Thinking the Twentieth Century, By Tony Judt, with Timothy Snyder

Before his death, the great historian of modern Europe worked on this set of conversations with an almost equally far-sighted colleague.

The result ranks not just as a memorial but a breathtakingly broad overview of Europe's past and present. Judt also supplies riveting snatches of memoir: as a Jewish outsider in south London, Cambridge whizz-kid, Parisian radical and New York intellectual gadfly.

In spite of some longueurs (mostly on parochial academic or Manhattan quarrels), this book is an absolute treasure – and an education in itself.