They travel endlessly and seem to appear almost everywhere, yet they are the world's most mysterious people: Gypsies. Isabel Fonseca has done the impossible, entering into their world, living and traveling with Gypsies during several long trips to Eastern Europe, and she has brought back an insightful, highly personal, and very readable account of who the Gypsies are and how they live. The Gypsies have a legendary aversion to "gadje," or outsiders, but Fonseca has lifted the curtain and written gracefully about their lives on the edge of society.


From Publishers Weekly
An exploration of the frequently persecuted and misunderstood Gypsy population of eastern Europe. Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
Traveling as a journalist, Fonseca stayed with a number of Gypsy families in Eastern Europe between 1991 and 1995. Through her experiences with them, study of the scholarship about them, and interviews with leading figures, she has produced a contemporary account of their status, incorporating details of their society, culture, and history. Her work portrays their commitment to tribal traditions and adherence to ritual and offers good insights, particularly into women's lives. The author regards Gypsies as "an ancient scapegoat" who survive through their traditions and a collective denial of their mistreatment by outsiders, including the Germans during World War II. The author details the discrimination that has kept the Gypsies, now often called Roma, from development of an identity and acceptance by the international community. Fonseca's work will appeal to both interested lay readers and scholars in the field. It belongs in subject collections.Rena Fowler, Humboldt State Univ., Arcata, Cal.Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.


The New York Times Book Review, Annette Kobak
. . . admirably musters difficult material into a story of vividly sketched individuals and enlightening ideas.


From Book News, Inc.
A remarkable, candid and unromanticized account of the Gypsies--or Roma--by Fonseca, who lived and traveled with the Gypsies of Bulgaria, Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, the former Yugoslavia, Romania, and Albania. Includes b&w photographs. Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or.


Book Description
Isabel Fonseca describes the four years she spent with Gypsies from Albania to Poland, listening to their stories, deciphering their taboos, and befriending their matriarchs, activists, and child prostitutes. A masterful work of personal reportage, this volume is also a vibrant portrait of a mysterious people and an essential document of a disappearing culture. 50 photos.


From the Inside Flap
Isabel Fonseca describes the four years she spent with Gypsies from Albania to Poland, listening to their stories, deciphering their taboos, and befriending their matriarchs, activists, and child prostitutes. A masterful work of personal reportage, this volume is also a vibrant portrait of a mysterious people and an essential document of a disappearing culture. 50 photos.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

After the revolutions of 1989, Isabel Fonseca lived and traveled with the Gypsies of Bulgaria, Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, the former Yugoslavia, Romainia, and Albania - listening to their stories and recording their attempts to become something more than despised outsiders. In Bury Me Standing, alongside unforgettable portraits of individuals - the poet, the politician, the child prostitute - are vivid insights into the wit, language, wisdom, and taboos of the Roma. In a compelling narrative account of this large and landless minority, Fonseca also traces their long-ago exodus out of India and their history of relentless persecution: enslaved by the princes of medieval Romania; massacred by the Nazis in what the Roma call "the Devouring"; forcibly assimilated by the communist regime; and, most recently, evicted from their settlements by nationalistic mobs in the new "democracies" of the East, and under violent attack in the Western countries to which many have fled.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

An exploration of the frequently persecuted and misunderstood Gypsy population of eastern Europe. (Oct.)

Library Journal

Traveling as a journalist, Fonseca stayed with a number of Gypsy families in Eastern Europe between 1991 and 1995. Through her experiences with them, study of the scholarship about them, and interviews with leading figures, she has produced a contemporary account of their status, incorporating details of their society, culture, and history. Her work portrays their commitment to tribal traditions and adherence to ritual and offers good insights, particularly into women's lives. The author regards Gypsies as "an ancient scapegoat" who survive through their traditions and a collective denial of their mistreatment by outsiders, including the Germans during World War II. The author details the discrimination that has kept the Gypsies, now often called Roma, from development of an identity and acceptance by the international community. Fonseca's work will appeal to both interested lay readers and scholars in the field. It belongs in subject collections.-Rena Fowler, Humboldt State Univ., Arcata, Cal.

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