Thinking Europe’s Catastrophe

With his astonishing range, the historian Dan Stone excavates the multiple causes and inhuman consequences of Europe’s catastrophic twentieth century. This priceless collection of essays brings together his many studies, ranging from little-known psychologists to famous philosophers, from race science to the Holocaust in Romania—among many other topics. Stone’s research casts an exacting eye on the perpetrators and an empathic eye on their victims. Taken together, Thinking Europe’s Catastrophe presents an unsparing analysis of the last century that provides the intellectual tools to interpret the current one. Unfortunately the warnings he sounds are going unheeded.
—A. Dirk Moses, City College of New York, and author of The Problems of Genocide.

This two-volume collection offers a most welcome introduction to Dan Stone’s amazing scholarship. A historian of breathtaking scope and reach, Stone’s probing analyses illuminate a vast range of issues. In these volumes, he takes on race, genocide, modernity and Nazism and, with an equally deft hand, an array of postwar historical and historiographical questions. In short: an outstanding contribution. —Debórah Dwork, Director, Center for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide, and Crimes Against Humanity, Graduate Center—City University of New York

Thinking Europe’s Catastrophe is a powerful collection that brings together decades of Dan Stone’s pioneering scholarship on fascism, genocide, and Holocaust historiography. Combining theoretical insight with precise archival research, these essays illuminate how ideas and historical practice shape our understanding of Europe’s darkest chapters, while speaking urgently to the present. This work stands as an essential contribution to modern European history and Holocaust studies. —Christine Schmidt, The Wiener Holocaust Library