This gripping and heartbreaking narrative is the first full account of an American woman who gave her life in the struggle against the Nazi regime. As members of a key resistance group, Mildred Harnack and her husband, Arvid, assisted in the escape of German Jews and political dissidents, and for years provided vital economic and military intelligence to both Washington and Moscow. But in 1942, following a Soviet blunder, the Gestapo arrested, tortured, and tried some four score members of the Harnacks' group, which the Nazis dubbed the Red Orchestra. Mildred Fish-Harnack was guillotined in Berlin on February 16, 1943, on the personal instruction of Adolf Hitler--she was the only American woman to be executed as an underground conspirator during World War II. Yet as the war ended and the Cold War began, her courage, idealism, and self-sacrifice went largely unacknowledged in America and the democratic West, and were distorted and sanitized in the Communist East. Only now, with the opening of long-sealed archives from Germany, the KGB, the CIA, and the FBI, can the full story be told. In this superbly told life of an unjustly forgotten woman, Shareen Blair Brysac depicts the human side of a controversial resistance group that for too long has been portrayed as merely a Soviet espionage network.

Resisting Hitler: Mildred Harnack and the Red Orchestra

Biographies & Memoirs

Brysac, Shareen Blair

Community & Culture

Oxford University Press

The original Great Game (1800-1917), the clandestine struggle between Russia and Britain for mastery of Central Asia, has long been regarded as one of the greatest geopolitical conflicts in history. The prize, control of the vast Eurasian heartland, was believed by some to be the key to world domination. Teeming with improbable drama and exaggerated tensions, the conflict featured soldiers, mystics and spies, among them some of history's most colourful and romantic characters.While the original Great Game ended with the Russian Revolution, the geopolitical wrangles for territory and power have continued into the late twentieth century - culminating in the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Karl Meyer and Shareen Brysac's magisterial one-volume survey chronicles nearly two centuries of conflict in vivid and compelling fashion.

Tournament of Shadows : The Great Game and the Race for Empire in Central Asia

History

Meyer, Karl E.

Asia

Little,Brown & Co

A brilliant narrative history tracing today's troubles back to grandiose imperial overreach of Great Britain and the United States.Kingmakers is the story of how the modern Middle East came to be, told through the lives of the Britons and Americans who shaped it. Some are famous (Lawrence of Arabia and Gertrude Bell); others infamous (Harry St. John Philby, father of Kim); some forgotten (Sir Mark Sykes, Israel's godfather, and A. T. Wilson, the territorial creator of Iraq); some controversial (the CIA's Miles Copeland and the Pentagon's Paul Wolfowitz). All helped enthrone rulers in a region whose very name is an Anglo-American invention. As a bonus, we meet the British Empire's power couple, Lord and Lady Lugard (Flora Shaw): she named Nigeria, he ruled it; she used the power of the Times of London to attempt a regime change in the gold-rich Transvaal. The narrative is character-driven, and the aim is to restore to life the colorful figures who for good or ill gave us the Middle East in which Americans are enmeshed today. 30; 2 maps

Kingmakers: The Invention of the Modern Middle East

Middle East

W.W.Norton&Company

A brilliant narrative history tracing today’s troubles back to the grandiose imperial overreach of Great Britain and the United States.Kingmakers is the gripping story of how the modern Middle East came to be, as told through the lives of the Britons and Americans who shaped it. Some are famous (Lawrence of Arabia and Gertrude Bell); others infamous (Harry St. John Philby, father of Kim); some forgotten (Sir Mark Sykes, Israel’s godfather, and A. T. Wilson, the territorial creator of Iraq). All helped enthrone rulers in a region whose very name is an Anglo-American invention. The aim of this engrossing character-driven narrative is to restore to life the colorful figures who gave us the Middle East in which Americans are enmeshed today. 30 illustrations; 2 maps

