The Red Globe

This volume contributes to the emerging scholarship on Eastern European internationalism and engagement in the decolonisation of the Global South. It examines travelogues from the Cold War era that enhanced new understanding of worldwide alliances after years of Stalinist isolation.

From the 1950s to the 1980s, travel literature was a widely read and translated genre within and beyond Socialist Eastern Europe. Mostly overlooked by scholars thus far, this volume rediscovers road novels, travel diaries, political reportages, and literary sketches which reflect the tensions of the time. Promoting international solidarity, the authors witness the contradictory postcolonial reality; discovering unknown civilisations, they reproduce colonial stereotypes, and in supporting industrial modernisation, they are confronted with its ecological destruction. This volume explores the uniqueness, diversity and development of the genre in the context of the East-West conflict.

By examining this fascinating body of literary works, the volume sheds new light on current debates about decolonisation, alternative globalisation, and world literature. It also helps us understand how our increasingly divided, crisis-ridden, globalised present came to be.