In the Midst of Civilized Europe

Veidlinger’s book ranks alongside Timothy Snyder’s Bloodlands in forcing our eyes eastwards. It is deeply researched and masterfully written, with a cool restraint that only intensifies its power. It reminded me of Faulkner’s line that “the past is never dead. It’s not even past.” – Patrick Bishop * The Sunday Telegraph *[An] exhaustive, clearly written, deeply researched story of events in a time and place most of us know nearly nothing about - the pogroms of 1918-21 in Ukraine and Poland … [an] imortant and scholalry book. – David Aaronovitch * The Times *We now know much more about the pogroms of 1918–21 because of Veidlinger’s painstaking research … he has succeeded in shining a bright scholarly light on a much less well-known attempt to exterminate European Jews two decades before the Holocaust. In its thoroughness and controlled passion, In the Midst of Civilized Europe is descriptive history at its best. – David N Myers * Literary Review *Superbly researched … Jeffrey Veidlinger askes big historical questions that will change our understanding of the relation between pogroms immediately after the First World War and the Holocaust, barely twenty years later. – David Herman * TLS *Revelatory … Veidlinger’s crisp prose and extensive research makes the scale of the tragedy immediate and devastating. This is a vital addition to understanding how the Holocaust happened. * Publishers Weekly *Chilling … unequivocal … A vital history that draws a direct line from Eastern European antisemitic violence to the Holocaust. * Kirkus Reviews *No history of that Jewish catastrophe comes close to the virtuosity of research, clarity of prose, and power of analysis of this extraordinary book. – Timothy Snyder, author of BloodlandsThis brilliant account of the bloody pogroms, which were perpetrated in Ukraine during the Russian Revolution, represents an important advance on a neglected subject. – Norman Davies, author of God’s Playground, Europe: A History and Vanished KingdomsA work of singular importance: a meticulous, original and deeply affecting historical account, one that provides new insights into the conditions that catalyzed mass-murder on an industrial scale. – Philippe Sands, author of East West StreetCompelling and well-written, the book will find a broad audience. This is a story that needs to be told. – Ronald Grigor Suny, author of Stalin: Passage to RevolutionIn this deeply learned but highly readable book, Veidlinger demonstrates how the all-but-forgotten pogroms in the collapsing Russian Empire in 1918–21 set precedents for the horrors that were to follow just two decades later. – Zvi Gitelman, author of A Century of Ambivalence

Jeffrey Veidlinger is a professor of history and Judaic studies at the University of Michigan and the director of the Frankel Center for Judaic Studies. His books, which include The Moscow State Yiddish Theater and In the Shadow of the Shtetl, have won a National Jewish Book Award, the Barnard Hewitt Award for Theatre Scholarship, two Canadian Jewish Book Awards, and the J. I. Segal Award. He lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan.