In Dancing Bears, author Witold Szablowski travels the length and breadth of the former Soviet states (and satellite states), conversing with those whose lives have changed, not always for the better.
The dancing bears of the titles are those bears who were kept by the Roma of Bulgaria, rescued by a German NGO upon Bulgaria's entry into the EU, and now live a pampered and free life at a park in Belitsa. Much to the chagrin of the park managers, when sad, lonely, or stressed, the bears revert to the behavior that ensured their keep for years: dancing. Neither have their former keepers adapted well to the changing times. Szablowski frequently encounters Gypsy families that have splintered, fractured by depression and death, in the aftermath of the bears' departure.
Beyond Bulgaria, Szablowski introduces his reader to the Stalin-loving guides at the Stalin Museum in Gori, Georgia, where the great man's memory looms large, and to the questions of nationality and identity confronting Russian Estonians...or is it Estonian Russians? He also explores the quietly simmering tensions of life in Kosovo and, in the western hemisphere, Szablowski journeys to Cuba, where more than one leery Cuban expresses uncertainly about the fate of the country should Fidel Castro die (Dancing Bears was published in 2014). On the brighter side, there's good money to be made running goods from the Polish EU to the decidedly-not-the-EU Ukraine.
This is a unique book that provides western readers with perspectives that aren't otherwise easily encountered. Szablowski's work on the dancing bears is especially provocative, yet balanced; he presents a clear-eyed view of the obvious downsides of training bears (removing their teeth, inserting rings through their noses, creating alcohol dependency), but also a sympathetic view of the keepers - Szablowski is at pains (in a good way) to remind readers to the extent to which training bears was a genuine part of the cultural fabric.
Dancing Bears reminded me of Secondhand Time, another work that seeks to provide understanding of how and why the transition from Communism has been so daunting for so many. Whereas I found the latter became repetitive, and ultimately too long, I would have happily read another 100 pages of this one.
Five stars.
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