
Lisbon
War in the Shadows of the City of Light, 1939–1945
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Narrated by:
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Robin Sachs
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By:
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Neill Lochery
About this listen
Throughout the Second World War, Lisbon was at the very center of the world’s attention and was the only European city in which both the Allies and the Axis powers openly operated. Portugal was frantically trying to hold on to its self-proclaimed wartime neutrality but in reality was increasingly caught in the middle of the economic, and naval, wars between the Allies and the Nazis. The story is not, however, a conventional tale of World War II in that barely a shot was fired or a bomb dropped. Instead, it is a gripping tale of intrigue, betrayal, opportunism, and double-dealing, all of which took place in the Cidade da Luz and along its idyllic Atlantic coastline. It is the story of how a relatively poor European country not only survived the war physically intact but came out of it in 1945 much wealthier than it had been when war broke out in 1939. Portugal’s emergence as a prosperous European Union nation would be financed in part, it turns out, by a cache of Nazi gold.
During the war, Lisbon was a temporary home to much of Europe’s exiled royalty, over one million refugees seeking passage to the US, and to a host of spies, secret police, captains of industry, bankers, prominent Jews, writers and artists, escaped POWs, and black marketeers. An operations officer writing in 1944 described the daily scene at Lisbon’s airport as being like the movie Casablanca - times twenty.
In this riveting narrative, renowned historian Neill Lochery draws on his relationships with high-level Portuguese contacts, records recently uncovered from Portuguese secret police and banking archives, and other unpublished documents to offer a revelatory portrait of the war’s backstage.
©2011 Neill Lochery (P)2011 Blackstone Audio, Inc.Critic reviews
An excellent narrative history
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Insighful, detailed, well read
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The narration was good, even if the narrator clearly struggled with the correct pronounciation of Portuguese names, with some names completly off the mark.
I enjoyed the book a lot. It's worth a read (or listen) to anyone interested in this period of the history of World War II or Portugal.
Very interesting
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Lisbon - War in the Shadows... an excellent read
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Good with caveats...
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Fascinating study of Portugal’s role in WW2
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Excellent research and content
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The various decor shows posters of Casablanca, James Bond, etc.
The story documents the diplomatic world that surrounded Prime Minister Salazar and his Estado Novo. The narration by Sachs evokes a WWII ministerial briefing room in a good way.
a glimpse of Rick's Cafe Americain
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It is a bit of a Salazar lovefest, but I don't begrudge a historian their point of view and Salazar was clearly a remarkable man. It isn't quite a hagiography but it occasionally grates though. The bumbling British and the hapless Germans are masterfully played off against each other in Salazar's game of multidimensional chess; meanwhile morally repugnant policies such as actively preventing Jewish refugees from entering Portugal are reframed as a necessary part of a bigger work of foreign policy genius.
The Salazar love aside, Lochery does discuss the nature of the Portugal's WWII experience fairly openly and in detail, which includes the business dealings with the Germans and the postwar agreements on looted Nazi gold. It all seems pretty detailed and well-researched.
Interesting History from the Periphery
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A joy to listen to, an education, and an easy way to learn about a much forgotten subject
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