The most comprehensive survey of Polish history available in English,
God's Playground demonstrates Poland's importance in European history
from medieval times to the present. Abandoning the traditional
nationalist approach to Polish history, Norman Davies instead stresses
the country's rich multinational heritage and places the development of
the Jewish German, Ukrainian, and Lithuanian communities firmly within
the Polish context.
Davies emphasizes the cultural history of Poland through a presentation
of extensive poetical, literary, and documentary texts in English
translation. In each volume, chronological chapters of political
narrative are interspersed with essays on religious, social, economic,
constitutional, philosophical, and diplomatic themes.
This new edition has been revised and fully updated with two new
chapters to bring the story to the end of the twentieth century.