Brilliant survey, Chris! I laughed out loud when I saw “Diocletian and the Roman Recovery” on the list, because I ordered that book on Amazon back in 2014 while living in Vienna and it got lost in the mail. But I miraculously found a copy of it at a gift shop near the ruins of Carnutum. I love Split (quondam Spalatum), and there’s that famous Croatian sculptor (a contemporary of Rodin) who has a villa dedicated to his works across the bay there. Such a wonderful place. I wrote a short story back in 2015 called “The Retirement of Diocletian” which is a gothic story in which he’s made out to be an eminence gris running affairs even though he’s ostensibly merely “tending his cabbages” in Dalmatia.
Congratulations Chris on reaching the 100 subscribers mark! Excellent progress in ten months. Your list of books on the Eastern Adriatic looks very interesting, but especially your own of course. Good luck in building your TLS subscriber base in 2024!
I read Glenny before heading off to Kosovo in 2005 but the rest of your selections offer great ways to delve deeper. The Balkans are continually interesting and frustrating. One area that I've always wanted to learn more about is the relationships between the Bogomils and Cathars (https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/bogomils-and-cathars). In Sarajevo, I believe I saw graves that seemed to be similar to those of both sects.
Brilliant survey, Chris! I laughed out loud when I saw “Diocletian and the Roman Recovery” on the list, because I ordered that book on Amazon back in 2014 while living in Vienna and it got lost in the mail. But I miraculously found a copy of it at a gift shop near the ruins of Carnutum. I love Split (quondam Spalatum), and there’s that famous Croatian sculptor (a contemporary of Rodin) who has a villa dedicated to his works across the bay there. Such a wonderful place. I wrote a short story back in 2015 called “The Retirement of Diocletian” which is a gothic story in which he’s made out to be an eminence gris running affairs even though he’s ostensibly merely “tending his cabbages” in Dalmatia.
Congratulations Chris on reaching the 100 subscribers mark! Excellent progress in ten months. Your list of books on the Eastern Adriatic looks very interesting, but especially your own of course. Good luck in building your TLS subscriber base in 2024!
I read Glenny before heading off to Kosovo in 2005 but the rest of your selections offer great ways to delve deeper. The Balkans are continually interesting and frustrating. One area that I've always wanted to learn more about is the relationships between the Bogomils and Cathars (https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/bogomils-and-cathars). In Sarajevo, I believe I saw graves that seemed to be similar to those of both sects.