**One of The Washington Post's Notable Nonfiction Books of 2015**
Thanks to Salem sea captains, Gilded Age millionaires, curators on horseback and missionaries gone native, North American museums now possess the greatest collections of Chinese art outside of East Asia itself. How did it happen? The China Collectors is the first full account of a century-long treasure hunt in China from the Opium Wars and the Boxer Rebellion to Mao Zedong's 1949 ascent.
The principal gatherers are mostly little known and defy invention. They included "foreign devils" who braved desert sandstorms, bandits and local warlords in acquiring significant works. Adventurous curators like Langdon Warner, a forebear of Indiana Jones, argued that the caves of Dunhuang were already threatened by vandals, thereby justifying the removal of frescoes and sculptures. Other Americans include George Kates, an alumnus of Harvard, Oxford and Hollywood, who fell in love with Ming furniture. The Chinese were divided between dealers who profited from the artworks' removal, and scholars who sought to protect their country's patrimony. Duanfang, the greatest Chinese collector of his era, was beheaded in a coup and his splendid bronzes now adorn major museums. Others in this rich tapestry include Charles Lang Freer, an enlightened Detroit entrepreneur, two generations of Rockefellers, and Avery Brundage, the imperious Olympian, and Arthur Sackler, the grand acquisitor. No less important are two museum directors, Cleveland's Sherman Lee and Kansas City's Laurence Sickman, who challenged the East Coast's hegemony.
Shareen Blair Brysac and Karl E. Meyer even-handedly consider whether ancient treasures were looted or salvaged, and whether it was morally acceptable to spirit hitherto inaccessible objects westward, where they could be studied and preserved by trained museum personnel. And how should the US and Canada and their museums respond now that China has the means and will to reclaim its missing patrimony?

The China Collectors: America's Century-Long Hunt for Asian Art Treasures

Arts & Photography

History & Criticism

St.Martin's Press

A history of the struggle for mastery in Centra Asia

Tournament of Shadows: The Great Game and the Race for Empire in Central Asia

Basic Books

The original Great Game (1800–1917), the clandestine struggle between Russia and Britain for mastery of Central Asia, has long been regarded as one of the greatest geopolitical conflicts in history. The prize, control of the vast Eurasian heartland, was believed by some to be key to world dominion. Teeming with improbable drama and exaggerated tensions, the conflict featured soldiers, mystics, archeologists, and spies, among them some of history's most colorful characters.While the original Great Game ended with the Russian Revolution, the geopolitical struggles in Central Asia continue to the present day. Beginning with the soldiers and propagandists of the Victorian era, Tournament of Shadows chronicles nearly two centuries of conflict in the Eurasian heartland, conflict that has spawned wars in Afghanistan, the invasion of Tibet, and economic scrambles for control of Caspian oil. Karl E. Meyer, formerly of the New York Times, and his wife, Shareen Blair Brysac, formerly of CBS News, have created a vivid narrative that brings to life the engaging personalities in this colorful conflict:• Russia's greatest explorer, Nicholas Przhevalsky, who died trying to shoot his way to Lhasa;• Nicholas Roerich, the Russian artist and mystic who searched for fabled Shambhala under the patronage of Henry Wallace, the American Secretary of Agriculture;• Philadelphia socialite Brooke Dolan, like a figure out of Hemingway, who reached Lhasa as an OSS operative;• SS Captain Ernst Schäfer, who led an expedition to Tibet in the late 1930s in an attempt to confirm Nazi racial theories;• William Rockhill, the first American to befriend and advise a Dalai Lama;• Sarat Chandra Das, the Bengali explorer who went to Lhasa in the secret service of the Raj.Revealing a wealth of new material that has never before been published, Meyer and Brysac have written a sweeping history of a riveting tournament, a two-century joust with political and economic implications that remain as topical today as this morning's newspaper.

In a world replete with stories of sectarian violence, we are often left wondering: Are there places where people of different ethnicities, especially with significant Muslim minorities, live in peace? If so, why haven't we heard more about them, and what explains their success?
 To answer these questions, Karl Meyer and Shareen Brysac undertook a two-year exploration of oases of civility, places notable for minimal violence, rising life-expectancy, high literacy, and pragmatic compromises on cultural rights. They explored the Indian state of Kerala, the Russian republic of Tatarstan, the city of Marseille in France, the city of Flensburg, Germany, and the borough of Queens, New York. Through scores of interviews, they document ways and means that have proven successful in defusing ethnic tensions. This pathbreaking book elegantly blends political history, sociology, anthropology, and journalism, to provide big ideas for peace.

Pax Ethnica: Where and How Diversity Succeeds

Politics & Social Sciences

Social Sciences

PublicAffairs

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Brysac, Shareen Blair. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Brysac, Shareen Blair

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Brysac, Shareen Blair. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Resisting Hitler: Mildred Harnack and the Red Orchestra

Resisting Hitler: Mildred Harnack and the Red Orchestra

Tournament of Shadows : The Great Game and the Race for Empire in Central Asia

Kingmakers: The Invention of the Modern Middle East

Kingmakers: The Invention of the Modern Middle East

The China Collectors: America's Century-Long Hunt for Asian Art Treasures

Tournament of Shadows: The Great Game and the Race for Empire in Central Asia

Tournament of Shadows: The Great Game and the Race for Empire in Central Asia

Pax Ethnica: Where and How Diversity Succeeds