Everyone else has been doing it, so here are the five non-fiction titles I’ve most enjoyed in 2007 in no particular order (no fiction because I’ve been reading 1930s and 1940s novels):
Simon Sebag Montefiore, Young Stalin
An absolute corker: lots of stuff from the Georgian archives and a stunning narrative. You couldn’t make it up.
Claude Lefort, Complications: Communism and the Dilemmas of Democracy
Veteran French libertarian democratic leftist responds (belatedly in English translation) to the hardcore French anticommunist histories of the 20th century. They’re not tough enough intellectually, he says. Right on!
Patrick Wright, Iron Curtain: From Stage to Cold War
Not quite sure it coheres, but this is a great history of the left’s delusions about Soviet communism.
Kenneth O Morgan, Michael Foot: A Life
Very readable and perhaps over-friendly, but hey, a solid piece of work on a lovely geezer.
Nick Cohen, What’s Left: How Liberals Lost Their Way
Well, I would, wouldn’t I?
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