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When planning the trip to Georgia back in 2017, I did some search on what to see, what not to miss while there. And as an avid reader, I had a few books to savor and to get to know about the country and its people, culture and traditions. So here I'm sharing my findings - hope this list will be helpful when you plan your trip. When the borders open up again. Obviously.
Alice
Feiring - For the Love of Wine: My
Odyssey Through the World’s Most Ancient Wine Culture
For the Love of Wine is Feiring’s emotional tale of a
remarkable country and people who have survived religious wars and Soviet
occupation yet managed always to keep hold of their precious wine traditions. She
encounters the thriving qvevri craftspeople of the countryside, wild grape
hunters, and even Stalin’s last winemaker while plumbing the depths of this
tiny country’s love for its wines.
Carla Capalbo - Tasting Georgia: A Food and Wine
Journey in the Caucasus
Nestled between the Caucasus Mountains and the Black Sea, and
with a climate similar to the Mediterranean, Georgia has colorful, delicious
food. Vegetables blended with walnuts and vibrant herbs, subtly spiced meat
stews, and home-baked pies like the irresistible cheese-filled khachapuri are
served at generous tables all over the country. Georgia is also one of the
world's oldest winemaking areas, with wines traditionally made in qvevri: large
clay jars buried in the ground.
Christina
Nichol - Waiting for the Electricity
In the republic of Georgia, the Communists are long gone,
replaced by . . . well, by what? Something much more confusing, that’s for
sure. There are no jobs in the cities. And when there are jobs, employees aren’t compensated. And when they are compensated, it’s because the jobs are . . . not
strictly scrupulous. In the village, life goes on much as it always did, but
these days, homemade farmers' cheese is giving way to the oil pipeline. And
as for romance in this strange, confounding modern age . . . the less said, the
better.
Dato Turashvili - Flight from the USSR
The novel is based upon an electrifying and tragic event in
1983. Gega Kobakhidze, a young actor, and seven friends hijack an airplane
heading from Tbilisi to Leningrad. They desperately want to flee from the USSR
and go to Turkey. They fail, are imprisoned and a number are killed. All of
Georgia and the world were caught up in these events.
David Gorji - Georgian Gorgeous or Gorgeous Georgians?
David Gorji, an American of Caucasus Georgian descent,
describes his quest to seek his ancestral roots where he discovers a gorgeous
land called Georgia and its most hospitable inhabitants, the Georgians. Gorji’s
excitement at learning about his newly reclaimed homeland is evident in his
fireside-like narration about this marvelous country, its rich history and
culture, amazing heritage, and millennia-old winemaking and feasting traditions.
Donald Rayfield - Edge of Empires: A History of Georgia
Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe,
Georgia is a country of rainforests and swamps, snow and glaciers, and
semi-arid plains. It has ski resorts and mineral springs, monuments, and an oil
pipeline. It also has one of the longest and most turbulent histories in the
Christian or Near Eastern world, but no comprehensive, up-to-date account has
been written about this little-known country.
Grigol Abashidze - Lasharela: A Georgian Chronicle Of The 13th Century
Grigol Abashidze's novel Lasharela tells about the reign of
Lasha-Georgi IV, son of the great Queen Tamar, about the people’s illusions,
the growing cruelty of the feudal lords, the flourishing of poetry and the
arts, and the end of the Georgian Renaissance.
Keke Jughashvili - My Dear Son: The Memoirs
of Stalin’s Mother
This is a transcript of the memories of Ekaterine (Keke)
Jughashvili, Stalin’s mother, which was dictated in 1935, two years before her
death.
It is a captivating novel as evocative of the exotic desert
landscape as it is of the passion between two people pulled apart by culture,
religion, and war. Ali Khan Shirvanshir, a Muslim schoolboy from a
proud, aristocratic family, has fallen in love with the beautiful and enigmatic
Nino Kipiani, a Christian girl with distinctly European
sensibilities. To be together they must overcome blood feud and
scandal. When war threatens their future, Ali is forced to choose
between his loyalty to the beliefs of his Asian ancestors and his profound
devotion to Nino.
Mary Russell - Please
Don’t Call It Soviet Georgia
Mary Russell, the English traveler, records her impressions of
the birth of nationalism in Georgia and its movement for secession from The Soviet Union.
Michael Berman - Georgia Through Its Legends,
Folklore, and People
In early Georgian myths, it is said that when the mountains
were young, they had legs - could walk from the edges of the oceans to the
deserts, flirting with the low hills, shrouding them with soft clouds of love.
But what about those aspects of life which remain relatively constant - the
traditional practices of the people, the practices that are reflected in their
legends and their folklore?
Otar
Chiladze - A Man Was Going Down the
Road
Set in Vani, the semi-legendary capital of Colchis (as
western Georgia was called in antiquity), Otar Chiladze’s first novel of 1972
explores the Georgian ramifications of the myth of Jason, the Golden Fleece and
Medea, weaving his own inventions with Greek myth and history.
