I've just finished to read this masterpiece for The second time, after having read it a few years ago. It's true that the characters, the framework, the prose, the emotions, the deep thoughts about life and conscience stick in your mind for a long time. Now I've started "Stalingrad". I think it would be better to read the latter first since "Life and destiny" is a sequel to it.

Love it, thank you!

Thank you for your review!

Thanks so much for your reviews.

Probably fairly honest book, - would like to know her total income ,not just her Guardian salary when she opened up about it and expected everyone else to follow …otherwise very enjoyable book with one glaring question , why didn’t she forgo the majority of her income and live on the average wage, a Polly Toynbee charitable foundation distributing the majority of her wealth would be very honourable.

Thank you for such a great review

Not easy to review this book, but you did an excellent job, so thank you very much. I’m on page 189 at the moment.

Oh I loved your review!! I just finished this book an hour ago and it was nice to see someone else’s thoughts

Somebody gave me this book around eleven when I started riding. I didn't read the lock aches then what I do now and after coming across this. I want to get my hands-on that book because writing is a big part of my life. Hi all this wonder what it was about

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As a student of English Literature, this analysis has been helpful for me. Keep going!

Very strange narrative - McGregor is so skilled at this gestural, almost throwaway style that looks deceptively simple. I know this part of the world well - the claustrophobic villages, the towering hills and the silent reservoirs - he’s has completely nailed it. Thanks for posting

I thought Vasily was a Ukrainian?

Super interesting, thank you. I'll have ro re-read it.

Wonderful review. I am finishing the last chapters of the book. This is one of the best novels I've ever read.

Could not put this down once I started reading.

Koestler's 'The Act of Creation' is one of my all time favourite book, cognitive science just recently has caught up with his mind but not with the beauty of his writing! The sleepwalkers is on my reading list, what a joy it must be to read it and follow Koestler in his journey through time / space and the universe of human ideas since antiquity!

Thanks for the recommendation! I'm definitely gonna ask the library for this book :)

I was told about this book today. It made a significant impact on the person who told me about it. I plan to read it this year.

прочтите еще Все течет. Но только с коньяком.

Phenomenal mind/author. You can still buy vintage hardbacks of his works at reasonable prices. A must have in the philosophers library 📚.

Loved it! I couldn't agree more

This was so interesting! Convinced me to reread it :)

Interesting, I've regularly read Toynbee in the Guardian without knowing about her background. Did she write about what she gained from working in low paid jobs?

Excellent review of a favorite book of mine, read decades ago. Thank you. You reminded me of all the reasons I loved and was imprinted by this book. His Kepler was especially touching and memorable. Now I have to read it again.

Thanks so much for this review. Much appreciated. I've just begun the book. Brilliant so far. The writing and the characters and the history. And the story of the authors life and the repression of this novel so moving.

I found your channel some days ago after I read this book and wanted to see some discourse on the internet (your video is one of few I could find here on youtube). I really enjoy your reviews and find your way of speaking really endearing. Thank you for this sweet internet corner, book grandpa!

Agree with you on the point about taking time to digest books, nowadays it’s so sad even the best books are consumed like fast food

Lol. The line it was taking. We are all put here to question the power at be. . Period. Up your game my man exercise your balls ⚽️ As a man.

Yes, a worthy read. A friend started Life and Fate and told me about it, so I bought a copy. It took a couple weeks to finish. There are segments I re-read again and again - I have those pages marked. A masterpiece.

A wonderful collection indeed. Have you picked up Dylan's 'Mixing Up The Medicine' yet?

This ny favourite book

Met Ted in Cartagena Colombia during his 2nd RTW ride, and he stayed in my apartment. He was kind enough to come to the school where I taught and give a talk. He is exactly as you describe. And having ridden a few years around South America myself, he and all the other people who ventured to foreign lands without the luxury of GPS deserve a lot of respect.

Thank you for this review, enjoyed the video :)

Thank you so much for this, I saw something on "X" Twitter with the russian war in ukraine, someone who posts commented about this maybe they were russian, anyway I was drawn to it somehow it called to me. I'm starting to read it and I believe it's a wonder first hand account of horror of all sides and regimes war and politics. Thank you!

i also really enjoyed this book!

