The collapse of Communism in Central and Eastern Europe opened the doors to cultural treasures that for decades had been hidden, forgotten, or misinterpreted. Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann looks at Central Europe as a cultural entity while chronicling more than three hundred years of painting, sculpture, and architecture in Germany, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Austria, Ukraine, Lithuania and western parts of the Russian Federation. Kaufmann surveys a remarkable range of art and artifacts created from the coming of the Renaissance through to the Enlightenment.

"Kaufmann throws considerable light on one of the more neglected and least understood periods in art history."—Philadelphia Inquirer

"A wonderful book which does justice both to a formal analysis of the art and to an explanation of broader political and economic forces at work."—Virginia Quarterly Review

"Important and stimulating, Kaufmann's study examines the cultural legacy of a region too little known and understood."—Choice

"Peaks of the creative heritage which [Kaufmann] describes reserve their message—and their surprises—for those who visit them in situ. But invest in Kaufmann's volume before you go."—R. J. W. Evans, New York Review of Books

Václav Houžvicka describes the development of the Czech-German national controversies from the mid-nineteenth century, through the establishing of the Czechoslovak Republic in 1918, to the beginning of the twenty-first century. He focuses primarily on the tragic end of the nations’ coexistence in 1938–1945 and the differing Czech and German understandings of the reasons for the removal of Germans from the Czechoslovak Republic after 1945 in the latter part of the twentieth century. Houžvicka clarifies the relationships between Czech, German, and Sudeten-German identities within the international and social-economic context of the twentieth century.

In Fragile Dreams, John A. Gould examines Central European communism, why it failed, and what has come since. Moving loosely chronologically from 1989 to the present, each chapter focuses on topics of importance to the fields of comparative politics, sociology, and feminist and gender studies. He draws heavily from his own research and experience as well as case studies of the former Czechoslovakia, Western Balkans, and Hungary—but much of the analysis has general applicability to the broader postcommunist region.

Broad in its coverage, this academically rigorous book is ideal for students, travelers, and general readers. Gould writes in the first person and seamlessly blends theory with stories both from the existing literature and from 30 years of regional personal experience with family and friends. Throughout, Gould introduces key concepts, players, and events with precise definitions. Wherever possible, he emphasizes marginalized narratives, centering theory and stories that are often overlooked in standard comparative political science literature.