Europe

[Czech Republic] [Denmark] [France] [Germany] [Great Britain- England, Scotland and Wales] [Greece] [Hungary] [Ireland] [Italy] [Netherlands] [Russia] [Spain] [Sweden]

 

 

CZECH REPUBLIC

Books:

Ash, Timothy Garten. The Magic Lantern: The Revolution of 1989 Witnessed in Warsaw, Budapest, Berlin and Prague (Vintage Books, 1993)

Burton, Richard. Prague: A Cultural and Literary History (NY: Interlink Books, 2003)

Day, Barbara. The Velvet Philosophers (London: Claridge Press, 1999)

Franz Kafka.  The Trial

Havel, Vaclav. Open Letters: Selected Writings, 1965-1990 (Vintage, 1992), esp. "The Power of the Powerless" and "Six Asides About Culture."

Havel, Vaclav. Summer Meditations (London: Faber and Faber Ltd., 1992)

Havel, Vaclav. Disturbing the Peace: A Conversation with Karel Hvízdala (NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 1990)

Holy, Ladislav. The Little Czech and the Great Czech Nation: National Identity and the Post-Communist Social Transformation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996)

Hrabal, Bohumil. Too Loud a Solitude (1976; Harcourt, Inc. translation, 1990)

Kafka, Franz. America (Schocken, 1996) or any other books of his.

Richmond, Yale. From Da to Yes: Understanding the East Europeans (Intercultural Press, 1995)

Skilling, H. Gordon. Samizdat and an Independent Society in Central and Eastern Europe (OH: Ohio State University Press, 1989)

Wilson, Paul. Prague: A Traveler's Literary Companion (Whereabouts Press, 1995)

Anything by Ludvik Vakulic, Ivan Klima, Milan Kundera (especially the earlier books), Arnost Lustig, Iva Pekarkova, Josef Skvorecky, or Jáchym Topol.

Films:

Kolya (dir. Jan Sverák, 1996)
Zelary (dir. Ondrej Trojan, 2003)

 

 

 

DENMARK

Books:

Blixen, Karen (pseud. Dinesen, Isak). Seven Gothic Tales (Harrison Smith/Robert Haas, 1934)

Blixen, Karen (pseud. Dinesen, Isak). Out of Africa (Modern Library, 1992)

Grøndahl, Jens Christian. Silence in October (Harvest Book, 2002)

Hansen, Thorkild. Arabia Felix (Harper and Row, 1962)

Høeg, Peter. Smilla's Sense of Snow (Delta, 1995)

Kristensen, Tom. Havoc (University of Wisconsin Pres, 1968)

Larsen, Michael. The Snake in Sydney (Sceptre, 2000)

Nordbrandt, Henrick. Selected Poems (Curbstone Press, 1995)

Scherfig, Hans. Stolen Spring (Fjord Press, 1983)

Films:

Adam's Apples (dir. Anders Thomas Jensen, 2005)
After the Wedding (dir. Susanne Bier, 2006)
Angels in Fast Motion (dir. Ole Christian Madsen, 2005)
The Bench (1st in a trilogy. dir. Per Fly, 2000)
The Best of Victor Borge: Act One & Two (dir. Ronald Borge, 1990)
Breaking the Waves (dir. Lars von Trier, 1996)
The Celebration (dir. Thomas Vinterberg, 1998)
Copenhagen (dir. Howard Davies, 2002)
Dancer in the Dark (dir. Lars von Trier, 2000)
The Green Butchers (dir. Anders Thomas Jensen, 2003)
The Idiots (dir. Lars von Trier, 1998)
The Inheritance (2nd in a trilogy. dir. Per Fly, 2003)
Italian for Beginners (dir. Lone Scherfig, 2000)
King's Game (dir. Nikolaj Arcel, 2004)
Manslaughter (3rd in a trilogy. dir. Per Fly, 2005)
Mifune's Last Song (dir. Søren Kragh-Jacobsen, 1999)
The One and Only (dir. Susanne Bier, 1999)
Pusher (dir. Nicolas Winding Refn, 1996)
Terkel in Trouble (dir. Kristian Vesbjerg Andersen, 2004)
We Shall Overcome (dir. Niels Ander Oplev, 2006)
Worlds Apart (dir. Niels Arden Oplev, 2008)

