leonhard von Herberstein and Barbara von Lueg, members of the prominent German-speaking family which had already resided in Herberstein Castle for nearly 200 years. Little is known of his early life apart from the fact that he became familiar with the Slovene language spoken in the region. This knowledge became significant later in his life. ... Read more

Product Description
By and large, the books on Jewish demography andsocial relations are in short supply. It is even moretrue as to research dealing with the tiny Jewishcommunities in Eastern and South Central Europe,where either inaccessibility of the archives duringthe Soviet era or lack of scholarly tradition haveimpeded such studies for decades. This book providesthe fresh gaze into Jewish history from theperspective of modern times and culture. It focuseson the social mobility of Estonian and SlovenianJewish intelligentsia and doing that draws on theunique archival sources. Jews and education presentsitself as one of the main motifs and thrust in Jewishculture during the Modern Era. Recurrently strugglingagainst the various odds in history, many Jewsavailed themselves of a specific modus operandi ¿early schooling and striving for educationalexcellence in higher learning institutions ¿ eitherto accomplish career related pursuits or find bothsocial and political acceptance among the hostsocieties. The study should have a positive value forthe broad circle of people and academics alike whoare interested in remarkable facets of Jewish historyand European history in general. ... Read more

Product Description

These three volumes deal with the Iron Age grave materials from Magdalenska gora, excavated by the Duchess Paul Friedrich von Mecklenburg-Schwerin. The Duchess of Mecklenburg, a member of an Austrian royal family with estates in Slovenia, conducted her excavations in the early years of the twentieth century. The materials from Magdalenska gora were punchased by the Peabodt Museum in the 1930s. Volume III presents data and analysis of the horse remains and human skeletal materials.

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"We must believe with all our hearts and souls that He is with us. He is a God of love!" So shouted Jakob, the evangelist, as the German tanks roared across Yugoslavian soil, and machine guns, motorcycles and Messerschmitts screamed in the hills.

Out of the sky came the Stukas. They nosed over, dropped their bombs and veered off into the cold blue. The wagon in front of them was hit. The donkey was dead, and the driver lay mutilated in the brush at the side of the road.

"This is war," said the gray-clad officer. "The only place you will be safe is in the grave."

Weak and divided, the Yugoslavians fought back. Their ill-equipped guerrillas chewed on the German army like vermin on the flanks of a stallion. They cut phone lines, laid mines, dynamited bridges and blew up armored cars. Their stubborn war cry was, "Better grave than slave!" But, for every German they killed a hundred Yugoslavs were shot in retaliation.

In the midst of this living hell, Jakob, Jozeca and other believers clung to God and prayed for both friend and foe. The enemies of their beloved homeland could burn their cities and towns, but they could not destroy their souls or quench their indomitable spirits.

Marie Chapian went to Yugoslavia and interviewed peasants, gypsies, factory workers, doctors, laborers, and officials of the Communist party. She wanted to know how the Christians' faith was sustained through those terrible years of war, famine and cold. She learned that they had simply clung to God with an almost incredible fait ... Read more

Customer Reviews (8)

The sons of Jacob & Jozeca Kovac
The closing quotation of the book is a godly mother's exhortation to her sons:

"Janez, Josip---listen to me.Tell them in America and all over the world that we love God.Tell them about us in the Balkans.Tell them about our great God who loves all men.Tell them about Him, my sons.He will help you.

She looked at the faces of her sons, strong, unafraid to suffer, unafraid to sacrifice, with hearts as gentle as lambs, yet brave as bulls.'Because of these sons of mine whom the Lord gave to Jakob Kavoc and me.' she thought, 'and to thousands of believers all over the world from America to Australia, there is hope.Hope for Jugoslavia, hope for the whole world.'And she believed that.

"Of Whom The World Was Not Worthy" was published in 1978, eleven years before the Berlin Wall fell.At the time, it would have been dangerous to reveal their identities.Although a slice of my personal life story touched that of Janez and Josip Kovac (their real names are Marijan & Martin Hlasten) at a little village in Germany and then in Sweden during the early 70s, almost 40 years would pass before we'd be linked in a fellowship of the heart.

This review is submitted while I'm a guest in the home of Marijan & Jackie Hlasten in McKinney, Texas (2/28/2010)

Ron Forberg

OF WHOM THE WORLD WAS NOT WORTHYT
I had already read this book, but it was such a blessing to me I wanted to own it to share it with others.OF WHOM THE WORLD WAS NOT WORTHY was a wonderful story of retaining one's faith in the face of the worst kinds of adversities.I wish everyone could read it.My purchase was through Amazon.com and I was amazed to get a used book that looked like new.

A Must Read
This book is not only a page turner, but it will affect the reader profoundly.I've read it three times with the same brokenness and conviction each time.I believe it will cause each reader to search his/her own soul and think about how how he/she would respond in similar circumstances as the characters in this true story.It motivates the reader to take steps to build a depth of relationship with God that will stand up to such testing.It details faith in everyday practice that prays against incredible evil and stands against all odds--until victory comes.The testimony of the characters in this book leaves the reader with renewed hope in a loving, faithful God.

The Best Book I've Ever Read
This book was, by far, the most moving, challenging, and faith inspiring books I've ever read. It is a must read for every Christian!

Reading This Book Will Move You To Tears
Of Whom The World Was Not Worthy, by Marie Chapian, is one of the most moving books I have read during my Christian walk.It truly lives up to it's name, because the family described in this book, primarily Jacob Kovac and his wife, Jozeca, were truly of whom the world was not worthy.The faith that they held on to, while enduring one of the most horrific times our world has ever seen, is truly awe inspiring. I'm still amazed at how Jozeca managed to have three children under the circumstances she lived in.Especially the second child which she gave birth to during the war.She was on the battlefield away from her husband and family and stayed there supporting the resistance effort until she went into labor.Jozeca was a woman of prayer, and the LORD Jesus heard and answered her prayers. This book is truly a reminder that our God is an awesome God and "For with God nothing shall be impossible."(Luke 1:37).This book was wonderful to read and if you are going through any faith trials right now, just read this book and it will help you get a new perspective on your situation. ... Read more

Product Description
Illustrated with black-and-white photographs and one print. Text in Slovenian. ... Read more

Product Description
New concepts and strategies are needed to manage the pressure put on regions as yet unexploited by the leisure industry, changes in agriculture towards intensive farming, extensive farming, and the space needed for urban expansion and the infrastructure these requires. This is true for every Alpine country. In Slovenia, the issue is compounded by the recent change to the political system which has brought increasing economic opportunities for marketing the country's protected areas and for profit to be made from their use, for example, in the tourism industry. Starting with the status quo and focusing on the country's arrangements for protected areas, thos dissertation goes on to present the plans the Slovenian state intends to implement. This is followed by an exposition of the problems of public acceptance of the plans and the resulting conflicts in society and among the local population, illustrated with examples such as the Triglav National Park in the Julian Alps biosphere reserve. Many of Slovenia's policy-makers are convinced that introducing conservation measures would ruin future economic opportunities. Thus far, the economic potential of sustainable countryside development has not been recognised. Slovenia's government wants to set up protected areas and thereby contribute to sustainable development, but a lack of expertise and finance as well as inadequate management structures are hampering the establishment and further development of the old protected areas which were set up before the 1995 Seville Strategy and are purely research facilities devoted solely to nature conservation. German text. ... Read more