Along the Edge of the Forest by Anthony Bailey

Along the Edge of the Forest: An Iron Curtain Journey by Anthony Bailey

Along the Edge of the Forest is an account of a memorable journey from the Baltic to Trieste-along and occasionally across the dividing line, the Iron Curtain, which continues to split apart not just Europe but the world, almost forty years after the end of World War II.

Anthony Bailey brings his powers of observation and perception to this strange frontier, which has shaped our consciousness of friend and foe, "us" and "them," and which at one and the same time seems to keep the peace, create the wall of a prison, and serve as a reminder of the possibility of nuclear war.

On Baltic beaches, in German forests, Berlin streets, Budapest cafés and Austrian hillsides during the wine harvest, Bailey movingly evokes the landscape and the people whose lives are formed by the border. He describes dramatic escapes; he writes of those who failed to make the crossing; he has his own adventures with border patrols from East and West.

Bailey recounts various ways in which the Iron Curtain continues successfully to prevent the passage of people and things, and examines means by which it is constantly pierced and vaulted over.

This is a travel book, but one that takes us on a journey through some of the most crucial history of the modern world. Along the Edge of the Forest reawakens us to facts that are central to our existence. It does so by involving the reader in the destinies of people whom Bailey meets, by incident and exploration. It is a powerful and illuminating voyage of rediscovery.

Along the Edge of the Forest: An Iron Curtain Journey by Anthony Bailey | First Edition 1983