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The Real North Korea: Life And Politics In The Failed Stalinist Utopia (2013)

by Andrei Lankov(Favorite Author)

4.06 of 5 Votes: 4

ISBN

0199964297 (ISBN13: 9780199964291)

languge

English

genre

History & Biography

publisher

Oxford University Press, USA

review 1: Странно, но из-за фрагментарного преподавания истории в школе мне не приходила в голову вполне логичная мысль - за Северную Корею ответственен СССР, а затем уже - Ким Ир Сен (заботливо подобранный представителями СССР как советский кореец), не согласившийся с десталинизацией и превративший страну в хор собственного воспевания посреди тюряги. Самыми интересными являются части про возвышение Ким Ир Сена и про бытовую жизнь, к�... more�торую смог заметить Ланьков.
review 2: This is a really fascinating book into one of the world's geopolitical curiosities: the hereditary Communist monarchy of North Korea. The author, Andrei Lankov, was born in the USSR, studied in Pyongyang in the 1980s, and is presently a professor at a university in Seoul, which means that he writes about this closed-off country with particular insight. There were times when it got a little repetitive (for example, I lost track of the number of times Lankov pointed out that DVDs and USB drives were allowing information about the outside world to enter North Korea in previously unheard-of quantities), but I found Lankov's conclusions to be pragmatic and largely persuasive. He argues that North Korea's leaders are not moustache-twirling madmen, but that their actions are driven by very rational considerations—indeed, the responses of international governments (largely South Korea, China and the U.S.) have spurred on their sabre-rattling and made them far less likely to give up their nuclear weapons. Definitely interesting and accessible to a popular audience. less

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