 

 

 

FRANCE

Asselin, Gilles. Au Contraire! Figuring Out the French (Intercultural Press, 2001)

Ardagh, John. France in the New Century (Penguin, 2000)

Baudry, Pascal. French and Americans: The Other Shore (Berkeley: Les Frenchies, 2005 or http://www.pbaudry.com/)

Gildea, Robert. France Since 1945 (Oxford University Press, 2002)

Gopnik, Adam. Paris to the Moon (Random House, 2000)

Nadeau, Jean-Benoit and Julie Barlow. Sixty Million French People Can't Be Wrong (Robson, 2005)

Taylor, Sally Adamson. Culture Shock! France (Marshall Cavendish Corporation, 2008)

 

 

 

GERMANY

Books:

Gunter Grass.  The Tin Drum

Jerome, Jerome K. Three Men on the Bummel (Serenity Publishers, LLC, 2009)

Stern, Susan. These Strange German Ways (Atlantic-Brocke, 1994)

Tellkamp, Uwe. Der Turm (Suhrkamp Verlag KG, 2008)

Films:

The Lives of Others (dir. Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, 2006)
Good Bye Lenin! (dir. Wolfgang Becker, 2003)

 

 

 

GREAT BRITIAN

Books:

Davies, Christopher et al. Divided by a Common Language (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2007)

Fox, Kate. Watching the English: The Hidden Rules of English Behaviour (Nicholas Brealey Publishing, 2008)

ENGLAND

Jane Austen.  Persuasion

SCOTLAND

James Kelman.  Kieron Smith

 

GREECE

Books:

Broome, Benjamin J. Exploring the Greek Mosaic: A Guide to Intercultural Communication in Greece (Intercultural Press, 1996)

Leontis, Artemis, ed. A Traveler's Literary Companion: Greece (Whereabouts Press, 1997)

Vassilis Vassilikos.  Z

Films:

Never on Sunday (dir. Jules Dassin, 1960)

 

 

 

HUNGARY

Ash, Timothy Garten. The Magic Lantern: The Revolution of 1989 Witnessed in Warsaw, Budapest, Berlin and Prague (Vintage Books, 1993)

Skilling, H. Gordon. Samizdat and an Independent Society in Central and Eastern Europe (OH: Ohio State University Press, 1989)

 

 

 

IRELAND

Books:

Arthur, Paul. Special Relationships: Britain, Ireland and the Northern Ireland Problem (Belfast: Blackstaff Press, 2000)

Deane, Seamus. Reading in the Dark (NY: Random House, 1998)

Douglas, Roy et al. Ireland Since 1690: A Concise History (Backstaff Press, 1999)

Doyle, Roddy. The Barrystown Trilogy (Penguin, 1995)

Inglis, Tom. Global Ireland: Same Difference (Routledge, 2008)

James Joyce.  A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

Joyce, James. Dubliners (NY: Bantam Books, 1990)

McCourt, Frank. Angela's Ashes (NY: Simon & Schuster Trade, 1996)

McKittrick, David and David McVeigh. Making Sense of the Troubles (UK: Penguin Books, 2001)

Moody, TW and FX Martin. The Course of Irish History (Boulder, CO: R. Rinehart Publishing, Inc., 1995)

 Murphy, Dervla. A Place Apart (Greenwich CT: Devin-Adair Publishers, 1980)

O'Brien, Edna. The House of Splendid Isolation (NY: Penguin, 1995)

Films:

