Este sitio utiliza cookies para ofrecer nuestros servicios, mejorar el rendimiento, análisis y (si no estás registrado) publicidad. Al usar LibraryThing reconoces que has leído y comprendido nuestros términos de servicio y política de privacidad. El uso del sitio y de los servicios está sujeto a estas políticas y términos.
The treasures of Quedlinburg ... the Trojan gold ... the Amber Room. These fabled objects are only the tiny summit of an immense mountain of artifacts - artistic, religious, historic - that were sold, confiscated, stolen, dismembered, defaced, destroyed, or buried as Europe succumbed first to the greed and fury of the Nazis and then to the ravages of war. Now, in a riveting account brimming with tales of courage and sacrifice, of venality and beastliness, Lynn H. Nicholas meticulously reconstructs the full story of this act of cultural rape and its aftermath. In doing so, she offers a new perspective on the history of the Third Reich and of World War II. From the day Hitler came to power, art was a matter of highest priority to the Reich. He and other Nazis (especially Hermann Goering) were ravenous collectors, stopping at nothing to acquire paintings and sculpture, as well as coins, books, tapestries, jewels, furniture - everything. Their insatiable appetite (feared by the museum directors who sent their collections into hiding as war loomed) whipped the international art market into a frenzy of often sleazy dealing. When the German occupation of Poland, France, the Low Countries, and finally Italy began, a colossal wave of organized and casual pillage stripped entire countries of their heritage as works of art were subjected to confiscation, wanton destruction, concealment in damp mines, and perilous transport across combat zones.
Meanwhile, in Washington and London curators and scholars campaigned energetically to convince President Franklin Roosevelt, Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and, most importantly, General Dwight Eisenhower to add the protection of art and edifices to the Allied invasion agenda. The landings in Italy and France, and the ultimate victory of the Allies, brought a dedicated corps of "Monuments officers" to the ravaged continent. On the front lines or immediately behind, they shored up bombed churches, cleaned the vandalized buildings and collections, and rescued great masterpieces such as the Ghent altarpiece from the mines. The Monuments officers spent six years locating and sorting huge repositories of treasure, and restoring their contents to museums and surviving owners. But much that was destroyed or stolen (by the Nazis and Soviets in organized looting and by individuals of all nations) has never been found. It is a story without an ending. More revelations can be expected in years to come. The facts behind these events will be clear and the human stories deeply moving to all who read Lynn H. Nicholas's impeccably researched, engagingly written account of the rapacity, horror, devotion, and heroism that characterized a unique and terrible era.… (más)
This is the story of the millions of pieces of art stolen and hidden by the Germans or hidden from the Germans during the Second World War. The blurb on the cover says "A scholarly work that reads like a gripping adventure story." This is not true. It is an adventure story, but it reads like a tedious laundry list.
Sadly, this is a poorly written book on a fascinating subject. Its 444 pages provide you with hundreds of names, places, organizations, and most important, works of art. But making sense of who did what to whom and where the stuff went is difficult to accomplish unless, perhaps, you make a spreadsheet while you read. Most annoying were all the hundreds of declarative sentences that opened paragraphs and led nowhere, creating paragraphs that made no sense. I read and reread. Maybe the problem is that there really are so many bits of information and maybe this book is intended for someone doing research, in which case dry doesn't matter, and it would probably be excellent.
I found this book on Amazon when I was looking at The Monuments Men (the book) and read one or more reviews that gave The Rape of Europa higher marks for being more informative. Because the subject interests me I may give the other book a go and see if perhaps, for me, less is more. ( )
If you’ve ever watched “The Monuments Men” movie and wondered ‘How did all the art the Nazi’s looted end up in those mines?’ Well this is the book that answers that question.
But it covers so much more in its densely packed, detailed research driven pages of which The Monuments Men is just a small part.
While the Nazi art confiscation is well documented and told, this book also covers the less talked about destruction of art by both sides (the Allies being particularly destructive in Italy), the bargaining and using of art to buy things such as transit visas, the boom in the world-wide art trade as items previously held in museums or private collections came on the market. While the Nazis did steal a lot, they were also the most rapacious buyers of art and dealers, and forgers, around the world made fortunes off them.
I found it fascinating to read how certain parts of the German infrastructure would hinder the confiscation and transfer of looted art, such as the Army in Paris refusing to supply trucks, or people starting shell companies that could then claim certain collections were “German owned” and stop them from being moved.
There are also stories of ingenious methods used to hide art treasures (sometimes in plain sight), and not so clever (a member of the Rothchild family in Holland burying art under a sand-dune and not marking it or even writing down its location!)
