An unforgettable coming of age story exploring the meaning of freedom - personal, collective, political - from an extraordinary new voice
*SHORTLISTED FOR THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE FOR NON-FICTION*
*SHORTLISTED FOR THE COSTA BIOGRAPHY AWARD*
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.
An unforgettable coming of age story exploring the meaning of freedom - personal, collective, political - from an extraordinary new voice
*SHORTLISTED FOR THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE FOR NON-FICTION*
*SHORTLISTED FOR THE COSTA BIOGRAPHY AWARD*
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.
Lea Ypi is a professor of Political Theory at the London School of Economics. Her first trade book, Free was shortlisted for the Baillie Gifford Prize, the Costa Biography Award and the Slightly Foxed Best First Biography Prize. It is being translated into nineteen languages.
If you read one memoir this year, let it be this
*Sunday Times, Books of the Year*
A magical, timeless and important account of what life was really
like under communism. Free brims with diamond-studded details, it
lays bare the compromises, fear and betrayals of a secret police
state, but is also an uplifting and humorous reminder of how much
the human spirit can endure
*Financial Times*
Lea Ypi's Free is the first book since Elena Ferrante's My
Brilliant Friend that I have pressed on family, friends and
colleagues, insisting they read it. . . a truly riveting memoir and
a profound meditation on what it means to be free
*Spectator, Books of the Year*
Enthralling. . . a classic in the making
*TLS, Books of the Year*
Ypi's deliciously smart memoir of her Albanian girlhood at the end
of the Cold War is a brilliant disquisition on the meanings of
freedom - its lures, false hopes, disappointments and possibilities
- in our time
*New Statesman, Books of the Year*
A tart and tender childhood memoir. But also a work of social
criticism, and a meditation on how to live with purpose. . . A
quick read, but like Marx's spectre haunting Europe, it stays with
you
*The New Yorker, Best Books of 2021*
An absorbing memoir of Ypi's Albanian childhood and its ideological
delusions. The freedom she discovers is far more complex than we
might expect
*TLS, Books of the Year*
A strange world and its legacy is now stunningly brought to life.
Lea Ypi offers a moving and compelling memoir of growing up in
turbulent times, as well as a frank questioning of what it really
means to be "free"
*Financial Times, Books of the Year*
Lea Ypi's Free: Coming of Age at the End of History is a
beautifully written account of life under a crumbling Stalinist
system in Albania and the shock and chaos of what came next. In
telling her story and examining the political systems in which she
was raised, the author and LSE professor asks tough questions about
the nature of freedom
*Guardian, Books of the Year*
An astonishing and deeply resonant memoir about growing up in the
last days of the last Stalinist outpost of the 20th century. . .
What makes it so unforgettable is that we see this world, one about
which we know so little, through the eyes of a child.. . It is more
fundamentally about humanity, and about the confusions and wonders
of childhood. Ypi weaves magic in this book: I was entranced from
beginning to end
*Sunday Times*
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