Angel (dir. François Ozon, 2007)
Butcher Boy (dir. Neil Jordan, 1997)
Cal (dir. Pat O'Connor, 1984)
Dancing at Lughnasa (dir. Pat O'Connor, 1998)
Hunger (dir. Steve McQueen, 2008)
In the Name of the Father (dir. Jim Sheridan, 1993)
Into the West (dir. Mike Newell, 1992)
Nothing Personal (dir. Urszula Antoniak, 2009)
Michael Collins (dir. Neil Jordan, 1996)
My Left Foot (dir. Jim Sheridan, 1989)
Some Mother's Son (dir. Terry George, 1996)
The Crying Game (dir. Neil Jordan, 1992)
The Dead (dir. John Huston, 1987)
The December Bride (dir. Thaddeus O'Sullivan, 1991)
The Magdalene Sisters (dir. Peter Mullan, 2002)
The Wind That Shakes the Barley (dir. Ken Loach, 2006)

 

 

 

ITALY

Books:

Falcone, Linda. Italians Dance and I'm a Wallflower: Adventures in Italian Expression (The Florentine Press, 2006)

Flower, Raymond and Alessandro Falassi. Culture Shock! Italy: A Survival Guide to Customs and Etiquette (Marshall Cavendish Corporation, 2008)

Matthew Fort.  Eating Up Italy

Venuti, Lawrence, ed./trans. Italy: A Traveler's Literary Companion (Berkeley, CA: Whereabouts Press, 2003)

Films:

Johnny Stecchino (dir. Roberto Benigni, 1991)
La vita é bella (dir. Roberto Benigni, 1997)

 

 

 

NETHERLANDS

Antonia's Line (dir. Marleen Gorris, 1995)

 

 

 

RUSSIA

Aleksander Solzhenitsyn.  One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

Baker, Peter and Susan Glasser. Kremlin Rising: Putin's Russia and the End of Revolution (Potomac Books Inc, 2007)

Bely, Andrei. Petersburg (Pushkin Press, 2009)

Dostoevsky, Fyodor. Crime and Punishment  (Collector's Library, 2010)

Figes, Orlando. Natasha's Dance: A Cultural History of Russia (Picador, 2003)

Fyodor Dostoevsky.  Crime and Punishment

Hoffman, David E. Oligarchs: Wealth and Power in the New Russia (Public Affairs, 2003)

Nikolai Gogol.  The Overcoat 

Petrushevskaya, Ludmilla. The Time: Night (Northwestern University Press, 2000)

Pushkin, Alexander. The Bronze Horseman (Duckworth Publishers, 2009)

Pushkin, Alexander. The Queen of Spades (Dodo Press, 2009)

Richmond, Yale. From Nyet to Da: Understanding the New Russia (Intercultural Press, 2008)

Service, Robert. Russia: Experiment with a People (Harvard University Press, 2006)

Shevtsova, Lilia. Lost in Translation: The Yeltsin and Putin Legacies (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2007)

Zoshchenko, Mikhail. Scenes from the Bathhouse and Other Stories of Communist Russia (Ann Arbor Paperbacks, 1961)

 

 

 

SPAIN

Books:

Ames, Helen Wattley. Spain Is Different (Intercultural Press, 1999)

Bush, Peter and Lisa Dillman, eds. Spain: A Traveler's Literary Companion (Berkeley, CA: Whereabouts Press, 2003)

Gibbons, John. Spanish Politics Today (Manchester University Press, 2006)

Hooper, John. Los Españoles de Hoy (Javier Vergara, S.A., 1987)

Jones, Rachel. Beyond the Spanish State: Central Government, Domestic Actors and the EU (Palgrave, 2000)

Miguel de Cervantes.  Don Quixote

Nash, Elizabeth. Madrid: A Cultural and Literary Companion (Interlink Books, 2001)

Williams, Mark. The Story of Spain (Mirador Publications S.L. Fuengirola, 1992)

Films:

Solas (Benito Zambrano, 1999)
Flores de otro mundo (Iciar Bollaín, 1999)
El rey pasmado (Imanol Uribe, 1991)
Mujeres al borde de un ataque de nervios (Pedro Almodóvar, 1988) or other Almodóvar films - very Madrid
Los lunes al sol (Fernando León de Aranoa, 2002)
Mar adentro (Alejandro Amenábar, 2004)

 

 

 

SWEDEN

Autumn Sonata (dir. Ingmar Bergman, 1978)