Lea Ypi, “Free: Coming of Age at the End of History”
Lea Ypi objavila je 2021, odnosno 2022. knjigu “Free: Coming of Age at the End of History” u kojem opisuje svoje odrastanje u komunističkoj Albaniji i tranziciju koja je uslijedila. Knjiga je nagrađivana i izazvala je veliki interes javnosti te brojne medijske napise, a 2022. objavljeno je i njemačko izdanje.
A reflection on “freedom” in a dramatic, beautifully written memoir of the end of Communism in the Balkans.
For precocious 11-year-old Lea Ypi, Albania’s Soviet-style socialism held the promise of a preordained future, a guarantee of security among enthusiastic comrades. That is, until she found herself clinging to a stone statue of Joseph Stalin, newly beheaded by student protests.
Communism had failed to deliver the promised utopia. One’s “biography”—class status and other associations long in the past—put strict boundaries around one’s individual future. When Lea’s parents spoke of relatives going to “university” or “graduating,” they were speaking of grave secrets Lea struggled to unveil. And when the early ’90s saw Albania and other Balkan countries exuberantly begin a transition to the “free market,” Western ideals of freedom delivered chaos: a dystopia of pyramid schemes, organized crime, and sex trafficking.
With her elegant, intellectual, French-speaking grandmother; her radical-chic father; and her staunchly anti-socialist, Thatcherite mother to guide her through these disorienting times, Lea had a political education of the most colorful sort—here recounted with outstanding literary talent. Now one of the world’s most dynamic young political thinkers and a prominent leftist voice in the United Kingdom, Lea offers a fresh and invigorating perspective on the relation between the personal and the political, between values and identity, posing urgent questions about the cost of freedom.
Lea Ypi is professor in political theory at London School of Economics, and adjunct associate professor in philosophy at the Australian National University, with expertise in Marxism and critical theory. She lives and works in London.
https://wwnorton.com/books/9780393867732/about-the-book/product-details
Lea Ypi
Free
Coming of Age at the End of History
‘We never lose our inner freedom; the freedom to do what is right’
Lea Ypi grew up in one of the most isolated countries on earth, a place where communist ideals had officially replaced religion. Albania, the last Stalinist outpost in Europe, was almost impossible to visit, almost impossible to leave. It was a place of queuing and scarcity, of political executions and secret police. To Lea, it was home. People were equal, neighbours helped each other, and children were expected to build a better world. There was community and hope.
Then, in December 1990, everything changed. The statues of Stalin and Hoxha were toppled. Almost overnight, people could vote freely, wear what they liked and worship as they wished. There was no longer anything to fear from prying ears. But factories shut, jobs disappeared and thousands fled to Italy on crowded ships, only to be sent back. Predatory pyramid schemes eventually bankrupted the country, leading to violent conflict. As one generation’s aspirations became another’s disillusionment, and as her own family’s secrets were revealed, Lea found herself questioning what freedom really meant.
Free is an engrossing memoir of coming of age amid political upheaval. With acute insight and wit, Lea Ypi traces the limits of progress and the burden of the past, illuminating the spaces between ideals and reality, and the hopes and fears of people pulled up by the sweep of history.
https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/320869/free-by-ypi-lea/9780141995106
Lea Ypi
Frei
Erwachsenwerden am Ende der Geschichte
Aus dem Englischen von Eva Bonné
Albanien 1989: Der letzte stalinistische Außenposten in Europa, ein isoliertes Land, das man nur schwer besuchen und noch schwerer verlassen kann. Es herrschen Mangelwirtschaft, Geheimpolizei und das Proletariat. Der Kommunismus hat den Platz der Religion übernommen. Für die zehnjährige Lea Ypi ist dieses Land ihr Zuhause: ein Ort der Geborgenheit, des Lernens, der Hoffnung und der Freiheit.
Alles ändert sich, als in Berlin die Mauer fällt und in Tirana Enver Hoxhas Statue vom Sockel stürzt. Jetzt können die Menschen wählen, wen sie wollen, sich kleiden, wie sie wollen, anbeten, was sie wollen. Aber die neue Zeit zeigt bald ihr unfreundliches Gesicht: Skrupellose Geschäftemacher ruinieren die Wirtschaft, die Aussicht auf eine bessere Zukunft löst sich auf in Arbeitslosigkeit und Massenflucht. Als das Land im Chaos zu versinken droht und in ihrer Familie Geheimnisse ans Licht kommen, beginnt Lea sich zu fragen, was das eigentlich ist: Freiheit.
In hinreißender Prosa erzählt Lea Ypi von ihrem Erwachsenwerden im poststalinistischen Albanien und in einer schillernden Familie, deren Geschichte eng mit der des Landes verwoben ist. Frei ist ein fesselndes Memoir und eine scharfsinnige Reflexion über die Grenzen des Fortschritts und die Last der Vergangenheit, über glänzende Ideale und harte Realitäten. Vor allem aber über die Leben von Menschen, die vom Sturm der Geschichte erfasst werden.
https://www.suhrkamp.de/buch/lea-ypi-frei-t-9783518430347
Pingback: Lea Ypi, „Slobodna. Odrastanje na kraju historije“ – Historiografija.hr