Bury Me Standing: The Gypsies and Their Journey [Englisch] [Taschenbuch]

They travel endlessly and seem to appear almost everywhere, yet they are the world's most mysterious people: Gypsies. Isabel Fonseca has done the impossible, entering into their world, living and traveling with Gypsies during several long trips to Eastern Europe, and she has brought back an insightful, highly personal, and very readable account of who the Gypsies are and how they live. The Gypsies have a legendary aversion to "gadje," or outsiders, but Fonseca has lifted the curtain and written gracefully about their lives on the edge of society. -- Dieser Text bezieht sich auf eine vergriffene oder nicht verfügbare Ausgabe dieses Titels.

Traveling as a journalist, Fonseca stayed with a number of Gypsy families in Eastern Europe between 1991 and 1995. Through her experiences with them, study of the scholarship about them, and interviews with leading figures, she has produced a contemporary account of their status, incorporating details of their society, culture, and history. Her work portrays their commitment to tribal traditions and adherence to ritual and offers good insights, particularly into women's lives. The author regards Gypsies as "an ancient scapegoat" who survive through their traditions and a collective denial of their mistreatment by outsiders, including the Germans during World War II. The author details the discrimination that has kept the Gypsies, now often called Roma, from development of an identity and acceptance by the international community. Fonseca's work will appeal to both interested lay readers and scholars in the field. It belongs in subject collections.
Rena Fowler, Humboldt State Univ., Arcata, Cal.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. -- Dieser Text bezieht sich auf eine vergriffene oder nicht verfügbare Ausgabe dieses Titels.

Travel and cultural history merge in this history of the Romany peoples of Europe. The author focused especially on the gypsies of Eastern Europe, examining their future as a distinct race.

Gypsies have always intrigued and fascinated - partly due to their their mysterious origins and partly due to the romance of nomadism. But because they resist assimilation, having survived as a distinct people for over 1000 years, they have also been the victims of other people's nationalism and xenophobia. The have been persecuted throughout the ages, including recently in German concentration camps and by nationalist mobs in Romania. In this study, the author focuses particularly on the gypsies of Eastern Europe (an estimated six million) and their future as a distinct race within a nationalist Europe. Her book is a blend of the scholarly - their origins, folklore, customs, dietary laws, myths, taboos - and the personal. While researching the book, Fonseca learned Romany and stayed with the gypsies, becoming deeply involved with their lives and befriending several gypsy kings.

Isabel Fonseca was born in New York and educated at Columbia University and Oxford. She was an assistant editor at the Times Literary Supplement and has written for a wide range of publications, from the Wall Street Journal to Vogue. Her first book, Bury Me Standing: The Gypsies and Their Journey, was an international bestseller. She lives in London with her husband and their two daughters.