![]() This is hardly a new or even exciting approach, nor does Asbrink present it as such. The conviction that the past is never really past, that it is always striking back, animates Asbrink’s work. But the causes of destruction prove disturbingly resilient: Revisionism, fascism, and fundamentalism take on new forms, finding footholds in new corners of the world. In 1947, “upon the quagmire of oblivion, the world rebuilds itself,” Asbrink writes. Marshall laid out his economic plan for Europe. It is also when the Soviet Union unexpectedly endorsed the creation of the state of Israel, and when Secretary of State George C. But 1947 is a particularly alluring inflection point for many reasons, not the least of which is that it is when the war officially came to an end, when the peace treaties were signed in Paris. ![]() ![]() (The titular “now” is 2016, the year the book was initially published, in Sweden.) Previous books have made similar claims about virtually every year before, during, and after World War II. In 1947: Where Now Begins, a book that blends history and memoir, Swedish journalist Elisabeth Asbrink proposes that the state of the world today can be traced directly to this consequential year. 1947: WHERE NOW BEGINS by Elisabeth Asbrink Other Press, 288 pp., $25.95 ![]()
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