Such are a few of the highlights in this narrative of a decade in Robert Payne’s life. Eyewitness recalls much more, however: refugee-filled Paris, Switzerland and Barcelona; German, Austrian, French and Russian Jewish emigrees; novelists, poets, playwrights, artists - a dazzling panorama of people and events that affected (and, in some cases, still affect) the lives of us all. Based on notes and diaries, Robert Payne has illuminated the march of civilization through eyewitness accounts of some of the most tumultuous events of the twentieth century.