Продолжение пособия по развитию навыков аудирования на материале языка СМИ. Включает 5 тем, каждая из которых рассчитана на 8-10 академических часов. Цель пособия - расширение лексического запаса и его систематизация, развитие и совершенствование умений а

The Diary is acclaimed writer Andrey Kurkov's first-hand account of the ongoing crisis in his country. From his flat in Kiev, just 500 yards from Independence Square, Kurkov can smell the burning barricades and hear the sounds of grenades and gunshot. Kur

The book includes unique testimonies of the terrible times of Soviet collectivization and the famine in Ukraine.

Mark Galeotti is the go-to expert on organized crime in Russia, consulted by governments and police around the world. Now, Western readers can explore the fascinating history of the vory v zakone, a group that has survived and thrived amid the changes brought on by Stalinism, the Cold War, the Afghan War, and the end of the Soviet experiment. The vory-as the Russian mafia is also known-was born early in the twentieth century, largely in the Gulags and criminal camps, where they developed their unique culture. Identified by their signature tattoos, members abided by the thieves' code, a strict system that forbade all paid employment and cooperation with law enforcement and the state. Based on two decades of on-the-ground research, Galeotti's captivating study details the vory's journey to power from their early days to their adaptation to modern-day Russia's free-wheeling oligarchy and global opportunities beyond.

The Splendid and the Vile, Erik Larson shows, in cinematic detail, how Churchill taught the British people 'the art of being fearless.' It is a story of political brinkmanship, but it's also an intimate domestic drama, set against the backdrop of Churchill's prime-ministerial country home, Chequers; his wartime retreat, Ditchley, where he and his entourage go when the moon is brightest and the bombing threat is highest; and of course 10 Downing Street in London. Drawing on diaries, original archival documents, and once-secret intelligence reports -some released only recently - Larson provides a new lens on London's darkest year through the day-to-day experience of Churchill and his family: his wife, Clementine; their youngest daughter, Mary, who chafes against her parents' wartime protectiveness; their son, Randolph, and his beautiful, unhappy wife, Pamela; Pamela's illicit lover, a dashing American emissary; and the advisers in Churchill's 'Secret Circle,' to whom he turns in the hard

The Spanish flu conjured up the specter of the Black Death of 1348 and the Great Plague of 1665, at a time when medicine did not have the resources to contain and defeat this new enemy. Source and Archival Historian Catherine Arnold gives readers the firs

Mary Stuart's life was filled with unprecedented drama and controversy. Becoming Queen of Scots at the age of nine months and Queen of France at the age of sixteen, she ascended the throne, which was her birthright, at eighteen. As the head of one of the most troubled countries in Europe, torn apart by religious conflict and power struggles, Mary led armies to victory and defeat; she survived the murder of her second husband and married what was called his murderer. At twenty-five, she was held captive by another queen - Elizabeth Tudor, who signed Mary's death sentence after nineteen years of imprisonment. Renowned historian and biographer John Guy examines the maze of conspiracies that the Scottish lords wove to seize power and the efforts of Elizabeth's ministers to exclude Mary from the rightful heirs to the English throne. It offers completely new interpretations of a famous story that has inspired writers, poets, composers, artists and filmmakers for centuries. The book formed th

'Commentary on Antiquity' is the first book by Paola Volkova, written by her on the basis of her own course of lectures 'Bridge over the Abyss,' as if throwing a bridge from one era to another, connecting the arts of different times and peoples. A brilliant teacher and storyteller, with her books, lectures and simple conversations P. Volkova instilled in students and listeners a sense of beauty, trying to awaken their interest in beauty. This book invites us on a journey through the centuries. The pages show new connections between distant forms that do not lie on the surface: from Stonehenge to the Globe Theater, from Crete to pre-Hispanic bullfighting, from the European Mediterranean to 20th century conceptualism.

This is the extraordinary story of Spain, from early tribalism and Roman rule to the Moorish conquest, Spain's eighteenth-century revival under the Bourbons, the Peninsular War and revolution in Spanish America right up to the catastrophic civil war and F

Despite the Roman Empire's famous 500-year reign over Europe, parts of Africa and the Middle East, Italy does not have the same long national history as states such as France or England. Divided for much of its history, Italy's regions have been, at vario

The book by Suzanne Shattenberg, a professor of modern history and culture at the University of Bremen, is a political biography of Leonid Brezhnev, who held senior management positions in the USSR for 18 years (from 1964 to 1982). The author recreates Brezhnev's life from the moment of birth in the village of Kamenskoe in December 1906. The readers are offered the image of a politician who, in his work at the highest party and state posts, was genuinely driven by the interests of preserving peace and raising the standard of living of the Soviet people. His personal political experience played a significant role in this. Brezhnev appears not as a hero of jokes, not as a poster character in history, but as a living person. The book is based on publications and documents from the archives of Russia, Ukraine, Moldova, Kazakhstan, as well as many Western European countries.

In light of the current struggles in the Caucasus, the author reviews the wars of the 19th century, the struggles between the mountain tribes of the Northern Caucasus under the leadership of Imam Shamil and the forces of Tsarist Russia.

Книга известного военного историка и писателя А.В.Шишова посвящена военным конфликтам XX века, от Англо-бурской войны 1899-1902 годов до чеченского конфликта в Российской Федерации в 1991-2006 годах. Рассказывается обо всех значительных межгосударственных конфликтах (так называемых локальных войнах) минувшего столетия, о гражданских войнах, национально-освободительных движениях, мятежах, переворотах и религиозно-этнических столкновениях в различных странах мира, в колониальных и полуколониальных владениях. Кроме того, в книгу включены краткие очерки о ходе и последствиях Первой и Второй мировых войн. Они позволяют понять истоки и тайные пружины многих военно-политических событий, происходивших на планете как в 1919-1939 годах, так и после 1945 года. Человеческая цивилизация, подчеркивает автор, последние шесть десятилетий постоянно оказывается перед угрозой нового большого пожара, который может быть и не локализован. Остается надеяться лишь на благоразумие мирового сообщества.

Rasputin - a simple monk from Siberia or the devil? The scandal surrounding him and the Tsar's family only further undermined the final years of Imperial Russia.

Dmitry Sergeevich Likhachev is a man whose name is known all over the world. An outstanding connoisseur of Russian and world culture, elected an honorary member of many foreign academies, a deep thinker and public figure. The book 'How We Survived' includ

The author of the book-album Joanna Stingray is an American singer, actress, music producer and public figure, one of the most significant persons and popularizers of Soviet and post-Soviet rock culture in the West.