Academic in tone it can be a bit of a slog to get through, but it’s full of interesting stories. ( )
Mixed feelings here. It is a topic I love but there is just SO VERY much detail that it is too much to process. Many of the threads and stories are fascinating, but the reader is swamped in detail. An editor, perhaps? It is a common problem amongst academics- I found all this information and, by George, you are going to read it! Whew. ( )
I liked this book a great deal. For one thing, the author remembered to include copious illustrations, which is a must for a book of this kind. For another, I thought the presentation was cogent and coherent, no easy task when you consider that the transactions involved in this matter -- the wholesale theft and destruction of artwork across Europe in World War II -- were meant to be covered up for one reason or another. A number of other books on this subject have come out ("The Book Thieves," "Nazi Plunder" and "The Lost Museum," to name three), but this one was one of the first, and deserves credit. Recommended. ( )
An epic chronicling the atrocities committed by Hitler and the Nazi Party against the art, history, and culture of Europe. Nicholas has painstakingly recorded with impeccable detail the looting of museums, confiscation of personal collections of Jewish citizens and fleeing refugees, and the burning and systematic destruction of countless works and artifacts deemed "degenerate" by Hitler and his Nazi underlings. The Rape of Europa simultaneously highlights the triumphant resistance efforts and quiet heroism of dedicated museum curators and their assistants, publishers secreting away manuscripts marked for destruction by fire, gallery owners hosting back room exhibitions of banned works, and countless civilians dedicated to the conservation of their cultural icons. Heralded as the "true story" behind the international efforts of the now-famous Monuments Men to spare historical sites and locate hidden and missing works, this is only a single component of this expansive text. A haunting masterpiece of WWII nonfiction. ( )
The treasures of Quedlinburg ... the Trojan gold ... the Amber Room. These fabled objects are only the tiny summit of an immense mountain of artifacts - artistic, religious, historic - that were sold, confiscated, stolen, dismembered, defaced, destroyed, or buried as Europe succumbed first to the greed and fury of the Nazis and then to the ravages of war. Now, in a riveting account brimming with tales of courage and sacrifice, of venality and beastliness, Lynn H. Nicholas meticulously reconstructs the full story of this act of cultural rape and its aftermath. In doing so, she offers a new perspective on the history of the Third Reich and of World War II. From the day Hitler came to power, art was a matter of highest priority to the Reich. He and other Nazis (especially Hermann Goering) were ravenous collectors, stopping at nothing to acquire paintings and sculpture, as well as coins, books, tapestries, jewels, furniture - everything. Their insatiable appetite (feared by the museum directors who sent their collections into hiding as war loomed) whipped the international art market into a frenzy of often sleazy dealing. When the German occupation of Poland, France, the Low Countries, and finally Italy began, a colossal wave of organized and casual pillage stripped entire countries of their heritage as works of art were subjected to confiscation, wanton destruction, concealment in damp mines, and perilous transport across combat zones.
Meanwhile, in Washington and London curators and scholars campaigned energetically to convince President Franklin Roosevelt, Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and, most importantly, General Dwight Eisenhower to add the protection of art and edifices to the Allied invasion agenda. The landings in Italy and France, and the ultimate victory of the Allies, brought a dedicated corps of "Monuments officers" to the ravaged continent. On the front lines or immediately behind, they shored up bombed churches, cleaned the vandalized buildings and collections, and rescued great masterpieces such as the Ghent altarpiece from the mines. The Monuments officers spent six years locating and sorting huge repositories of treasure, and restoring their contents to museums and surviving owners. But much that was destroyed or stolen (by the Nazis and Soviets in organized looting and by individuals of all nations) has never been found. It is a story without an ending. More revelations can be expected in years to come. The facts behind these events will be clear and the human stories deeply moving to all who read Lynn H. Nicholas's impeccably researched, engagingly written account of the rapacity, horror, devotion, and heroism that characterized a unique and terrible era.
)
)
)
Google Books — Cargando...
2
Sadly, this is a poorly written book on a fascinating subject. Its 444 pages provide you with hundreds of names, places, organizations, and most important, works of art. But making sense of who did what to whom and where the stuff went is difficult to accomplish unless, perhaps, you make a spreadsheet while you read. Most annoying were all the hundreds of declarative sentences that opened paragraphs and led nowhere, creating paragraphs that made no sense. I read and reread. Maybe the problem is that there really are so many bits of information and maybe this book is intended for someone doing research, in which case dry doesn't matter, and it would probably be excellent.
I found this book on Amazon when I was looking at The Monuments Men (the book) and read one or more reviews that gave The Rape of Europa higher marks for being more informative. Because the subject interests me I may give the other book a go and see if perhaps, for me, less is more. (