Poland, says Prof. Davies, is no island, ‘the bell on the Vistula tolls for us all’, ‘Poland's agony threatens to undermine[?] the Main'. The imagery may be confused but the message is clear and not unduly alarmist. An enduring Polish crisis may well lead to a world crisis and in the end to catastrophe. It is therefore the duty of leaders of the countries concerned, not only of the enigmatic Jaruzelski and the deceptively engaging Gorbachev, but also of the leaders of the western democracies to restore the normal functioning of ‘the heart of Europe'.

By a curious quirk of fate, Poland as a danger zone may be compared to Israel. A hundred years before the establishment of the Jewish state, Adam Mickiewicz called for respect, equality before the law and fraternity in relation to the people of Israel, the ‘elder brother’ of the Poles. That brotherly tie, such as it was, has been severed. Poland, ‘Judenfrei’, as well as being purged of the Slavonic and Teutonic minorities of the ancient Commonwealth and the inter-war Republic, draws much of its strength from this new ethnic and religious uniformity. The age-long process of Polish-Jewish cross-fertilization is at an end, probably to the detriment of both parties because self-fertile national cultures bear mediocre fruit. But Prof. Davies takes for granted the desirability of the nation state, one of the great delusions of our time. It is a pity that Prof. Davies, who is not averse to stimulating speculation, has not reflected on what might have happened if Poland had not, as a result of the Partitions, missed the opportunities of independent development offered by the 19th century. Would the changes that occurred in that period have kindled a flame under the potential melting pot of creeds and nationalities?

The delicate subject of Polish-Jewish relations in history, not being strictly relevant to the main theme of Heart of Europe, receives little attention. Prof. Davies writes with sympathy about the extermination of most of the Jewish community by the Germans during the last war and with restraint about the participation of Jews in the activities of the Communist Party before the war and in those of the political police in the post-war period. All this is well-trodden ground in the gaps of a minefield.