Paul Kriwaczek (1937–2011)

Em Babilônia, Paul Kriwaczek conta a história da antiga Mesopotâmia, desde as primeiras povoações, em torno de 5400 a.C., até a chegada dos persas no século VI a.C. O autor faz a crônica da ascensão e queda do reino babilônico durante esse período e analisa suas numerosas inovações materiais, sociais e culturais. O povo da Mesopotâmia lançou as bases do que hoje conhecemos como civilização – com o nascimento da escrita, do estado centralizado, da divisão do trabalho, da religião organizada, da matemática e da lei, entre muitas outras coisas fundamentais que nos servem até hoje. Nas cidades que construíram se desenrolou metade da história humana. No cerne da magistral narrativa de Kriwaczek está a glória da Babilônia ― “o portal dos deuses” ―, que teve seu apogeu no reinado do soberano amorita Hamurábi, que unificou a cidade entre 1800 e 1750 a.C. Embora o poder babilônico viesse a crescer e depois declinar nos séculos seguintes, a Babilônia preservou sua importância como centro cultural, religioso e político por mais de 4 mil anos.… (meer)

I have to admit that at first I was skeptical about this book. Kriwaczek is regularly cited in other studies for his original views, but with his profile as a television producer I feared the worst. I previously had bad experiences with his colleagues R. Miles (Ancient World) and Michael Wood (In search of First Civilizations). Indeed, occasionally this book contains passages that needlessly turn history into a dramatic narrative. The author also follows the organic model of civilization, going from birth, to rise and bloom, ending with fall, which is strange so many years after Spengler and Toynbee. But at the same time, this book certainly is thoroughly researched, and it contains a number of views that are indeed stimulating. So, in the end a bit of a mixed feelings about this book. Rating 2.5 stars. A more detailed review in my History Account on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3716358183… (meer)

Engaging history, multidextrous, sprinting through two thousand years of swirling, unfocused history to achieve its own unfocused swirl. Whenever people reminisce of Yiddish they seem too nostalgic for the `boue` of the impoverished shtetl, or for the anti-Zionist idealism of the Bundt and their insistence on doikayt — though either way, they are forgetting the thousands of Jewish history in Europe that preceded those Fiddler days. Those thousands of years of history is what this book tries to narrate, infused into the wider European and global history.

So much history here, packed into such a small area. Yiddish(ele) is the language of diminutive suffixes, and really only arrives a quarter or a third of the way into the book, with the Cambridge codex from 1382 (found in Cairo, not Ashkenaz.) Kriwaczek deftly explains what Yiddish is: Definitely not a straightforward combination of the most useful parts of German and Hebrew and Slavic, but a mishmash of them, organically formed over the course of centuries.

In the beginning, Kriwaczek seems to conjecture, Jews may have moved deeper and deeper into the woods of sparsely-populated Eastern Europe from the more populated Mediterranean areas. And what about the infamous Khazar theory? Not discussed, perhaps indicating the author's unfitness for historiographic review, which could have made this highly contested topic more interesting. He mentions the influence of Tatar (think the nomadic Turkic-Mongols) on modern-day Hasidic dress (think furry black hats, shtreimels) via Polish nobility. He discusses the impact of the Protest Reformation on the Jews — seemingly a disastrous one, leading to turmoil and expulsions, following the ones from England and Spain. He discusses the Hassidic-Mitnaged split, and the many famous characters and heroes and even antagonists of Yiddish civ and of the Jewish world in general (like the Rama, the false messiah Shabtai Zvi, the Besht, Moses Mendelson...) One of my favorite parts was the story of Glikel of Hameln -- a matriarch who wrote a diary after her husband died, the tale of an ordinary life of a grieving Yiddish-speaking woman.

So much is missing, too! I was looking for some description of the Yiddish theater scene. Perhaps a word or two about Spinoza (did he not speak Yiddish?), and many more words about the exile of Jews from Palesine, and nothing, really, comes after the World War I in the this book. Alas.… (meer)

It seemed to be a very rambling story. The information wasn't organized well. It would have been better if it was chronological. The main part of the book is also history lessons on almost everything but Zarathustra. I suppose I was expecting more about Zoroastrianism and how it affected the traditions of later religions. Also, the way it's written makes it harder to get through. It's not very conversational. It feels stuffy. I've read textbooks that were more clearly written. The redeeming factor in all of this is that it does offer some information, if not exactly what I was looking for. The joke on the last line isn't too bad either.… (meer)