The Europe That Was

Tales of Europe, before and after the war, when lives could change in an instant

Fleeing the Cuban revolution, a businessman’s return to England is blocked by the secret police of General Franco. In Hungary, a peasant treasures a barrel of wine as a symbol of the world she lost during the war. At a Romanian ball, in the frenzied years that followed the break-up of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, a British traveler finds himself challenged to a duel. And in England, an American pilot stumbles into an auction and discovers that the Greek bowl in his hands may be worth far more than he is willing to pay.

From country to country, Geoffrey Household takes us through the back alleys and open fields of the continent he knows so well, and finds that there is a beautiful madness in the European spirit that no war can kill.