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After surviving the blitzkrieg of World War II and escaping from two Nazi prison camps, Soviet soldier Azamat Altay was banished as a traitor from his native home land. Chinghiz Aitmatov became a hero of Kyrgyzstan, writing novels about the lives of everyday Soviet citizens but mourning a mystery that might never be solved. While both came from small villages in the beautiful mountainous countryside, they found themselves caught on opposite sides of the Cold War struggle between world superpowers. Altay became the voice of democracy on Radio Liberty, while Aitmatov rose through the ranks of Soviet politics. Yet just as they seemed to be pulled apart in the political turmoil, they found their lives intersecting in moving and surprising ways. Have the Mountains Fallen? traces the lives of these two men as they confronted the full threat and legacy of the Soviet empire. Through personal and intersecting narratives of loss, love, and longing for a homeland forever changed, a clearer picture emerges of the experience of the Cold War from the other side.
Sommario
Preface
Acknowledgments
Note on Transliteration and Translation
List of Names
Part I
1. Flight
2. Seeds of Rebellion
3. Have the Mountains Fallen?
4. The Burdens of War
Part II
5. Chinese with a Dog
6. Recovering Dignity
7. The Sting of Rejection
8. Balancing Acts
Part III
9. American Rendezvous
10. Standing up to Injustice
11. Waves of Change
12. An Expiring Ideology
Part IV
13. The Wheels of Truth
14. New Beginnings
15. Times of Tumult
16. Holy Ground
Epilogue
Bibliography
Index
Info autore
After witnessing the collapse of the Soviet Union as a journalist in the 1990s, Jeff Lilley moved to Central Asia in 2004. During a three-year posting in Kyrgyzstan, he read the works of Chinghiz Aitmatov, slept in yurts, drank fermented mare's milk, and hiked in the country's beautiful mountains. Over the next ten years, he worked in the field of democracy and governance support in Washington, DC, and the Middle East, returning to Kyrgyzstan in 2016 to lead a British-funded parliamentary support program. Lilley is the coauthor of
China Hands: Nine Decades of Adventure, Espionage and Diplomacy.