It's very weird how history rebate it's self wtf antisemitism become cool all over the fckng world again

Thank you Mr Andy.

Just finished the book and really appreciate your review. It was challenging and it also took me around 3-4 months to finish. Beautiful prose, vast expanse of human emotions and experience, and a striking examination of the dangers of both Nazism and Soviet Communism under Stalin. It's the most moving book I've ever read.

I loved this book and listening to your review was a pleasureable reminder. Having come late to the party as it were, I didn't have to wait years for the sequel, 'Olive Again!' as it had already been published. Just been watching the TV miniseries on KZbin which is also excellent, except that Frances Mcdormand is not a large woman and in my mind, that was a big (!) part of who Olive is. In every other way, though, she is excellent as Olive.

I love it and have read it many times. I hope to get to meet Ted sometime, and maybe like you share a bottle of wine. Many thanks and best wishes. Gérard lacey in Ireland.

Thank you for your lovely words sir. This was needed

I read this book many years ago, though I was in my mid twenties at least when I did so. I also read the dramatic version which did very well. Ditto Tobacco Road. I never felt the characters were to be admired, but I found it, as you might find a little oasis in a desert, delightful, but very strange. It blooms with strange flowers. As such it has a beauty that you would reject if written large. I think Steinbeck's world view hard to accept in Grapes of Wrath, but in these short little slices of life in Bohemia quite entrancing. I liked that quote from the book. What we believe in and what actually goes on in society are quite different. Children are told never to lie and always tell the truth. In home and school children will be punished more harshly for denying they did something than they would be if they admitted their guilt. Try that in a court room. Our system rewards liars and cheaters quite often, and frequently punishes those who naively think that they are still in school and will be punished more lightly when they tell the truth. Nice review.

I recently discovered your channel. It's been quite a while since you posted this, but it interests me because I adapted this novel into a play. I was pleased that you noted right up front that Raskolnikov killed 2 people, the nasty old pawnbroker or money lender and her sister who was retarded and dependent on her. The book starts out that way but soon the sister is almost totally forgotten and ignored by just about everybody and the discussion focuses on Raskolnikov's defense of himself which never seems to include the sister. Dostoevsky is intent on proving to his own satisfaction that Raskolnikov's conviction that he is a superior person entitles him to commit crimes of this sort with impunity. It's Dostoevsky's way of attacking the Russian intelligentsia and trying to blame it for crimes that are certainly not unique to atheists and freethinkers, since religious people have been around a long time and committing crimes with about the same frequency as freethinkers do. But as I recall no one seems to care about the poor retarded sister and she drops out of the argument almost immediately. Because I had a severely retarded daughter I really find that hard to swallow. And since neither Dostoevsky nor Raskolnikov make much of it, I think they just don't think she matters. But real Christians would not agree because all souls are equal before God. It reminds me a bit of Madame Bovary. When the novel is discussed no one ever mentions the fact she is in fact a mother. It's like the kid doesn't exist. A whole dimension is lost or ignored.

Thank you for this review. Read Darkness at Noon last year. Now I have picked up Dialogue with Death. Mr Koestler had a varied life. Would like to read more of him. Anyway again thank you for this posting. The most intelligent thing have run across on YT in months.

Obviously, 100 pop books of 200pp is not the same as 100 Dickens or Tolstoy at 700pp per book.

Well done and thanks. We need Grossman today, just as we need Orwell and Borowski and Shalamov and Arendt and Mann and Douglass and Le Guin, etc. I hope I can clear out three months of my life (and fate!) to jump into this novel! I’m a slow reader too, by choice, more or less. Speed reading is overrated!

Excellent commentary

thank you very much indeed for your brilliant review...The heart of the matter has been my favourite book for a couple of years now....I can also whole heartedly recommen "Travels with my aunt" which is one of his more humorous works but it still contains key themes like family and finding oneselfe even in old age

I love “The power and the glory” and Graham Green’s characters overwhelmed by feelings of guilt and failure.