Peter Nasmyth - Georgia: In the mountains of poetry
The book covers the country region by region, taking the form
of a literary journey through the transition from Soviet Georgia to the modern
independent nation-state. Georgia: Mountains and Honour will be essential reading for anyone interested in this
fascinating region, as well as those requiring an insight into the life after
the collapse of the old Soviet order in the richest and most dramatic of the
former republics.
Roger Rosen - Georgia: Sovereign
Country of the Caucasus
Bordered by the Caucasus Mountains
to the north, the Black Sea to the west, Azerbaijan to the east, and Turkey to
the south, Georgia stands at the crossroads of Europe and Asia. This
fascinating land is home to one of the most hospitable people in the world
whose culture dates back to the Bronze Age.
Ronald Asmus - A Little War that Shook the World: Georgia, Russia and the Future of the West
The brief war between Russia and Georgia in August 2008
seemed to many like an unexpected shot out of the blue that was gone as quickly
as it came. This book is a fascinating look at the breakdown of
relations between Russia and the West, the decay and decline of the Western
Alliance itself, and the fate of Eastern Europe in a time of economic crisis.
Ronald Grigor Suny - The Making of the Georgian Nation
Like the other republics floating free after the demise of
the Soviet empire, the independent republic of Georgia is reinventing its past,
recovering what had been forgotten or distorted during the long years of
Russian and Soviet rule. Whether Georgia can successfully be transformed from a
society rent by conflict into a pluralistic democratic nation will depend on
Georgians rethinking their history.
Simon Sebag Montefiore - Young Stalin
Based on ten years' astonishing new research, here is the thrilling story of how a charismatic, dangerous boy became a student priest,
romantic poet, gangster mastermind, prolific lover, murderous revolutionary,
and the merciless politician who shaped the Soviet Empire in his own brutal
image: How Stalin became Stalin.
Stephen F. Jones - The Making of
Modern Georgia, 1918-2012: The First Georgian Republic and Its Successors
Democratic Republic of Georgia (1918-1921) established a constitution, a parliamentary system with national elections, an active opposition, and a free press. As the Democratic Republic of Georgia in 1918, its successors emerged after 1991 from a bankrupt empire and faced the task of establishing a new economic, political and social system from scratch. In both 1918 and 1991, Georgia was confronted with a hostile Russia and followed a pro-Western and pro-democratic course.
Stephen F. Jones - War and Revolution in the Caucasus. Georgia Ablaze
The South Caucasus has traditionally been a playground of contesting
empires. This region is associated in Western minds with ethnic conflict and
geopolitical struggles in 2008. Yet, another war broke out in this distant European
periphery as Russia and Georgia clashed over the secessionist territory of
South Ossetia. The war had global ramifications culminating in deepening
tensions between Russia on the one hand, and Europe and the USA on the other.
Thomas Goltz - Georgia Diary: A Chronicle of War and Political Chaos in the Post-Soviet Caucasus
Soon after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Republic of
Georgia fell prey to a series of power struggles, rampant crime and corruption,
secessionist wars, and the spillover of the war in neighboring Chechenya. This
fast-paced, first-person account is filled with fascinating details about the
ongoing struggles of this little-known region of the former Soviet Union.
Thomas de Waal - The
Caucasus: An Introduction
In The Caucasus, de Waal provides this richer, deeper, and much-needed
appreciation, one that reveals that the South Caucasus is a fascinating and distinct world unto itself. Providing both historical background and insightful analysis of the period after 1991, de Waal sheds light on how the region has been scarred by the tumultuous scramble for independence and the
three major conflicts that broke out with the end of the Soviet Union.
Tony
Anderson - Bread And Ashes: A Walk
Through the Mountains of Georgia
Tony Anderson set out in the summer of 1998 to walkthrough
Georgia. He wanted particularly to visit the Georgian mountain tribes - Tush,
Khevsurs, Ratchuelians, and Svans - to discover if they shared a common mountain
culture, and to test the old idea of the Caucasus as an impenetrable barrier
from sea to sea.
Valeria Alfeyeva - Pilgrimage to Dzhvari: A Woman's
Journey of Spiritual Awakening
Pilgrimage to Dzhvari is set in the last days of the
Communist regime when people from all levels of Soviet society are searching
for ways to reconnect with their memories of goodness and truth. A
writer leaves her work in Moscow and with her teenage son sets out to visit the
few remaining monasteries in the Georgian Caucasus in order to discover the
mystical teachings of the Eastern Orthodox Church.
Wendell Steavenson - Stories I stole
Stories I Stole is a wonderful example of a writer tackling an unconventional subject with such wit, humanity, and sheer literary verve that one is unable to imagine why one never learned more about Georgia before.
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